Free 30 Day Trial - Ancestry.co.uk

I just had a 14 day free trial with Ancestry it was very good at finding my English relatives not so good at my Welsh and Irish. Try Jesus Christ of the Latterday Saints web site for free Genealogy information I found out a lot of information from them for nothing.
I hope this helps someone.

This one is quite good for English and Welsh ancestry: http://1837online.com/

It's not free but you can search the records for free and then pay in units to view the full record if it looks promising...minimum charge is £5 (90 day plan (50 units @ 10 pence)) Each time you view a birth, marriage or death index, one unit will be deducted from your account. Each time you view a census image or census transcription, three units will be deducted from your account. The charge allows you to view, print and save image pages. You must use all your units within 90 days of purchase.

If you are researching various families I find this an excellent site but never believe the transcripts always look at the original census.I found one where Newcastle (Upon Tyne)was in Northamptonshire yesterday. Free BMD is very good as is the IGI but always verify the info on them as they can be good starting points but can have mistypes etc . All information on these sites are put in by humans and we can all make mistakes! Local studies libraries usualy have copies of the BMD indexes and they are free to look at on microfiche.
It is also worth checking whether there is a GOON doing your family name...no not anything to do with Harry Seacombe but the Guild of One Name Studies they love to share their info with you and have most of the BMD references for their particular name from 1837 onwards plus as much information as they can collect from anyone with that name worldwide. I'm forever searching for GUSTARDs!
There is one warning though Genealogy is SERIOUSLY addictive and once you've caught it you infect friends at a rapid rate, you start reading credits at the end of films incase one of your names comes up and have to be dragged screaming past cemetries in case any of the gravestones belong to one of yours!

Hello
When you look up a referance you only get the registration district and referance numbers to order the certificate. You have to order the certificate to get the other details. On some marriage referances you will get a surname which you can then cross match with the spouses details ..same ref no etc to get a first name, not on the early ones though. If you know the parish they were from if you can get tothe local record office and know the year they married you can look that up in the parish registers for free. Even if they were not married there, the banns were probably called in the parish and can be checked this saves you having to buy the certificate.
Hope this helps if not ask me and I will do my best to help.

PS of course if the bride and groom were early money savers they will have both said they were from the same parish to save money having the banns called in 2 parishes!!!

Forgot to add the birth bit... you just get the childs name and on later ones the mothers maiden name

The mormons (LDS) also have libraries where you can go in to view their copies (on fiche) of parish registers/the IGI free. If they have not got them there they will order them for you. I believe they wrote to most parishes here and abroad to ask for permission to record the records it depended on the vicar/priest/minister/rabbi etc whether they have done the records .If it was a no they will not have anyone from that Parish. Records from abroad are somewhat of a mystery to me and their records are an excellent help My neighbour has Polish, Dutch German and Russian rellies for a start!!