Births, Marriages & Deaths

Civil Registration

Government recording of births, marriages and deaths in Australia is done at state or territory level. In the Northern Territory this official recording, known as civil registration, began on 24 August 1870.
Some of our indexes include dates earlier than 1870 and this is because the information has been gathered from other sources such as church records.

Indexes

We hold the following indexes to births, marriages and deaths in the Northern Territory in the Genealogy Centre on the 1st floor:

Ordering Certificates

Northern Territory Department of Justice
Certificates should be ordered from the Northern Territory Department of the Attorney-General and Justice. See their website for details of costs and how to apply.

What information will I find?

Australian birth, marriage and death certificates can contain lots of useful information for the family historian. Death certificates, in particular, can be very informative and often contain the names of children and the length of time spent in Australia. For a detailed breakdown of information recorded on Australian certificates, see our guide
Information found on certificates for Australian States, New Zealand and the British Isles

Early Records

You need to be aware that many states and territories, including the Northern Territory, were formerly part of other states. You will need to check the records for these other states for the following dates:

• 1856-1863 see New South Wales - Births, Marriages & Deaths
• 1863-1870 see South Australia - Births, Marriages & Deaths

Other Sources

Other useful sources of information include indexes to newspaper notices and entries in government gazettes. To find these try searching our online catalogue using these keywords + northern territory:

• baptismal records
• church records
• death notices
• marriage records
• registers of births

Related Pages

See these pages for other information related to Northern Territory births, marriages and deaths:

• Cemeteries
• Newspapers
• Probate