Is there an official record of deaths in the UK?
Posted by C-i-d@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 30 comments
A group of friends including my wife and myself found out in a tangential way that someone we all went to university with died a few years ago. We've been trying to find out how and why - he'd have been in his early 40s when he died - and I assumed there'd be some record of deaths and limited, but publicly available, information.
Is that not the case? I've tried to find information but people keep saying go to paid resources, and it just surprises me that when we die there isn't some public record.
I apologise if this is any way insensitive.
olivetree13@reddit
I believe you would have to pay to access the record via the General Register Office but you would need to provide sufficient information.
grepusman@reddit
Just the name, gender, and year of death.
IdioticMutterings@reddit
That is going to have hundreds of matches, if not thousands, unless it is a really uncommon name.
Educational-Newt2213@reddit
Not if you have the year of death - likelihood will be only a handful of same names within a year, if that.
huskydaisy@reddit
Should be fine unless it's a really common name. e.g. there were 253 John Smiths in 2024 (including Smiths with a first or middle name of John).
But even then you can whittle down a lot if you know anything else like middle names, quarter, area of registration, year of birth, etc.
TopBookChat1105@reddit
You think hundreds of thousands of people with the same name die in the same year?
There isn’t even hundreds of thousands of living people with the same name.
ElvishMystical@reddit
You need the GRO which will have all the statistics. Keep in mind that this is generally good when the cause of death is clear or non-preventable. If cause of death isn't clear then there has to be an inquest and a coroner involved and this can take some time.
I've just had a local acquaintance die in her flat about three weeks ago. She was found some three days later and nobody knows why she died. So it's going to be some time before we know because there has to be an inquest.
So you might need to expand the time frame you're searching in case there was an inquest.
Liam_021996@reddit
Yeah, the process is quite long and also quite unpleasant to go through if you're family. My son died suddenly in his sleep when he was 6 weeks old and from him dying to being able to have a funeral took a month due to them having to do a full post mortem. It was then another 8 months until we had an inquest which lead to a unacertained cause of death. So still all these years later we don't really know why he died
Timely_Egg_6827@reddit
You can ask the university. They sometimes track alumini. Though they told my partner's friend he was dead when he wasn't.
Flashy_Knowledge_948@reddit
Did the university then hire a hit man, in the interests of accurate record-keeping?
Timely_Egg_6827@reddit
No, just got confused between his and his Dad's obituary.
I_want_roti@reddit
They are public record but you have to pay a (relatively modest) fee.
egidione@reddit
No there is no fee unless you want a certificate, or at least there wasn’t a few months ago as I looked someone up.
grepusman@reddit
Without the certificate, you won't know how they died. All you can do for free is search, so that you can order the certificate.
BillWilberforce@reddit
Even the certificate won't tell you exactly how they died. HIV for instance is often pneumonia, as you don't actually die of HIV, you just have a weakened immune system that towards the end would let you die of virtually any disease.
It's not going to say fell of a 6 storey building whilst drunk.
Short-Shopping3197@reddit
Be aware that the UK is a big place. You’ll be surprised how many people with the same name die each year even if you think the name is quite uncommon. Helps to know where their death might have been registered and a date range that isn’t too big.
ambergriswoldo@reddit
I’m guessing you’ve tried searching his name on Facebook - I’ve previously found out about the death of an old friend when searching their name on Facebook and a public post regarding the death from someone they knew showed up in the search results
C-i-d@reddit (OP)
I'm not personally on Facebook but that's how one of us found out he'd died, from people saying a few years later 'miss you bro' and all that on his page or as comments or however it works.
ambergriswoldo@reddit
I’d just message one of the people that have commented that and ask “Hi, I’m really sorry for the out of the blue message but I was a friend of x at x uni - I was searching for old friends on Facebook and have just come across some posts which have made me worry something happened to him. We’d lost touch over the years but I have some great memories of our time together - I’m so sorry to ask but can you let me know what’s happened or if there’s someone else I could contact to ask? I’d like to be able to pay my respects”
OnlymyOP@reddit
Have you tried to look any obituaries in his local area, it maybe you can find the information there.
Your next and only other resource will be the GRO where you can search for the death certificate for free, but you would need to pay for a copy of the death certificate to find the registered cause of death.
Dolamed@reddit
Is there a particular reason you want to know the how & why?
ColumbosHairyFarter@reddit
There's this thing called closure, maybe Google it
Popular-Custard8519@reddit
Could you not reach out to a family member though, perhaps there’s s reading they haven’t shared the reason. They msg feel they’re protecting his dignity or perhaps he was a private person. It’s ratelg the case these things are held back lightly. If it was unexpected and within the last year they may not know themselves yet. My dad passed in February and we were told the histology could take upto 20w to complete. We are yet to have his funeral.
ColumbosHairyFarter@reddit
Not reading all that but I'm happy for you though or sorry that happened
chez2202@reddit
There’s no need to be rude. Dolamed asked a valid question.
THXORY@reddit
You can order death certificates, marriage certificates, wills and birth certificates online.
https://www.gov.uk/order-copy-birth-death-marriage-certificate
There is a fee.
chez2202@reddit
You could check the death registry in the town he lived in. If you have his full name and know roughly when he died you could also check the local newspaper for an obituary. If he died in an accident it might even have been reported in the local newspaper which will also be accessible online.
SarahL1990@reddit
You only have to pay if you want to order the certificate. You can search the details and if it brings up a match it would confirm that he died
If you wanted to know the exact cause or date you would need to order the certificate.
grepusman@reddit
You can get it from the General Register Office (GRO.gov.uk). At this moment, they only have up until 2024 available. The certificate can be ordered for £12.50.
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