Montana, County Marriages - FamilySearch Historical Records

United States Montana

What is in the Collection?
This collection consists of marriage licenses and certificates, including a few marriage declarations and marriage stubs for the years 1865 to 1950.

The records are arranged by county, then by volume and year range. The form type varies between register style and certificate style. County clerks usually used the same printed form during the same time periods. Marriage records were generally well preserved, although fires, floods, or other disasters may have destroyed some records.

Collection Content
The earliest marriage bonds and licenses were usually handwritten on loose papers that were later bound into lettered volumes. Some marriage records had multiple entries on each page, while others had single records per page.

Marriages were recorded by the clerk of the district court for each county from the time the county was formed. Persons desiring to marry obtained a license that they presented to the minister or other person authorized to marry, such as a justice of the peace. Once the marriage was performed, the officiator sent a return to the clerk confirming that the marriage had occurred. Montana does not have a centralized registration of marriage records.

A copy or an extract of most original records can be purchased from the Montana Vital Records State Department of Health or the county clerk’s office of the county where the event occurred.

The State Department of Health has an index to marriages beginning in 1943. This index helps to identify the county in which the marriage occurred. The original records are available only in the county.

Civil marriage records were created to legalize marital relationships and to protect the interests of the wife and other heirs to legal claims on property. The marriage date, place, residence of the bride and groom, and occupations are relatively reliable. Other information, such as age or birthplace, is dependent on the knowledge, memory, and accuracy of the informants, usually the bride and groom.

Coverage Table and Map
A coverage table for this collection is available in the wiki article Montana County Marriages Coverage Table (FamilySearch Historical Records).

To see a coverage map of FamilySearch's holdings of Montana marriages, click here.

What Can this Collection Tell Me?
Information found in these marriage records usually includes:


 * Date and place of marriage
 * Groom's name, age, race and residence
 * Groom's birth place
 * Groom's parents' names including maiden name of mother
 * Bride's name, age, race and residence
 * Bride's birth place
 * Bride's parents' names including maiden name of mother
 * Names of witnesses
 * Name of the officiator at marriage ceremony

How Do I Search the Collection?
To begin your search it is helpful to know:
 * The name of your ancestor.
 * The approximate date of the marriage.
 * The place where the marriage occurred.
 * The name of the intended spouse.

Search by Name by visiting the Collection Page: Fill in the requested information on the initial search page. This search will return a list of possible matches. Compare the information about the individuals in the list to what you already know about your ancestors to determine if this is the correct family or person. Keep in mind:


 * There may be more than one person in the records with the same name.
 * You may not be sure of your own ancestor’s name.
 * Your ancestor may have used different names, or variations of their name, throughout their life.
 * If your ancestor used an alias or a nickname, be sure to check for those alternate names.
 * Even though these indexes are very accurate they may still contain inaccuracies, such as altered spellings, misinterpretations, and optical character recognition errors if the information was scanned.

For tips about searching on-line collections see the on-line article FamilySearch Search Tips and Tricks.

What Do I Do Next?
When you have located your ancestor’s marriage record, carefully evaluate each piece of information given. These pieces of information may give you new biographical details that can lead you to other records about your ancestors. Add this new information to your records of each family.

I Found Who I was Looking for, What Now?

 * Use the marriage date and place as the basis for compiling a new family group or for verifying existing information.
 * Use the birth date or age along with the place of birth of each partner to find a couple's birth records and parents' names.
 * Use the birth date or age along with the place of birth to find the family in census records.
 * Use the residence and names of the parents to locate church and land records.
 * Use the parent’s birth places to find former residences and to establish a migration pattern for the family.
 * The name of the officiator is a clue to their religion or area of residence in the county. However, ministers may have reported marriages performed in other counties.
 * Compile the marriage entries for every person who has the same surname as the bride or groom, this is especially helpful in rural areas or if the surname is unusual.

I Can't Find Who I'm Looking for, What Now?

 * Look for variant spellings of the names. You should also look for nicknames and abbreviated names.
 * Check for a different index. There are often indexes at the beginning of each volume.
 * Search the indexes and records of nearby counties.

Known Issues with This Collection
For a full list of all known issues associated with this collection see the attached article. If you encounter additional problems, please email them to [mailto:support@familysearch.org support@familysearch.org]. Please include the full path to the link and a description of the problem in your e-mail. Your assistance will help ensure that future reworks will be considered.

Citing This Collection
Citing your sources makes it easy for others to find and evaluate the records you used. When you copy information from a record, list where you found that information. Here you can find citations already created for the entire collection and for each individual record or image.

Collection Citation

Record Citation (or citation for the index entry): Image Citation: