Birth Certificates, where do I find them?

Search for birth records in our databases

Search our baptisms records to find dates of birth

Contribute your birth certificate to Ancestry24 to get your records online faster for future generations.

Birth announcements are also published in the press and Ancestry24 aggregates many of these records. Below  is a list of handy databases that also provide dates of birth and parents names too.

Browse our birth records, Cullinan Mines Birth Records and Announcement records

• 1796 – 1803 British Chaplaincy Baptisms (675 records)
• Addington Christ Church Baptisms (3345 records)
• All Saint’s Namaqualand Baptisms (1444 records)
• All Saint’s Somerset West Baptisms (374 records)
• Baptism Records Mixed (4016 records)
• Beaufort West Wesleyan Baptisms (1120 records)
• Bredasdorp All Saints Baptisms 1861 – 1891 (1675 records)
• Graham’s Town Methodist Church Baptisms (3651 records)
• Graham’s Town Presbyterian Baptisms (1164 records)
• Lutheran Philippi Baptisms 1888 – 1940 (806 records)
• Methodist Baptisms (18420 records)
• Namaqualand Baptisms (907 records)
• Oudtshoorn Methodist Baptisms (361 records)
• Pilgrims Rest Methodist Baptisms (373 records)
• Port Elizabeth Methodist Baptisms (259 records)
• Queenstown Methodist Baptisms (3430 records)
• Somerset East Methodist Baptisms (379 records)
• St. Andrew’s Port Nolloth Baptisms 1874 – 1900 (764 records)
• St. Cyprians Baptisms Kimberley 1871 – 1968 (16645 records)
• St. Francis Simon’s Town Baptisms – 1813 – 1932 (4862 records)
• St. Francis Simon’s Town Baptisms Index 1921-1970 (6526 records)
• St. Georges Cathedral Military Baptisms 1806 – 1829 (1251 records)
• St. Georges Cathedral Cape Town Baptisms Index 1921 – 1970 (1967 records)
• St. Georges Cathedral Cape Town Baptisms 1849 – 1970 (5726 records)
• St. Georges Cathedral Grahams Town Baptisms 1823 – 1856 (800 records)
• St. George’s Simons Town Baptisms 1876 – 1964 (1598 records)
• St. John’s the Evangelist Cape Town Baptisms 1849 – 1886 (2571 records)
• St. John’s Anglican Church Clanwilliam Baptisms (2265 records)
• St. John’s Anglican Church Wynberg Baptisms 1832 – 1905 (3743 records)
• St. Mark’s District Six Baptisms 1877 – 1915 (8878 records)
• St. Mary’s Barkley West Baptisms (1389 records)
• St. Mary’s Port Elizabeth Baptisms (1392 records)
• St. Mary’s Potchefstroom Baptisms (442 records)
• St. Olav’s Durban Baptisms 1885 – 1979 (1066 records)
• St. Pauls Rondebosch Baptisms 1855 – 1952 (9009 records)
• St. Peter’s Mossel Bay Baptisms 1855 – 2007 (5017 records)
• St. Saviours Claremont Baptisms 1894 – 1910 (6687 records)
• Stutterheim Presbyterian Baptisms (223 records)
• Swellendam Baptisms 1849 – 1873 (600 records)
• Victoria West DRC Baptisms 1842 – 1864 (2532 records)
• Woodstock Presbyterian Baptisms 1916 – 1947 (415 records)
• Wynberg Methodist Baptisms 1836 – 1910 (1492 records)

Department of Home Affairs

• Department of Home Affairs which is the official holding office for Births records. Applications should be lodged at your nearest Home Affairs office if applying from within South Africa. If living abroad, you should contact the nearest South African Embassy, Consulate or High Commission. Always request a full, unabridged vault copy. There is no public access at all to the birth registers or indexes held at the Department of Home Affairs.
• For these certificates you will need to apply+ to the Department of Home Affairs, the official holding office for South African births, marriages and deaths. Applications should be lodged at your nearest Home Affairs office if applying from within South Africa. If living abroad, you should contact the nearest South African Embassy, Consulate or High Commission. Always request a full, unabridged vault copy. There is no public access at all to the birth, marriages and death registers or indexes held at the Department of Home Affairs. There is the index to the Home Affairs Western Cape registers.

When did Civil Registration begin for birth records in South Africa?

Birth certificates were introduced officially in the late 1800?s and was not compulsory until 1905: Cape: 1895 Natal: 1868 Transvaal: 1901 Orange Free State: 1903 Not everybody registered their child in the first month of birth. Some did it years later when they had more than one child to register. Additionally, not all our ancestors were law-abiding citizens and did not always conform. So do not expect to find a registration of birth for every person. For information dating back earlier, you have to consult baptism records, death notices or burial records. Birth dates were not included into baptism registers until around 1800 and in most instances it will say “date of birth unknown”. While the Department of Home Affairs in Pretoria is the official custodian of birth records, the general public may view these in the various provincial archival repositories. Access to the birth registers is closed for a period of 100 years to protect individuals.

• Below is a table for commencing dates for the registration of births in the various old provinces:
  

  PROVINCE	BIRTHS
  Cape	1895
  Natal	1868
  Transvaal	1901
  Orange Free State	1903

  When contacting the Department of Home Affairs:

  • Expect delays as they are very understaffed. Average waiting time is three months.
  • Take down the details of any official you deal with.
  • Supply an ID number for the person whose certificate you wish to obtain to speed up the process.
  • There is a charge of R45.00 per item.

  However very old birth certificates may be obtained through the National Archives.

  National Archives

  The National Archives is the custodian for birth certificates on behalf of the Department of Home Affairs up to the early 1970′s. Note that a CLOSED period of 100 years exists to all birth records to protect individuals.

  These indexes and registers are heavy and cumbersome. You will first need to know exactly which magisterial district the event took place before you can request the index. These indexes are not made available electronically, but the Western Cape indexes can be searched on Ancestry24. The Home Affairs Western Cape Index (HAWC) is housed in the Cape Town Archives as are the Home Affairs Eastern (HAEC) and Home Affairs Northern Cape (HANC).

  How to search at the Archives for Birth Certificates

  As an example, if someone was born in Cape Town you will need to check places like Cape Town Central, Wynberg, Docks, Green Point, See Point, Woodstock, Observatory etc – all separate registers. To find the birth certificate of an individual you will need to first consult the index to the birth in the area in which it was registered, e.g. Worcester. The earliest reference number begins with 1/3/57/4/1 – which covers 1895 to June 1905.

  Once you have got the register 1/3/57/4/1 you will need to look for the dates between 1895 – 1905 for that birth registration. There are two volumes of birth registers that apply for this period being 1/3/57/3/1 to 1/3/57/3/2. The first volume covers January 1895 to June 1899 and the second one June 1899 until January 1905.

  The size of the initial index will depend on how many volumes of registers there are for each area. Worcester has 62 Birth registers equaling about 4 years per book until 1933 and then one book per year thereafter.

  Some of these books are very large and the pages are difficult to photograph because of the size. They are on the top floor of the archives. First make sure you get your volume numbers correct before you attempt to order any of these books. Once ordered, be prepared for a very long wait.

  • Expect delays as they are very understaffed. Average waiting time is three months.
  • Take down the details of any official you deal with.
  • Supply an ID number for the person whose certificate you wish to obtain to speed up the process.
  • There is a charge of R45.00 per item.