How to access wills

England and Wales

Wills and Administrations until 1858

The National Archives has the records of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, which cover mainly the southern half of the country. Digital images of wills are available from DocumentsOnline - you can search for your ancestor’s will and then download it for a charge of £3.50 per will.

The records of the Prerogative Court of York are held at the Borthwick Institute of the University of York.

The records of the minor Probate Courts are deposited in county record offices or other local archives. As the courts of Canterbury and York only dealt with the wills of the very wealthy, most people are more likely to find information about an ancestor from one of the minor probate courts. Information about records held locally can be found at the Familia website. Some of these records are also described in the A2A (Access to Archives) database and may be found via a personal or place name search.

The National Library of Wales holds the original Welsh probates up to 1858.

Wills from 1858

You can find information on wills where probate was granted later than 1 January 1858 at the Courts Service website. They have a section on Probate Records and Family History. Copies of the index to wills from 1858 to 1943 are available on microfiche at The National Archives. The National Library of Wales holds volumes of copy wills after 1858, up to 1940.

Scotland

The National Archives of Scotland holds wills from the 16th century to 1991. They have a useful factsheet on their website entitled Wills and Testaments.

From the 16th century up to 1901 you can search for your ancestor’s will on ScotlandsPeople - the Scottish government’ genealogical site. You can pay £5 to download your ancestor’s will, which will be a digitised, colour image of the original. SCAN has lots of examples of wills to whet your appetite, from the periods 1514 to 1901. They also have a very good handwriting guide.

Ireland

Wills and Administrations until 1858

Wills proved prior to 1858 were destroyed in a fire at the Record Office in Dublin in 1922. However, there are bound, printed and manuscript indexes to the pre-1858 diocesan wills, administrations and administration bonds, as well indexes to many of the prerogative wills (Vicar’s Index to Prerogative Wills, 1536-1810) that have survived. Copies of these indexes are available on the shelves in the Public Search Room at The Public Record Office of Northern Ireland (PRONI).

Although the official wills and administrations prior to 1858 were destroyed in 1922, copies can often be found in other records, for example, in private collections or in solicitors’ records. These can be traced using the pre-1858 Wills Card Index (now also available as a computerised print out) located in the Public Search Room at PRONI. In addition, small family trees compiled from almost all pre-1858 prerogative wills are to be found in the Burke collection (T/559). A typescript index is included in the T/559 catalogue. All these wills can be ordered in the normal way via the computer ordering system at PRONI. For more information see the PRONI (Public Record Office of Northern Ireland).

For information on wills proved in the Republic of Ireland see the National Archives of Ireland.

Wills from 1858-1900

All the original wills and letters of administrations from 1858 to 1900 were among the records destroyed in the fire at the Public Record Office in Dublin.

Luckily, before wills were sent to Dublin, the District Registries copied most of the information into large volumes, known as “copy will books” and these have survived. The copy will books for Armagh, Belfast and Londonderry District Registries, covering the years 1858 to c.1900, have been microfilmed by PRONI (MIC/15C) and are available in the Self Service Microfilm Room. For more information see the PRONI (Public Record Office of Northern Ireland).

For information on wills proved in the Republic of Ireland see the National Archives of Ireland.

Wills from 1900

PRONI holds all original wills and letters of administration granted in the six counties that make up Northern Ireland from 1900 onwards. For more information see the PRONI (Public Record Office of Northern Ireland).

For information on wills proved in the Republic of Ireland see the National Archives of Ireland.

India and related countries

You can find wills and related records for British India and related countries (Burma, Malacca, St Helena, Penang, Singapore, Sumatra) 1618-1948 in the India Office Records which form part of the Oriental and India Office collections held at the British Library.