There are several reasons why you might want to look up divorce records in Tennessee. Maybe you need to refer to the records for a legal matter, or perhaps you have a personal use for the knowledge. Depending on the date at which the divorce occurred, there can be a few different processes to obtaining divorce records.
According to the Tennessee Secretary of State, you can come to the Tennessee State Library and Archives at any time during normal business hours to search through records, and you are allowed to make copies as well. If you wish to find a record contained in the index, you must provide the Library and Archives with the date of the divorce within a five-year range, the names of the husband and wife and (optionally) the county where the divorce took place. The library’s index contains divorces between the years of 1969 and 1945.
There are other methods by which you can attempt to pull up divorce records if they are not available at the Library and Archives. By providing the specific court, county, date and names of the divorce, you can search the Inventories of Local Records on Microfilm or the Genealogical County Fact Sheets.
When you use this method, you will be given the court minutes of the case in question. It is a good idea to do some research beforehand so you have an idea of which court would have granted the divorce.
If you are looking for divorce records between 1796 and 1850, you must find the listing in the published Acts of Tennessee. The Library and Archives can copy up to three chapters for you.
This information is meant to inform you about obtaining divorce records and is not a form of legal advice.
