Hi All,

I wonder if anyone state side has any concrete advice on the following problem.

My wife is currently in the process of trying to obtain a passport but there seems to be 2 problems. Firstly she is a US citizen who was born in England, and more recently had her bag stolen with her drivers licence in it.... the full story as follows!

She was born in Surrey England (on a RAF base) so has an English birth certificate but is a US citizen (her parents are both US citizens). Her family departed England when she was 6 years old, and she has been in the US since.

My wife has moved to different states over the years, her mothers family are in the Florida area, she is currently in Illinois (since January) and recently had her bag stolen with her Florida issued drivers licence.

She knows about having to obtain a birth abroad certificate, but replacing any id requires photo id or US birth certificate, and it seems like a circle where one requires the other. Her relationship with her parents isn't great, she does have access to her mothers birth certificate, and marriage licence but that is all she will have. Her original passport was destroyed years ago in a house fire. My main question is, what other documents can she potential source to try and get the ball rolling... it seems for the birth abroad photo id is required and for photo id, a US birth certificate is required.....

There must be a way around it but all the websites I've looked at seem to be leading to a dead end.

Kind Regards,
Mike

You forgot to mention that her FL DL is not valid in IL anymore:>(

Has she contacted FL DMV about a replacement of her FL DL? It looks like she will have to deal with her parents to obtain the required documents. Secondary Evidence of U.S. Citizenship

Yes the parent angle isn't going to happen - marrying an English guy with the reality of trying to move to the UK! Fun... I'm going to be back in Chicago next week, so I'll make some phone calls, and ask the questions. I just see everything leading to a dead end. Once she had a passport and a birth abroad but they are long gone. And replacing the Florida licence I guess would be easy if she still lived in Florida, out of state reading the Illinois site, looks like birth certificate would be needed if no existing photo id available.

So she never had a birth abroad birth certificate? How did she obtain a US passport in the first place? If she had a birth abroad certificate she can obtain a copy from DC of that without an actual photo id, if she has a copy of one or has her very original passport information, the first US passport she got.

Sorry I just re-read your post, the certificate itself may be "long gone' but it's still on file with the Department of State. They have a phone number and from my experience they've been very helpful. They have a vital statistics department that handles the birth abroads.

Thanks for you reply, I have passed the information on, when I looked at the Birth abroad info on the website it stated valid id, i just presumed it meant photo id.