Genealogy Chat

Can anybody please offer me any ideas as to why someone would have two children, a year apart, but not register either of them.

Their mother married in 1928 when they were 5 and 4 and they were finally registered in 1929, but in their mothers maiden name.

That suggests to me that the husband was not the father.

Were they registered perhaps with their father's surname, even though parents may not have been married.

Are you able to give names, ...or pm them if you wish, if they are still living.

Gwyn

I would agree with you MS, and I would suggest that both girls were illigitimate, but why they were not registered is puzzling me.

I can only speculate: but perhaps if the same man fathered both children, he was around for a while after their births, and was not keen to be identified as father, and brought pressure to bear on the mother not to register the births.

Time having passed, he presumably quit the scene - a husband appeared, and the matter was regularised; but without the father being present, the births would have been registered in the name of the mother, alone. I expect that giving her maiden name suited both husband and wife.

Perhaps ...

Oh MS, to be able to just pop back and view a scene from history!!!!

Kathlyn

My mum was one of 13 children born in the 20s and 30s none of whom were ever registered. Perhaps it cost too much ??

You have a point there Shannette and I can just imagine how difficult that could be for us researchers.

I am sure that all these long dead rellies are sitting on clouds laughing at us lot down here pulling our hair out.

Joan,

There were two sorts of certs available...the long version and the short one. The short one being the cheapest.

Have you got either of the birth certificates for the girls who were registered late.?
It would be interesting to know the actual date of registration.
Perhaps they needed documentation to start school?

As the mother had fairly recently married, that seems significant....not sure why though.

This is a puzzler.....

Gwyn

As far as I can tell the only one of my mother's siblings who had a birth cert was one who was killed in WW2 and they got that when he died for some reason.

Joan, it always was a legal requirement from 1837 onwards to register births, the onus originally was on the registrar to collect the births, then in 1875 it became the parents responsibility to register, with a fine if failed to do so.

I read somewhere (maybe one of those Family Tree magazines) of a chap who did some research on registrations. He compared baptisms in an area with registered births. He found quite a few gaps - I think there was a 20% or so "shortfall". In a large town I can understand this as there may have been a lot of movement but I recall that the area he was checking was not that large a place.

He researched past the 1875 period and still found gaps. He concluded that where one child in a family was not registered quite often the other children in the family would not be registered either.

I have never been able to find my grandfather's details - or any of his 5 siblings (born between 1876 and 1894) and am coming to the conclusion that none of them were registered.

Difficult to see how they could have enforced the non-registration. If parents did not register (for whatever reason) then who would know? Problems would only arise when applying for a pension or whatever and state pensions were not around in the late 19th century so maybe people saw no reason to register their children. If they'd been baptised perhaps they thought that was enough.

Interesting topic though.

Jill

Jill
That's interesting re non registration.

Would employers need proof of age?

I wonder this because I have a copy of a 1888 birth certificate which was altered after statutory declaration by the parents in September 1901..... perhaps at school leaving?
They declared that the registered 'Girl ' was a boy.

Gwyn

That's an odd one Gwyn ... wonder what that was about.

I wonder when it became popular to produce birth certificates when applying for jobs.

I will see if I can find the article - but it may not be until the weekend before I can have a proper search.

Jill

A Yorkshireman.

Some interesting points are raised here in this exchange of views.
1- My late father was born in 1917 and was registered 39 day later and issued with the small certificate( that I now have). Issued free I believe at registeration.
2- In February 1937 A full certificate was obtained at the Special price of 6d Applicable in Certain Statutory Cases. It is A Certified Copy of an Entry of Birth. This may have been as a result of Statutory Registeration for any forthcoming call up. Hence the special deal. He was called up in 1939 and he luckily survived the fighting.
3- The next is a question, if you did not survive and was killed or missing in action with nothing to recover,
Was the family issued with the normal Death Certificate or did the MOD just inform the family via a Telegram and that was it! Was this suffice for widows pensions, insurance etc.
4- Was it a case of no birth registeration, no callup, no pension, no NHS number etc. You did not exist.

Yorkie