Genealogy Chat

Hi I wonder if someone could help me please, is there a simple way of finding out how many children someone had and their names? I am new to genealogy and the only way I can think of is to look through census information. I have looked at one census and found several children for my great nan but my mum says there is a child missing (could it be this child was not born then?). This was the 1911 census so how do I find out who lived after 1911? Any help would be most grateful.

use /www.freebmd.org.uk

search the births using the correct registration district and put in the mothers maiden name. This will bring up any possible births in that area.
The mothers maiden name is only recorded on the searches after 1911, before that, the results do not show the mother, so unless it was a very unusual surname, you would not know which were yours.
You can then try the death search to see if any child you found died.

Some counties have an opc (online parish clerk) and the volunteers are transcribing the records. Lancashire for instance has an excellent one where the mothers maiden names and the spouses and churches are transcribed from much earlier that the freebmd ones. Just google your county followed by opc to see if there is a scheme where you need it

If you have the original image from the 1911 census, it tells you on the page how many children the woman has and how many are still living (the transcription does not give this information)

A new facility on Ancestry makes searching for births much easier.
They can be searched 1915 to 2005 by child's name / surname.

Gwyn

Thanks everyone you have all been so helpful.

I will put your ideas into practice.