Genealogy Chat

Hi, I am looking for a birth certificate for someone born in N. Ireland in 1889. She emmigrated to New Zealand in 1923 without her husband, so I assume she had her own passport. My question is does this mean she would have had to have a regisitered birth in N, Ireland in order to get a passport, or is there some other documentatlon that the government would accept. I have been looking for a birth certificate and someone suggested she might not have been registered. Thank you.

Read this;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_passport

The Irish Free State (as the state was known between 1922 and 1937) first notified the Government of the United Kingdom that it proposed to issue its own passports in 1923.[5] The Irish initially proposed that the description they would give their citizens in their passports would be "Citizen of the Irish Free State".[6] The British Government objected to this. It insisted that the appropriate description was "British subject", because, inter alia, the Irish Free State was part of the British Commonwealth of Nations. The Government of the Irish Free State considered the British viewpoint. The Governor-General of the Irish Free State subsequently informed the British Government that the description that would generally (there were some exceptions) be used would be "Citizen of the Irish Free State and of the British Commonwealth of Nations".[7] Without reaching agreement, the Irish issued their first passports in March 1924, using this description.

I do know that in England and Wales,even today,you can get a passport without a birth cert.

http://www.ips.gov.uk/cps/files/ips/live/assets/documents/Birth_Certificates__FBC_Policy_TO_PUBLISH.pdf

Where an applicant is unable to provide a birth certificate and there is a plausible explanation, discretion may be used in accepting other documents providing birth details. This discretion should be exercised carefully and account taken on the overall 'feeling' of the application. Acceptable documents for this purpose may be:
• a baptismal certificate (provided the baptism took place in early childhood)
• a letter from the applicant's doctor at the time of birth or the first/primary school attended, which provides confirmation of identity; AND,
• a letter from the General Register Office stating there is no trace of the birth having been registered together with evidence that the birth was likely to be in the United Kingdom.
The principle aim is for the applicant to produce some document as near as possible to the date of birth indicating that birth was likely to have been in the United Kingdom.

What's her name and who did she marry?

They may have accepted a baptismal cert

thanks for the info. We haven't been able to find her baptismal cert either, but we know she was Presbyterian, and was baptized in 1890. Maura, I have posted the info on 'Need to find" under her name, Frances Hunt Williams Shields. Her parents were Margaret Dugan and Daniel Shields. Here older sister Ellen shows up in the 1881 Census with her parents in Scotland. The family moved between the two places, but Frances always insisted she was born and raised in Ireland, and we have no reason to doubt her. Her parents were married in Ahoghill First Presybetrian Church, Antrim. She married Thomas Dugan - her first cousin, in Scotland.
Thanks for your interest, I really appreciate any help I can get here. I have paid for two gov. searches of her birth certificate under Bellymena,, but they came up empty.

Parents marriage info.
Again, I don't want to mislead anyone, this is on the thread in Looking for under her name Frances Hunt Williams Shields. Her marriager cert says she was born in Bellymena Ireland. Her death cert says she was born in Scotland, same place as she married exactly - this appears to be a clerical error! (just to add to the confusion.) This is her parents marriage cert.
Frances had sisters, Ellen, Etta and Elieen that we know of.

Margaret Dugan
Daniel Shields

Ireland, Civil Registration Indexes, 1845-1958
residence: Ballymena
marriage: 1877 — Ballymena

record title: Ireland, Civil Registration Indexes, 1845-1958
name: Daniel Shields
registration district: Ballymena
event type: MARRIAGES
registration quarter and year: 1877
volume number: 16
page number: 147
digital folder number: 4179386

Found births for Elizabeth 7th March 1880 Ahoghill, Ellen 10th Sept 1878 Ahoghill

Daniel Shields married Margaret Dugan 29th Nov 1877 Ahoghill First Presbyterian Church, Daniel father Robert, Margaret father's Mark.

By any chance was Frances called Fanny

Residents of a house 42 in Riverside (Antrim Urban, Antrim)1901
Show all information
Surname Forename Age Sex Relation to head Religion Birthplace Occupation Literacy Irish Language Marital Status Specified Illnesses
Sheilds Ellen 21 Female Daughter Church of Ireland Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Not Married -
Sheilds Mary Jane 17 Female Daughter Church of Ireland Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Not Married -
Sheilds Fanny 14 Female Daughter Church of Ireland Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Not Married -
Sheilds Maggie 12 Female Daughter Church of Ireland Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Not Married -
Sheilds Margaret 42 Female Head of Family Church of Ireland Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Widow -
Sheilds John 7 Male Son Church of Ireland Co Antrim Scholar Read and write - Not Married -
Sheilds James 10 Male Son Church of Ireland

Residents of a house 7 in Abbey Gardens (White Abbey, Antrim)1911
Show all information
Surname Forename Age Sex Relation to head Religion Birthplace Occupation Literacy Irish Language Marital Status Specified Illnesses Years Married Children Born Children Living
Shields Margaret 54 Female Head of Family Presbyterian Co Antrim - Read and write - Widow - 31 9 7
Shields Fanny 24 Female Daughter Presbyterian Co Antrim Linen Weaver Read and write - Single - - - -
Shields Margaret 22 Female Daughter Presbyterian Co Antrim Linen Drawer Read and write - Single - - - -
Shields James 19 Male Son Presbyterian Co Antrim General Labourer Read and write - Single - - - -
Shields John 17 Male Son Presbyterian Co Antrim General Labourer Read and write

Mary Jane Shields married a George Campbell 4th Jan 1909 Whitehouse Presbyterian Church, Carnmoney Her father's a Daniel, his fathers a Charles.

White Abbey come under Carmoney

Yes, this is great, in further consulation with the family more facts have emerged.... (hard to get info out of elderly people without providing something to 'hang their memories on.')
Yes, this is the family, I had some wrong syblings. James, apparently was killed in a mining accident. There is a Campbell - Charlie, who is now supposed to be the son of George and Mary Jane. Daniel (father) died young, so that goes with the widow idea. Frances did go by Fanny as well. So, this looks like a match. Fanny's age is two years out, but that isn't a big deal or is it? I am pretty new to this. Also, am I reading it right, "years married" = 31 that matches her marriage date, does that mean she was just widowed, or is it just years since marriage took place regardless of when husband died? Also, she had nine children, and seven of them are still living at this time? (Elizabeth 1880 could be one of the dead ones.) And we are missing one from the 1901 census, or she had it later?
Also Ellen Shields married a Woods.
Frances birthdate is 26 July 1889.
In her Bible it says she was baptised on 20 July 1890.
Frances and her son John Dugan (also Dougan) sailed for New Zealand aboard the Dorset, departing 6 Sept 1923 from Dorset. Frances husband Thomas had gone on ahead a year eariler.

No it not a big deal about Frances age being a couple years out. As for Margaret being a widow, if you look at the original image it has been scored out, it could be 24 which would tally with her marriage and him dying just before 1901 census.

Ellen Shields married John Woods 13th July 1901 Muckamore Presbyterian Church Co Antrim

Residents of a house 66 in Riverside Street (Antrim Urban, Antrim)1911
Show all information
Surname Forename Age Sex Relation to head Religion Birthplace Occupation Literacy Irish Language Marital Status Specified Illnesses Years Married Children Born Children Living
Woods John 32 Male Head of Family Presbyterian Co Antrim Yarn Dresser Read and write - Married - - - -
Woods Ellen 32 Female Wife Presbyterian Co Antrim - Read and write - Married - 9 6 6
Woods Maggie 8 Female Daughter Presbyterian Co Antrim Scholar Read and write - Single - - - -
Woods Mary 6 Female Daughter Presbyterian Co Antrim Scholar Read and write - Single - - - -
Woods Robert 6 Male Son Presbyterian Co Antrim Scholar Read and write - Single - - - -
Woods James 4 Male Son Presbyterian Co Antrim Scholar Cannot read - Single - - - -
Woods Daniel 3 Male Son Presbyterian Co Armagh - Cannot read - Single - - - -
Woods John 1 Male Son Presbyterian Co Armagh - Cannot read -

James Shields married a Amy Nicholls 31st Dec 1919 Whitehouse Church of Ireland

Margaret Shields married a James Andrew Crowe 7th April 1911 Whiteabbey Presbyterian Church

This is great, Maura thank you so much! If we have birth registrations for Ellen and Elizabeth, why wouldn;t there be one for Frances (Fanny?) Or have I been looking in the wrong way? I have ordered two searches for Bellymena and Antrim. Both came up negative. Is there any point in ordering one for Ahoghill, or would that be covered in the Antrim search? thanks for your help, I really do want to crack this one.

Janet,

Frances could have been mistranscribed as Francis ,its a common mistake especailly in GRO's

Thanks for the tip, Kay, Would GRO's have checked both, I suppose not, and her middle names are Hunt WIlliams which are probably more male names that female.. something to think about! Should I resubmit the birth certificate search under Francis do you think?

I'll send you a pm

Thanks Maura, very interesting, Thomas Dugan, Frances' husband also came from Bell Hills Scotland, this confirms the family had two bases of operation, Good to have Mary Jane nailed down! I appreciate your help, any ideas on what I should do next for Frances? They seem very strongly rooted in Ahoghill about the time of her birth.

Another example of why the idea of having one thread about a person and another thread about some particular technical/hypothetical question *relating to that person* (as some here argue for) is a bad idea.

http://www.genesreunited.co.uk/boards.page/board/trying_to_find/shields/thread/1052986

There's no point in saying one doesn't want to mislead without actually linking to the previous thread -- are people supposed to go searching? I did, now. And found that I had done the original background research, three years earlier.

And now:

http://www.genesreunited.co.uk/boards.page/board/trying_to_find/shiels/thread/1265622

Janey, is there somewhere on this site where I could pose a general geneological question? I have lots of them and they range over five countries, so it's hard to get a handle on how things work in different countries/time zones. Sometimes I am eager to go forward and just need to know what the laws etc were in that place at that time - as with the Passport to leave Ireland for a Commonwealth Country in the 1920's. I think a site where one could pose these general questions and not use names would be helpful to me.