Genealogy Chat

Hi,
Hope someone can help. I have found an ancestor who was born in the same village as another child of the same name.
They were born three months apart and both fathers have the same name as each other also.
They obviously have different mothers but which one is my ancestors mother as on a marriage certificate ,only the father is mentioned?
Did people have to produce birth certificates when marrying in 1868.
If so, would there be a record of it somewhere.
I believe I have the right ancestor in my tree but it would be nice to confirm it definitely.
This is a general question and not an request for a search. :-)

what about father occupations are they the same? witness names on a marriage cert may help(sometimes mother or sibling?)
can you trace family's on census years?

In answer to your question about whether it was necessary to produce your birth certificate when getting married in 1868, the answer is no.

The only way to be sure which is your ancestor is to obtain a copy of the birth certificate of the one you think it was. If that shows who you believe to be their parents then great. If not you will need to obtain the others birth certificate to confirm that it is indeed the correct one.

Until 1875, there weren't any penalties for not registering births....your relation's birth may simply not have been registered

The person you KNOW to be your ancestor must have married - the marriage cert will include the father's details, including occupation, which may help you to differentiate

Thanks everyone. I have the marriage certificate and the birth ones as well. Both fathers were lead miners and lived in the same street. Both children were baptized but only a couple of months apart.
I can't seem to find a marriage for one of the children.
I at least know that birth certificates weren't needed then to marry.
None of my ancestors children had the names of the mothers passed down only the Fathers which is a shame.

Katherine,

As you have both birth certificates then you know the names of their mother. Have you looked at appropriate census records both before and after the birth of the children to see if there are any clues such as a naming pattern which is common to the fathers/families and to the children of the person who married in 1868.

Another often overlooked source of information are the witnesses to a marriage. Obviously your hope is that one or both the witnesses might be recognised as a parent or sibling or the person getting married. There are however other possibilities.

Whilst trying to help my brother in law to discover his ancestry he had a not dissimilar situation. Two similarly named individuals that could have been his ancestor. Neither witness to a marriage initially appeared to be related to either the bride or groom. A bit more investigation however uncovered the fact that one of the witnesses was the husband of the sister of the groom. Obviously the witness's surname was completely different from both bride and groom but finding the family connection meant that it was possible to positively identify the groom to be the person being followed.

Good luck.

Hello Jonesy,

My ancestor married away from where he lived and none of the witnesses had the same surname of himself or his bride. (She was an only child).

The other ancestor with the same name was still in the area in 1861 but unmarried and I can't trace his marriage.

There is no naming pattern from this ancestor down to me, the only clue i had was that this ancestor travelled away and the other one didn't seem to. I will post his details I think on the finding ancestors board and see if anyone can help on there.

Thanks for your help so far xx

Put the details up.

I'll put them up tomorrow as i'm off out now

Thanks for the answer about the marriage certs everyone x