Genealogy Chat

Can anyone tell me how accurate the BDM records are. I am searching for death details of James Leighton born c 1823 and living in Cinderford Gl. until the 1891 census. The closest death record I can find shows James, birth date about 1822 at Westbury, Wiltshire, and I was wondering if it could in fact be Westbury on Severn, Gl. Is this possible? Thanks to Genes experts I have now solved this puzzle, and the transcription was in fact incorrect.

They are as accurate as the person reporting the facts, in the case of a name - so usually registered in the name the person was known as in the case of a death. ( I registered my next door neighbours death, about 15 years ago. I knew him as Henry, so that is what I registered. later, when sorting thru his stuff, I happened across his birth cert., his name was actually Alexander Henry , but everything was in the name of Henry,) In terms of the age of the deceased , again , as accurate as the person knew. Bear in mind if someone that was born in the year 2000 died today , they maybe recorded as age 6, or 5 if their birthday isn't until say October

This is the Westbury registration district: WESTBURY REGISTRATION DISTRICT Registration County : Wiltshire. Created : 1.7.1837. Sub-districts : Bradley; Edington; North Bradley; Westbury. GRO volumes : VIII (1837-51); 5a (1852-1930). Parishes in Wiltshire (1837-1930): Bratton, Bulkington, Dilton Marsh, East Coulston, Edington, Great Hinton, Heywood, Keevil, North Bradley, Southwick, Steeple Ashton, West Ashton, Westbury. Registers now in Warminster district. This is Westbury on Severn WESTBURY ON SEVERN REGISTRATION DISTRICT Registration County : Gloucestershire. Created : 1.7.1837. Sub-districts : East Dean; Huntley; Newsham. GRO volumes : XI (1837-51); 6a (1852-1930). Parishes in Gloucestershire (1837-1930): Abenhall, Awre, Blaisdon, Bulley, Churcham, East Dean, Flaxley, Hinders Lane and Dockham, Huntley, Lea Bailey (from 1890), Littledean, Longhope, Minsterworth, Mitcheldean, Newnham, Westbury on Severn. Registers now divided between Forest of Dean and Gloucester districts. Jess is right in that details on certs are as accurate as the informant gave them/the registrar wrote down/the indexer indexed them, but registration district details don't vary. The registration district in an index is exactly as it should be, although it might be abbreviated. But you can check which is yours by seeing the volume number in the index. If its 5a its the one in Wilts and if its 6a its the one in Glos. nell

you mean this one in the GRO index: Deaths Dec 1894 Leighton James 72 Westbury 5a 148 So no, this death was registered at one of the local offices under the superintendent of Westbury, Wilts. In some cases it may not be absolutely impossible for a family to lie about where a death occurred, but there's no way to make a link with a different Westbury.

Any records rely for their accuracy on the transcription from the original, and as Jess said on the accuracy of the information reported at the time. My great grandmother was on BMD as Samuel instead of Sarah so it took me a while to find her death record. I eventually got BMD to change it. My grandfather was Horace George Alfred but never used the Horace, even on his marriage certificate. My mother didn't know that was his real name until he died!!

I've had a look at the GRO index entry and the district is actually given as 'Westbury S' which is short for Westbury on Severn. The volume is definitely 6a and the page number 148. So it is a mistranscription by FreeBMD and you are absolutely right! I will send FreeBMD a correction. Kate.

Thanks for all the information provided, however I am a bit confused. Is the entry mentioned by Robin the same one mentioned by Kate? If so, why the different volume numbers?

Fay, the 'entry' that Robin posted up is actually the transcription from FreeBMD (I sent you the website address in a private message earlier), but the correct details on the actual GRO index are the ones that I said. What it is, is that the GRO index is available on various websites such as ancestry and 1837 online; you can look through pages and pages to find the entry you want. But if you want it to be quicker, you can use an index to it such as FreeBMD's (also available on ancestry). BUT as somebody actually types up the entries for FreeBMD's index, copying each entry from an image of the GRO index, there are bound to be mistakes. Sometimes the original GRO index entry is difficult to read, and sometimes the transcriber just makes a sloppy mistake. There is a checking program which is supposed to be run on the transcriptions before they are sent to FreeBMD, and FreeBMD also run some checking software which will usually put dubious district names in italics (I already explained to you why I think that didn't happen here) BUT there are still mistakes on FreeBMD, and you can always look at the actual GRO index image to see if FreeBMD have made a mistake or not. In this case, they did. Nobody's perfect! (And don't forget, FreeBMD is all done by volunteers.) I have sent them an error report but it usually takes a few weeks for the errors to be corrected. Why don't you have a look at the actual GRO index entry and you will see what I mean. Kate.