Genealogy Chat

Michelle, Have you tried looking under A'Hern/e and not Ahern/e. I noticed on Ancestry that there are a lot of the former turning up on a soundex search especially in the Cardiff area. Emma x

Irish independence wasn't until 1921, so yes I guess that she could have had a UK passport. Maybe the Michael Ahern in Tredager wasn't her dad after all?? just a thought....

Richard - believe it or not, I hadn't thought of her being born in Ireland! It really does help having fresh eyes look at your "difficult" relatives! She always told me she was from Wales, and she did have a British passport, is this possible if you are born in southern Ireland?

Births are supposed to be registered in the district where birth occurred, though I am sure that there were instances where this didn't happen in practice. It is possible (though unlikely in 1900's) that she wasn't registered, or maybe registered outside of England & Wales (Ireland maybe???) Re age on marriage cert - it's possible that she could have gone through her entire life not knowing exactly when she was born - in which case, her age could have been consistently wrong on both marriage and death certs.

I have considered the year being wrong, and searched from 1900-1909. I'm sure 1906 is right though as she is 22 on the marriage certificate from 24/12/1928. The most helpful thing for me would be access to the 1911 census!!!

Does the birth have to be registered in same district a person was born? Is it at all possible the birth wasn't registered at all? I'm sure she would have been baptised, as the family were Catholic. I guess finding some money and ordering the possible certificates, with specification on father's name would at least eliminate them...

The dates of birth on both my grandparents death certs are wrong. Grannie's is out by 2 years (she'd have been delighted to be so much younger!) and Grandad has been made 7 years older! Lou

This one's a bit closer to Wales: Name: AHERN, Mary Ellen Record Type: Births Quarter: June Year: 1907 District: Bristol County: Avon Gloucestershire Volume: 6a Page: 91 Maybe she was a bit younger than she thought, or maybe she was registered late for some reason? Ages on death certs are not always right! Nor necessarily are people's memories!!

Jeanette, I have considered the idea, but it seems extremely unlikely to me that a poor Irish Catholic family would move from London to a tiny Welsh mining village, at that time. They would have had to pass Wales to get to London from Ireland in the first place!! I only know her father was Michael, and she had a lot of siblings. She also told me they had several sets of twins. No idea of ages, names etc..

Anne, yes, have been searching on 1837 site, so it shows all Ahern and Aherne in same place. She could be an Ellen or Eleanor, as she was never anything other than Nell or Nellie to her family. My great nan's family is something of a mystery - she told me she ran away to London aged about 17, and eventually married my great grandad Sidney Tombs, who wasn't a Catholic so her family disowned her..

Michelle It could be possible that she was born in Wandsworth but moved to Wales when only small so believed she had lived there all the time. Do you know her parents names? If you do you could take a chance at ordering the cert but secifying what the parents names should be. Jeanette x

I should add, I have her marriage certificate which shows father Michael (deceased). The marriage cert from 1928 shows her as Nellie Aherne aged 22. I am not sure which is the correct spelling of last name, I had always thought it was without an E. I found one Michael Ahern (no E) in Tredegar in 1901 census, aged 34, born Ireland, unmarried. So think this could be her father.

My great gran Ellen (Nell) Ahern was born 22/08/1906. I know this for sure as it is on her death cert, plus she lived till her 90s so she told me herself. My problem is her birth doesn't appear to be registered - or is 1837 not 100% complete? I have checked several years either side. There is an Ellen Ahern registered at the right time, but in Wandsworth, sth London. My nan was Welsh, and grew up in small mining village, in a large Irish Catholic family. I can think of no logical reason why her birth would be registered in London. Any ideas where to go next???