Genealogy Chat

Hi Susan Birth registration was not made compulsory until 1875. Death registration was compulsory from 1837, or you couldn't legally bury the body, amd marriage registration had effeectively been compulsory since Harwicke's Act of 1754 prevented clandestine marriages. The effect of this is that there was no way anyone could have had their age checked on marriage during the nineteenth century, since a significant minority could not have produced a birth certificate at all, and many of the others wouldn't have one, or couldn't get one since they did not know where they were born, while some might not know its significance since they couldn't read it. That is why people could get away with overstating their age if they looked the part. Regards Stan

hi all i e-mailed GC/GR last night and i have recieved a nice reply today when i got home from work.GC/GR have checked all the years i wrote down in mail to them and they can confirm that my rellies are not on 1837 so they said that the rellies were not registered.but i thought if you got married in the 1800's you needed your birth cert to prove how old you really were(some people did tell porkies about their age).my grt grandparents registered only one of their offspring and that was john born 1870 but not edward who was born 1872. well i am hoping it is my grt uncle ,will just have to send for cert and keep my fingers crossed. thanks for all your help, sue

I have had trouble finding 4 members of my husbands ancestors births. I have looked through the St Catherines index at a local records office and cant find them anywhere. They were believed to be born in Manchester late 1800's. I phoned the Manchester registrar's to check if maybe they could have been missed off the national index and would there still be a record at the said registrars office. I was told def not, if they are not on the index held at records office then they werent registered. I am sure sometimes people slipped through the net.

susan the 1837 index isnt complete my eldest son isnt even on there!!! he was definately born,cos i was there lol susie

Sue one of the biggest mistakes people new to genealogy make is to assume the GRO/1837 records are accurate and complete. They are copies of the original records which are held locally by the district registrars. The net result is that there are many errors and omissions. Records exist locally that are not on GRO. Some of the earlier hand written GRO indexes were retyped and the originals destroyed ! (some of the indexes are typed, before the typewriter was invented)This introduced even more errors. If you know the area always search locally. Bob

There are a few Tetlows on FreeBMD at Chesterfield (as well as Titlows). Can you match any of them with 1881 census? It may help you find a Cert which would give parents' names.

I have looked on 1837 for my grandma's and grt uncles gro reference but cannot find them HENRY born 1865 portsmouth JAMES born 1867 portsmouth CATHERINE born 1869 CHESTERFIELD -GRANDMA. EDWARD born 1872 CHESTERFIELD SURNAME TITLOW I have looked from 1863-1873 but they are not there so you see why i put the title,LOL SUE ps i was going to get my grandma's birth cert to find her mother's maiden name