Careless registrars

[bearkat]

When we went to register the birth of our twins we couldn't get the buggy through the door! -  so  had to let my OH register the births alone.

When we met up one of the certificates wasn't signed.  We presumed the certificate wasn't legal so went back to get it sorted.

[patrish]

My friend who married in the mid sixties found her marriage was missing from the index's 

She discovered it by chance after beginning her family history, when she decided to take a look.

[MrsLizzy]

I bet it's in there somewhere, mistranscribed.  I remember hearing of a man searching for his ancestors by the name of Gosh for decades, only to find them eventually on the census returns, all mistranscribed as Fosh.  The headline was "Gosh! It's Fosh!"   

[patrish]

No its wasn't, when she contacted the registrars it had been omitted. 
but it there now 

[Elliebob]

And here's one for registrars using their initiative well. 

My m-i-l was one of a big family and her father could never remember what his children should be called when he went to register the birth.  On one occasion when asked what the baby's name was he said "Oh put her down as Jane"  The registrar wouldn't do it and sent him home.  The child was Gladys Vera Eileen!!

Ellen

[old rowley]

 My father died in 1991 and when my sister and I went to register his death at the local office in Essex it was our luck to have a near blind partily, deaf registrar (she wasn't either  but you can see why I have said that) as she typed in his place of birth as Plaistow when we told her that he was born in Glasgow (easy mistake, they are only some 400 odd miles apart  ) and she entered his surname as Tite instead of Tait. Not only did we have to correct her at the time of telling but also when she printed the certificate off as well.

old rowley

[MrsLizzy]

You have to watch these civil servants like a hawk!   It's not always their fault though.  I was asked by a friend of mine to go with her to see the vicar the night before her wedding, as she had to go to the church and tell him all her "details" for the marriage certificate.  He asked her the name and occupation of her father etc, and I listened while she told him and he wrote them out.  We walked out of the church and I asked her "Did your Dad adopt you officially, then?" (I knew the details she'd just given were for her stepfather, not her birth father).  She answered, "No." So I told her, explained what she'd just done, and we had to go back and tell the vicar, who had to put lines through the certificate and start all over again writing out a new one with the real father on it!

[Sue in Aust]

What about careless parish clerks?

I have an entry for a burial in 1818 which gives Hannah Adams daughter of John Adams of Little Saughall, age 65. I wonder if this entry should rather read "wife of". Try as I may I cannot fit this Hannah with a father John but I can fit her in with a husband John Adams and a father Robert.

Perhaps my thinking is "up the perverbial spout" but it also occurs to me that the entry suggests Hannah was a single woman and at the age of 65 spinster rather than daughter of would be a more likely description of her in the PR if she was an unmarried woman.

Any thoughts?