Are mistakes made on birth certs?

[roofy]

Hi, I have a similar problem in my family. My great great grandmother may well have been married and widowed already by the time she had her 3 children ie I dont know if Lawler is her maiden name or the name of a first husband if she had one. Because she didnt marry the father of her children she put widow on one census and called herself seyer [his name] on the next census. As well as clerical error there are also human possibilites to consider.
btw she used her maiden name as a middle name for all three children, however, the youngest got christened lawless cos someone must have read the squiggly r as a double ss.
Hope this helps rather than hinders;)
Roofy

[akanex2]

I have a similar question mark over my gt gt grandmother's maiden name on her children's birth certificates.  She was illegitimate with no father's name on her birth certificate, on her marriage certificate she gives her maternal grandfather as her "father", but on her eldest child's birth certificate she gives her maiden name as Cochrane- which is neither her mother's maiden name (i.e. the name she was registered with) nor her stepfather's name (her mother having married when she was 9). 

Subsequent children were registered with her maiden name as her actual birth name, but "Cochrane" remains either a clerical error ..  or a tantalising clue to her actual father's identity.

[newby dee]

its amazing we  actually do as well as we do at tracing our ancestry 
but thats the buzz , seeing through the mistakes/lies and breaking down these walls
dee

[carol8353]

My husband's dad had the wrong date of birth on his cert.

They were Irish and when grandad went to town to register the birth-one of many he'd had to do  he said 'the wife had a baby boy last Wednesday'

But the registrars idea of last Wednesday was different to grandad's and it ended up being a week out....of course he was either a little sozzled,or he didn't read and write English too well to notice the error at the time.

Carol

[genuisscuffy]

My GGrandmother had put her fathers first name and then stepfathers surname on her 3rd marriage cert - caused no end of problems until I realised what she had done! She was a bit flightly!!!

[RichardK]

I remember hearing somewhere that the Queen Mother's birth certificate was a bit dubious - apparently her birth was registered late and it says she was born at the family's country home at St Paul's Walden near Hitchin in Hertfordshire, when many biographies think this is inaccurate and she was actually born in London.

Not just illiterate labourers who get things muddled...

[stanmapstone]

Elizabeth's birth was registered as having taken place at the family home of St Paul's Walden Bury, near Hitchin, Hertfordshire, though there is some doubt about this, and it has been suggested that the delivery occurred in a horse-drawn ambulance in London or perhaps at her parents' town house in Grosvenor Gardens. For failing to register the birth within the required forty-two days Lord Glamis was fined 7s. 6d.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

Stan

[coombs]

My great, great grandfather's 1856 birth appears not to have been registered by his parents Thomas and Ann Musgrave. He had a namesake cousin (so of Thomas's brother Robert) whose birth was registered. And he was nearly not the only one not to have their birth registered as his sister was born 1st March 1871 and not registered until 27th April 1871. Thomas and Ann Musgrave were not too bothered with registration then if they missed one of their sons and almost failed to register their daughter. Their other childrens births seemed to have been registered.

It was the duty of the registrar to travel around the district before 1875 so it is no wonder why some births slipped the net.

[stanmapstone]

The 1836 Registration Act stated;

" every Registrar shall be authorized and is hereby required to inform himself carefully of every Birth and every Death which shall happen within his District after the said First Day of March, and to learn and register soon after the Event as conveniently may be done, without Fee or Reward save as herein-after mentioned,"


It was left to his discretion to employ such lawful means of informing himself as appeared to be best, but he had to employ some means. He would most likely have referred to people such as doctors, midwives, undertakers etc. that would have knowledge of any birth or death in his district.

Stan