BMD transcription by Ancestry

[Comosus]

Many of you might have noticed that Ancestry have been transcribing BMDs from 1916 to 1983. They first made available the births, and recently the marriages have become available, and the deaths will soon follow.

However I would just like to point out that they do not seem to be complete. I searched for a distant relative trying to trace the line further down. I had trawled through the indexes the 'old fashioned' way and found 3 children. I just tried searching by using the surname and the mother's maiden name (which is rare) and it brought up 3 children - but one I didn't know of, and one of the ones I knew of was not there! I double-checked by searching for the 'missing' person and she did not appear in the search. I checked the index too and she is there.

So in other words, don't abandon the old fashioned trawling just yet as you may miss out on some details.

Andrew

[Comosus]

Also, be careful with mistranscriptions. I was looking for someone registered at Welton in Lincolnshire, but it had been transcribed as Wilton and put under Wiltshire.

[Darren S]

The OCR that Ancestry have used to transcribe the indexes is not perfect, largely due to the condition of the source index sheets that have been used.

I've found many of my relatives, who should be in there, at first glance aren't. That's because the OCR has misread one of the letters in the name (typically the mother's maiden name). For example, Harris is transcribed as Barris, Garrard as Carrard, De Gaetano as De Gaetans, etc.

So it's likely that your record is there, but mistranscribed. For the one you're missing, try searching without the surname and with the mother's maiden name, or with the forename, district and quarter, etc. You'll probably find it.

[Nick29]

I found a mis-transcription this morning..... I found the 2nd husband of one of my aunts, and the name KEMBALL had been incorrectly transcribed as KERNALL.  It didn't take me long to spot the error (and to report it), and despite its obvious faults, I think Ancestry's new BMD search is great ! 

[Alan b]

They have my Grandad's surname down as HANLIN instead of HAMLIN so mistakes are present but if you know what you are looking for they should hinder you to much.

The new marriage search has cleared up one point of interest for me and that is my mother's granddad's second marriage did not take place in this country because he is only present on there the once..

I am just waiting for the full death index to be done as this should help no end.