Researching offspring who may not have survived

[Dee the gardener]

Hello
I am still quite new to family history research, but I wonder if someone can tell me the best (easiest? cheapest? quickest?) way to find out how many children were born to a marriage, some of which may not have survived to be named in the censuses?

Are copies of birth certificates available to be viewed at county archives, or anywhere else, or is my only option to take a guess from the Birth and Death indexes, and order up the relevant certificates?

Thank you

Dee

[alpinecottage]

Birth certs can not be inspected, you have to buy the ones you want.  A cheaper way can be to try and find baptismal and burial records from the parish they lived in and see if you can work things out from there.  If you post some names, dates and places on here, someone may be able to be more specific about online records etc.

[coombs]

Hi Dee

The 1911 census for women gave the number of children she has had, how many are alive and how many have died. Copies of birth and death certificates are not available at county record offices but providing you know the district they were born in you can obtain from the local district. Although over the decades district names and sizes have changed. Some counties have indexed their own BMDs.

Even though the 1911 census for women gave the number of children born and how many were alive and how many had died it is still a case of finding out which ones died. Birth, marriage and death certificates are available from 1837 onwards at the General register Office.

Although providing the marriage took place in a parish church you can obtain post 1837 marriage registers from your local record office. If they occurred in a non conformist church or registry office then they will not be at county record offices.

Ben

[Dee the gardener]

Thanks for your help and advice.

Dee

[stanmapstone]

Just to clarify, in the 1911 census married women were asked to state how long they had been married, the number of children born of the current marriage, the number of those children who were still alive and the number who had died.

Stan

[Sloe Gin]

You may be able to find some baptisms by searching on Family Search.  This is part of the LDS Church index.  Depending on when/where your people of interest are, you may be lucky.

Some important points!

It is NOT a complete index of baptisms: there are many churches and parishes not covered, and the range of dates included is variable.

Records described as "extracted" have been transcribed from film of the parish registers, and should be reasonably accurate (although there is always room for error).  There may often be additional details in the parish register itself.

Records described as "submitted" have been contributed by members of the LDS church, and other parties.  Some are properly researched and genuine, others regrettably are not reliable.  It's best to treat "submitted" entries with caution.

Very few deaths/burials are recorded by the LDS, but occasionally they are indicated with a baptism when the child died young.

[eadaoin]

But, remember,  the wives didn't always tell the truth - maybe they didn't want to be reminded of the dead children.
I have one family - I have `14 baptisms, and a photo of the family grave giving 5 children who died prior to 1911.
In the census she says she has 9 children, 9 alive.

eadaoin

[Sloe Gin]

Yes, in the case of the 1911 census the information on the form may not be accurate - lots of people misunderstood what was being asked for.  They were not supposed to include stillborn children, for one thing, but it's a fair bet that some did.

[angelan]

On the 1911 census for my great grandparents it stated that they had 13 children born living, 10 still living, 3 who had died.

I already knew that 2 of them had died as young adults as they were on some census records with the family. I had no idea about the 3rd until I found a baptism record for Elsie with parents names, address and father's occupation in Parish records. Amongst the burial records for the same parish I came across Elsie aged 4 months.

It's expensive enough buying certificates for direct ancestors, but to send for them for siblings who died before they were old enough to be included on a census could cost a lot of money.

If you are unable to get to the appropriate records office to check details yourself, you could request a look up. There is a board for each county, and there are many kind rootschatters who are willing to look for other people if they are given enough information.

As Sloe Gin suggested the familysearch IGI is a useful source. Have you used this yourself?

Good luck
Angela