Birth Certificate Shock

[jericho]

My auntie needed a passport a few years back, and sent of for her birth certificate, it wasn't until it arrived back that she realised that she had been registered under her mother's maiden name and not her father's name, upon further investigate I discovered that her parents hadn't married until a few months before her father's death and my auntie and her 7 siblings all had been registered under their mother's maiden name, yet since birth they had all been known by their father's surname. So there were a few surprises and lots of unanswered questions, as none of the family knew they had a different surname and not the one they had known all their lives.


On my own birth certificate, I have been registered with only a first name and no surname, yet all the other birth certificate I have brought over the years have always had shown a surname. So I wonder if this was a common practice or the surname was omitted for some reason.

[patrish]

On my birth certificate where it says "name and surname of father "only his two christian names appear.

[shellyesq]

I remember a few years back I was working in the States when I came across the tale of a baby born to a, let's say, not so sophisticated couple. The proud father took a look at the wrist band and declared that he was happy with the name the hospital had chosen for the little girl. Pronouncing it Feemawlya he didn't get it that all the girls had Female Surname on the bands.
I often wonder if the child was actually registered by that name.

I'm pretty sure that's an urban legend - http://www.snopes.com/racial/language/names.asp

[antiquesam]

My grandmother was born in 1896 and registered as "Minnie Ina Thiel", married in 1917 as "Minnie Shiel", married again in 1943 as "Minnie Ena" and her death certificate in 1968 as "Minniemena". They do like to make things difficult for researchers.

[flipflops]

Having read through this topic i guess any of us looking for an explanation of the occassional anomaly on birth certificates will start by checking whether the birth had been registered by dad

I could never understand why my sister thought that our mum was two years older than her actual age because that was what mum would tell her.  The strange part being that mum had never made a secret of her DOB. so all you needed was to do the maths - and sis was a mathetician

The strange part was that growing up I'd always believed absolutely that my sister was five years older than me with the corresponding DOB and it was only when she died last year that I saw from her birth certificate that she was actually six years older all along

[mortieau]

My Grandmother was born in 1891 her given names in her birth certificate were Donah May but in the 1911 census she's just plan May, then the next year she meets my grandfather who she told her name was Mabel, I can sort of see it a young woman meeting this dodgey Italian fellow in Hyde Park not wanting to give her real name, anyway she must have liked the name Mabel as their marriage certificate says she's  Mabel Agnes, and those names stuck untill the 1950's when my Mum went to find her birth cerificate for the old age pension and couldn't find any Mabel Agnes with the right birthday, then the real story came out.

Best
John

[Viktoria]

W e lived abroad when my youngest child was born, my husband registered the birth.
In England and many other countries the name is very common, however in the country where we were resident at that time it was the name of a certain type of biscuit.
The registrar refused to put it on the certificate saying it would be a burden for the child - being named after a biscuit. My husband had to return with a bible and show it was a name from the O.T. then get a bible in the language of that country to show it was in there too, biscuit or no biscuit.When this child marred the old Verger in the church mixed up the bride`s and groom`s Christian  names.  The photo taken at the signing of the register is hilarious as they noticed the error . It was hard work getting things sorted, we had to appeal to the Rural Dean as the marriage cert is a legal document and ought not to be altered but we were doubtful of its legality .
It was sorted in the end. Viktoria.

[IgorStrav]

Having read through this topic i guess any of us looking for an explanation of the occassional anomaly on birth certificates will start by checking whether the birth had been registered by dad

I could never understand why my sister thought that our mum was two years older than her actual age because that was what mum would tell her.  The strange part being that mum had never made a secret of her DOB. so all you needed was to do the maths - and sis was a mathetician

The strange part was that growing up I'd always believed absolutely that my sister was five years older than me with the corresponding DOB and it was only when she died last year that I saw from her birth certificate that she was actually six years older all along

I've also always known the dob of all my close relatives, day, month, year, (all correct!) and so it's been surprising recently to find out that other people don't seem to notice large discrepancies and the conclusions one might draw from them...

Recently a researcher, T, contacted me to say that her sister in law, HC, was looking for a cousin, D, connected on her mother's side.  D is a cousin of mine on my father's side.

This was interesting, because D's mother, H, was Irish, and died very young when he was a child, and nobody in the family knew much about her.

In the usual way, given that both T and myself are family history researchers, although neither of us is directly connected, we both set about finding out about the family. 

In short, it turned out that D's mother, H, was born in 1925.  However, her "father", was well known in the family to have "died in the war", by which was meant the first world war.  The family were all highly respected Catholics, living in Ireland.

We found the death source - sure enough, it was in 1917.  But nobody in the family seemed to notice the HUGE anomaly, which explained why H's birth reference had been so difficult to track down.  Eventually I found her, under her mother's maiden surname.

T and I were quite worried about the implications of our discovery, particularly on the Irish Catholic side of the family.  But HC is apparently "very vague about dates", even though one of the possibilities includes her own mother (aged 15 in 1925) being the parent of H.

It's amazing what you can just refuse to notice, if you set your mind to it.

[rancegal]

 
  At least these fathers actually registered the birth, even if the results were dire!
  My great-grandfather went to register the birth of one of his sons. When he got there, the (part time) register office was shut, so he went away (probably to the pub, said my mother) and the boy was never registered. As an adult, this boy spent many years working for the LMS. When the time came for him to retire, he couldn't prove his age, so he had to write to his sister, my grandmother, and she had to go to the vicar. The vicar then wrote to the LMS affirming the date of his baptism from the PR. The family had had a sort of 'mass baptism' of the children from a babe in arms up to about the age of 11. I'm not sure whereabouts in that my great-uncle came, but he certainly wasn't a new-born baby, so whether he had to wait for his retirement, I don't know.