Yes, happens OFTEN .... particularly 1870s to 1930s .....
The paperwork system went something like this
1. You went to town to get the essentials, and went around to the court house to register your new baby. You gave the info verbally across a wide counter in the Sheriff's admin area.
2. Depending on who was on duty depends on how accurate the info was recorded. If the Sheriff or his offsider was a long standing local, who attended same Church as you, then pretty good chance your info is easily found by us in the 21st century. If the clerk asking the questions was new on the job, a poor speller, and perhaps not a local, then the info can be harder to find as there was a great deal of creativity with spelling.
3. So you answer all the questions, your own schooling was not of a university standard (compulsory primary schooling starts in NSW in late 1870s) so you have no idea WHAT was actually recorded, as you are not able to read 'upside down' as the clerk kept the big book facing him while he wrote the answers down.
4. The book is swung around to face you. You are holding your baby, watching your other children running wild, your husband is about to get into an argument with someone else you spot, so you SIGN or make your mark, trusting that the info is as per your own verbal statements just made.
THEN thats not all.....
There's the back office .....
Once every quarter (beginning April, beginning July, beginning Oct, and beginning Jan) the Deputy registrar is MEANT to transfer that info and remit the Quarterly returns to the Registrar General. BY THE POSTAL SYSTEM, to Sydney. Remember the Bush Rangers, well, they also nicked the ROYAL MAIL BAGS.... not just the Gold Dust.... So quarterly returns could get lost right from the beginning of civil registration. Then there's floods, fires, etc. Then there's lazy clerks .... and NO protocols for following up NON receipt of summaries.... And then there's summary returns that were received and not actioned..... eg poor handwriting, lack of staff numbers, or simply staff avoiding making the effort....
Then there's the indexes.... The current online index stems from the index that volunteers made in the 1930s .... yes, the Early Church Records date from 1787 .... indexed in the 1930s .... ink bleeds, torn pages, misplaced records .....
We are lucky there is ANY index
Marriages were meant to be registered at the local registrar's by the clergy ....
and Deaths ... well .... the householder was meant to report the death to the registrar so that a pro temp certificate could be provided to the funeral director for the burial. If a sudden death then the police became involved and sometimes, despite the Sheriff's office usually being the registrars centre too (same person/s doing dual roles), "they forgot" ....
I think you should consider the marriage I mentioned earlier, and once you have an official transcription of it, then try the following thread's tips
KEENEHAN (yes, could be long hand transcription errors) KEITH It is from 1882, and registered Dubbo DISTRICT. NSW BDM districts were very large in those rural areas, and were different from the electoral districts, the lands districts, the pastoral districts, the police districts.... The Colonial Administration was very cumbersome, and no department had same geographical boundaries as the next one. (#3688, Patrick KEENEHAN and Ada KEITH, registered Dubbo 1882)
I am suggesting that Keenehan could be transcription error for Heffernan and Keith could be similar for Selmes.
I have seen far worse. You know Ada's parents .... and it is possible there's going to be hurdles with blanks on the 1882 rural marriage. DON'T PANIC ...
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=660501.0 Cheers, JM
