Bristol lies partly in Gloucestershire and partly in Somerset

[ReadyDale]

And under current BMD registration rules, places are always supposed to be recorded as they are NOW - so on the death certificate of someone born maybe a hundred years ago in Warrington and may have called themselves a proud Lancastrian, their place of birth would be shown as Warrington,Cheshire.

Will be potentially confusing for future researchers.

At a families very earnest request I did once record a birthplace on a death reg using its old historical details, which successfully slipped through the checking process. They were very grateful. 

And their current instruction can even confuse the registrar.
When I had to register my Dad's death, I was asked for his place of birth. I told them Queen Charlotte's Hospital, Marylebone. They said they had to go by the names of the areas now, and wanted to put Acton.
It took a lot of pursuading that it wasn't that the area had changed names. The hospital was in a totally different location, miles apart (and indeed had been in a third location for many years in between too).
Eventually, sense prevailed.

[AntonyMMM]

And their current instruction can even confuse the registrar.
When I had to register my Dad's death, I was asked for his place of birth. I told them Queen Charlotte's Hospital, Marylebone. They said they had to go by the names of the areas now, and wanted to put Acton.
It took a lot of pursuading that it wasn't that the area had changed names. The hospital was in a totally different location, miles apart (and indeed had been in a third location for many years in between too).
Eventually, sense prevailed.

Obviously they hadn't read the manual properly !  The guidance, for the birthplace on a death registration,  is that things like a hospital name aren't included only the town/village and county, so they should just have put:

"Marylebone, City of Westminster"

If you, as the informant really wanted it on there I would probably have entered it as:

"Marylebone, City of Westminster: Queen Charlotte's Hospital"

...although it would probably have been queried and got me a telling off during the quarterly checking process.

[ReadyDale]

They just wanted to put Acton, which was false. I'd have been ok with just Marylebone.

[radstockjeff]

The previous big shake-up was in 1894 when urban and rural districts were invented.  After that County Boroughs gobbled up some surrounding parishes via local acts of parliament.  Added: I think that was probably halted by the Town & Country Planning Act of 1948, which created Green Belts.

The new London Boroughs were created in 1964, then the new counties and districts were invented 1 April 1974.  Metropolitan counties were scrapped 1 April 1986, except county-wide services were retained for Police and Fire.  Some met. districts decided to run joint county services for smaller functions - eg archaeology, archives, in some counties but not in others.  I have lost track of the unitary authorities created since then in non-met counties.  I will not make any statements about Bristol because I really do not know, except to say that Avon was invented as a "non-metropolitan county" from 1974, comprising two non-met. districts, Bristol and Bath.

It was possible to find lists of changes up to 1974 in the Vision of Britain website until a few weeks ago when it was all rearranged, now I cannot find them.

And then in 1996 Avon was abolished andthe area re-designated- Bath and North East Somerset, North Somerset, Bristol, South Glos. And LG still being reorganised all over the place. rj

[MollyC]

So in Avon county, the two districts created in 1974 were turned into four unitary authorities in 1996?  Now the government is trying to amalagamate smaller authorities to create populations of about half a million.  There is a furious row in Nottinghamshire about which of three districts will be joined to Nottingham City Council district (recently bankrupt).  Nobody wants to be connected with it.

2½ years ago the 1974 county of Cumbria was dissolved.  (Ancestry, please note.)
We now have Cumberland again, and Westmorland-and-Furness.  (Furness being a pre-1974 detached piece of Lancashire.)  But they are not identical with the past boundaries.

[Top-of-the-hill]

  At least they can't fiddle much with the outer boundaries of Kent, and there is not much point in altering the Kent/Sussex border, but there is talk of internal divisions. It is a pity Kent was not divided into East and West in 1974(?) when Sussex was. It would be a fairly natural division and we would have got a County Town nearer than Maidstone!

[radstockjeff]

Regarding the establishment of Bath and North East Somerset - BANES- some wag at the time suggested a different acronym - BASTARD  - Bath And Small Towns And Rural Districts, which probably reflected the opinions of numerous citizens at that time.