Birth Registration or abode on Baptism?

Question

Hi

I am Lucy. I have been adding a few profiles to WikiTree and am enjoying being a part of this community.

It may seem like a daft question but do you put the Birth Registration district on your profiles (1837 onwards) if you do not have sight of the birth certificate but do have the abode given on a Baptism record for their Birth Place or not?

For example, Catherine Mary Shattock who is part of my St George Church burials study. Her birth was registered in Taunton, Somerset, but her parents abode on her baptism was Norton Fitzwarren.  

Your help is appreciated.

Lucy

Comments

I would agree with putting the place of residence as the main place, but either in biography or research notes for other information is useful. Which St George parish in Taunton area are you referring to?

Heather

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Hi Heather

It is St George's Church in the Wilton Parish of Taunton, Somerset -  https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:St_George_Churchyard%2C_Taunton%2C_Somerset

Lucy

Answer 1

Why not add a statement like your example to the biography?  I think it is helpful to have both the registration district and where the parents lived.

Comments

Thank you Kathy for your reply. I will add this to my biographies.

Answer 2

Hi Lucy, if I do not have any proof of where someone was born, for example a residence at baptism, or census information that agrees across a few census's for the birthplace then I put the registration district in the data field, mark as uncertain and add a research notes section on the profile to say that the birthplace is the registration district.

Hope that helps,

Becky

Comments

I don't think it's necessary to mark the registration district as uncertain if you have a source specifying it. I reserve uncertain for inferred data like a birth year when there is no direct source.

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So Matthew, would an example of this be when there is no birth or baptism record, only census records and a death index but all are giving a different year of birth?

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Thank you Becky for your reply. It is helpful.

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Yes exactly.

Answer 3

I normally use the birth location listed on the next census after a child was born (assuming they were still alive), as that normally gives the town/village rather than just the registration district. In the case of Catherine Mary Shattock the 1871 census (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VFJV-H6T) gives her place of birth as Norton Fitzwarren, so that is what I would use.

For somebody who doesn't appear in any censuses I use the baptism place, as that is normally likely to either be the same as the birth place or at least closer to it than the centre of the registration district. Only if I can't find either a census or a baptism record do I use the registration district, as that is certainly better than leaving it blank.

By the way, I notice that you are including links to the ancestry.co.uk homepage in the sources. You can actually link directly to the relevant record using the template on https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Links_to_Ancestry. For example, the link to the 1939 register would be {{Ancestry Record|1939UKRegister|35378488|uk}}. You can also include a free-to-view image so that people without an Ancestry subscription can still see the record. For instructions on how to do that see https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/792811/creating-a-free-to-view-image-link-from-ancestry-com

Comments

Thank you for your reply Paul and the helpful information regarding Ancestry and linking. I will being doing this.

Answer 4

I would say that the birth registration district is better than nothing, but a more precise location from either a christening record or census is better, particularly as registration districts often spanned county boundaries so can imply the wrong county. Ages on censuses are often not reliable (supposed to be age at last birthday, which was usually in the year before the census, so the computed year on the transcriptions is more often than not a year out), so I would advise taking the year from the registration but the place from the other records - in this case Norton Fitzwarren.

Comments

Thank you for your reply Stephen. Appreciate it.