Hi Shirlann, in reply to your original request - if you want to find William's birth cert then you have a couple of choices.
One: If you apply in writing to the Registrar for Stourbridge or Dudley & explain that you want the birth cert for a William Hill born around 1893/94 in Stourbridge, but there are six possibilities, one March quarter 1893, three June quarter 1893, one Dec quarter 1893 & one Mar quarter 1894.
If you are confident that his parents are Thomas & Mary then ask the Registrar to only issue a cert if these parents names match. If you are not sure about Thomas & Mary then say "I think his parents should be Thomas & Mary". Send a cheque for £7 made payable to the Superintendent Registrar & make sure your put a telephone number where the Registrar can contact you during their opening hours. This way if they cannot find a William Hill born to Thomas & Mary they will usually phone & tell you, THIS MEANS THEY HAVE FOUND SOMETHING CLOSE MAYBE ONLY ONE PARENT'S NAME MATCHES.
Note the Registrar cannot tell you what is on the cert but this gives you the chance to ask questions of the Registrar which they can answer yes/no. EG if this happens you could ask is Thomas recorded as the father or have I got the wrong mother's name etc. Depending on your questions & their answers they will ask if you want the cert they have in mind & then it's up to you to make a decision - you could always ask for time to mull it over before ringing them back to order cert.
Outcome of this method will be either: the Registrar finds the correct birth & sends you the cert or the Registrar finds something close & phones you or the birth cannot be found.
Cost would be £7 for a cert and nothing if they do not find the birth.
Only downside to using local Registrar is they issue a 'handwritten' copy of the cert
so you do not see any ancestor's signatures, if they could write of course.
Registrars Offices:
Superintendent Registrar
Stourbridge Branch Office,
Crown Lane,
Crown Centre,
Stourbridge,
West Midlands,
DY8 1YA
Superintendent Registrar
Dudley District Register Office
Priory Hall,
Priory Park,
Dudley,
West Midlands
DY1 4EU
Two: apply to the GRO asking for William's birth to Thomas & Mary from the following possibilities:
William Henry Hill Mar quarter 1893 Stourbridge 6c 167
William Benjamin Hill June quarter 1893 Stourbridge 6c 224
William Henry Hill June quarter 1893 Stourbridge 6c 192
William John Hill June quarter 1893 Stourbridge 6c 171
William Hill Dec quarter 1893 Stourbridge 6c 154
William Vernon E. Hill Mar quarter 1894 Stourbridge 6c 193
The GRO website has this: "If you have done your own searching in the GRO indexes and have found more than one reference to the name you are researching, or are unsure which is the entry you require, we offer reference checking online. The charge is £7 for action on the first entry, which includes the cost of the certificate, and £3 for checking each subsequent reference against the information you have provided. To enable us to do this, you must give us one piece of information that you are sure will appear on the certificate, e.g. the exact date of the event. A certificate will only be issued if the entry we check matches the checking point you give us".
Doing it this way could cost £22, ie if the correct birth is the last one the GRO check it would be £7 to check the first entry plus £3 each for checking the other five entries.
If none of the match I think it would still cost you £18, thats £3 to check each of the six entries. Only benefit is as above, if they could write, you get to see ancestor's signature.
Three: Again if you are confident that William's parents are Thomas & Mary why not try & find his baptism. Explain your predicament to the Archive service & see if they can help.
It's got to be worth a try even before applying for any birth certs. For a simple query they might be able find William's baptism & you might be able to get a copy of this for your records or they may tell you where to look if they don't have the records. I fear that if you ask for lots of info like all his siblings details & parent's marriage they will probably tell you to employ a researcher or call in & look for yourself.
Archives and Local History Service
Mount Pleasant Street
Coseley
West Midlands
WV14 9JR
Tel/fax: 01384 812770
Email:
archive@vinl.dudley.gov.ukContact: Mrs K.H. Atkins, Archivist
I would advise caution in applying for a sibling's birth cert & then accepting their parents as also being Williams. In an ideal world this would be true but we are not researching in ideal conditions. It's even possible that William is the son of the 20 year old Nellie & Thomas recorded him as his son to avoid any embarrassment. I know this would make Nellie only 13 or 14 when she had William but these things happened, in fact I think girls could still marry at 12 years old around this time! If it were me looking for William I would try & find his baptism first & that way you will have correct parents to apply for his birth cert if you need it. Much better this way than get the wrong parents & base your research on wrong info. Hope this helps & good luck. Regards, TonyR.
