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Scotland (Counties as in 1851-1901) => Scotland => Topic started by: loobylooayr on Tuesday 05 April 16 10:22 BST (UK)
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Good Morning,
I wonder if anyone could enlighten me.
A 1903 birth registration in Ayrshire of an illegitimate child - a daughter.
The baby is registered with the father's surname - the word illegitimate is clearly written below. Both parents' names and occupations are recorded.
The informants - first the Mother's signature followed by the father's signature and address (he is living at a different address and town than the mother) .
I know that (as is the case today) a child of an unmarried couple could be registered with the father's surname if he was present at the registration.
This couple married approx. 6 months after their daughter's birth and remained married till the woman died in the 1940s.
However in the left hand column of the birth registration the words Re-registered on 16th May 1959 are written. There is no RCE.
What would this mean? Does it just mean that a new birth certificate has been issued ? If so why the term Re-registered ?
Many thanks for any ideas.
Looby :)
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RCE stands for Register of Corrected Entries. Since 1965, it has been known as the Register of Corrections, Etc.
There is info. on SP.
Colin
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RCE stands for Register of Corrected Entries. Since 1965, it has been known as the Register of Corrections, Etc.
There is info. on SP.
Colin
Hi Colin,
Thank you for your info.
I should have clarified that I knew what RCE (Register for Corrected Entries ) stood for and that if there is a correction it can be viewed for the extra charge of 2 credits on Scotlands People.
However as I stated this birth entry does not have a RCE. :-\
Thanks and regards,
Looby :)
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Hi Looby,
Interesting. I have had occasion to correct 2 entries, one a birth, one a death recently on SP. When they sent me the new copies (which I had to pay for) one says " corrected entry" and the other has just the extra info added to it (the birth).
Just had a thought. The birth entry which I had corrected was my late husband's. He was born in 1934 and was illegitimate. The year after his birth his mother was awarded maintenance for him through the courts in Edinburgh. His father did not contest this. Parents never married. When we were getting married in 1965 we had to obtain a copy of his birth certificate and were told that because of this court order his birth was open to re-registration but would have to be done by one of his parents. His mother was still alive but he never broached the subject with her.
Enough of my story but my point being perhaps the lady born in 1903 waited until both her parents had passed away before she had her birth certificate amended.
Hope this helps.
Dorrie
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Thanks for your reply Dorrie.
It's certainly puzzled me - the word re-registered
There has been no additional info or amendment added to or made to the original record except those words (obviously in a different hand ) in the left hand column.
As approx. 56 years had passed - I wonder what led to this re-registration ?
Would the term 'illegitimate' be on the actual birth certificate? Could it be she asked for that to be removed?
Looby
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Hi Looby,
Have you seen both the original and the re- registration? Normally on births registered at that time date and place of parents marriage would be noted on the birth certificate - as you probably know already. It would be interesting to know exactly what extra info is on the 1959 one.
I don't know what your relationship is to the lady and what you know of her life but could there have been anything significant happening around 1959 that she would need her birth certificate for and that's how it came to be re-registered?
Dorrie
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By Gosh, thanks Dorrie ;D
This is going to sound stupid but it never occurred to me that there would be another registration in 1959 !! DOH !
I had assumed that something had to be altered on existing record or on the actual certificate and couldn't work out what that could be. But a quick look on SP has established that there is a birth registration in 1959 for my lady (Christian name/middle name/surname all match as do County and district) . I never knew that an adult could re-register their birth 56 years on !
The mother of the girl was my great -grandmother's sister , so the girl was my grandmother's cousin. There is a bit of a mystery with them and the 2 sister's had lost contact circa 1910.
Thank you for your help. I will now have to go in a week or two when I can get the chance to my nearest SP centre and check out the 1959 entry. How exciting :D
Looby
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Did she maybe need her full birth cert to obtain her first passport in 1959?
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Could be carol8353. That is possible.
I do not know anything about the lady concerned other than she was a cousin my grandmother never really knew as my great-grandmother's sister and her husband plus daughter moved away and all contact was (allegedly) lost.
Being inquisitive I had been looking into the circumstances of this family's estrangement and finding this note on the birth certificate proved that the daughter at least must have returned to the town of her birth to re-register that birth !
It will be interesting to see the 1959 entry when I can get to SP centre.
Thanks for your suggestion,
Looby
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No worries Looby glad to have helped.
I would be interested to know how the 1959 entry differs from the 1903 one when you have checked it out.
One thing though it probably won't tell you who gave the new information at least it didn't in my two.
Good Luck
Dorrie
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Once I get to see it I'll post on this thread what I discover Dorrie.
Thanks again.
Looby
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There has been for some time a way of re-registering illegitimate births where the parents subsequently marry and, therefor, the birth is legitimised on the records. This is done through an application to the Sheriff Court but I'm not sure whether anyone even goes to the bother of applying nowadays!
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Thank you Carolineasb,
Legitimising the birth due to the parents having married could well be the reason behind this re-registration.
Why it took 56 years , I'll probably never know??
Looby
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Hi :)
An update to my puzzle - I finally got to a Scotlands People Centre and looked at the 1959 birth registration.
It was in fact the child's father , who 56 years after her birth re-registered it and although he had been named on and signed the original , had his and the mother's marriage details added .The word "illegitmate" is now missing.
A member of the staff at the centre, tells me a new birth certificate would've been issued too without the word "illegitimate" .
Thanks to those who contributed to the post,
Looby :)
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That's a great outcome Looby. A mystery now solved.
Would never have thought that it would be the father who re-registered her birth.
Dorrie :)
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I would think that it has to be one or both of the parents who would apply to the Court for re-registration of a birth.
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I would think that it has to be one or both of the parents who would apply to the Court for re-registration of a birth.
I do not know if parents need to apply to the Court to re-register a birth, there was certainly no mention on the record of a Court being involved. And if they do today, I don't know if that was a requirement in 1959 :-\
But you are right, I was told at the Scotlands People Centre that only a parent could re-register a birth and not the child themselves. In this case it was only the father as the mother was deceased.
You learn something new every day.
Thanks for commenting,
Lobby :)
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It is not unusual to have a re-registration. A great uncle and aunt of mine had a daughter born in 1916. They were not married and the birth certificate only has the mother's name because the father was in the army in France. They married when he was on leave in 1917. Just before the girl married, her father went back to the district where the birth was originally registered and re-registered it. The new certificate has both parents' names and the date of their marriage.
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It is not unusual to have a re-registration. A great uncle and aunt of mine had a daughter born in 1916. They were not married and the birth certificate only has the mother's name because the father was in the army in France. They married when he was on leave in 1917. Just before the girl married, her father went back to the district where the birth was originally registered and re-registered it. The new certificate has both parents' names and the date of their marriage.
Thank you GR2- I didn't realise that a birth could be re-registered - this is the first one I'd come across . However I can understand why people wanted to re-register , to remove the word and therefore (at that time) stigma of "illegitimate" . Just surprised they waited 56 years to do it !Bearing in mind the year, 1959, perhaps the "child" involved was applying for her first passport.
Looby :)
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I have a copy of Bisset-Smith's Vital Registration, a manual of the Law and Practice concerning the Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages in Scotland, published in 1902, so there may have been changes between then and 1959 in procedures.
Of illegitimate births which were originally jointly registered by both parents, or where paternity was found by a court, he says, "The Registrar, if so requested, upon production to him of an Extract of the Entry of Marriage notes the legitimation in the Register of Corrected Entries, inserting a reference thereto in the margin of the affected Birth Entry. The Extract of Marriage is necessary ... [it] is the indispensable authority for noting ...."
However, "If the paternity of a child has not been registered as having been acknowledged, nor determined by a decree of a competent Court, the Registrar cannot note the Legitimation simply on production of the parents' marriage certificate. In addition to the Marriage Extract, the Registrar requries to receive as authority for an insertion in his Register of Corrected Entries, a Warrant of the Sheriff, granted on the application of both parents, after due inquiry."