Why no baby`s Death Cert?

[Viktoria]

Why would a baby, who was  born alive but died some hours after birth be buried without a death certificate?
There is a slim possibility that due to circumstances the mother may have harmed the baby as she had one illegitimate child, one child born in wedlock but at the time of the baby in question`s birth had been living apart from her husband for some time and the child was not his.She had hidden her condition from her father with whom she was living  and who arrived home from work to find his daughter had yet another child out of wedlock but which had  already died. We are talking early 1900`s  in a very isolated hamlet.
The child`s grandfather had gone for the Dr. but the Dr. did not go to the house where the baby was born and lay dead.The midwife had also tried to get the Dr. but he seemingly was a  drunkard. Several days elapsed and when another Dr. was eventually able to visit he did not feel confident enough to give a cause of death and advised a Post mortem must take place.
The next thing to happen was that the grandfather accidentaly fatally wounded his daughter. From then on the baby seems to have been completely overlooked. Eventually the mother`s funeral was arranged and the baby was buried with her but there is no D.C for the baby who did not  even have a name and is just a "Female" on her B.C..There was no P.M performed on the baby so no cause of death  known but could that not have been stated on a cert?I can`t understand how the baby is just forgotten.Perhaps the mother caused some harm by tight corsetting to hide her condition but we will never know. I thought a D.C. was obligatory.  Any suggestions please. Viktoria.

[stanmapstone]

Did the baby have a name?

Stan

[stanmapstone]

You could look at Section 18 of the 1874 Act which is titled;
Burial of Deceased Children as Still-born
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts1874/pdf/ukpga_18740088_en.pdf

Stan

[Finley 1]

well what a story.. --- the father accidentally killed his daughter... omgoodness.  the mother may have accidentally harmed the baby.  

Scary..............  

xin

[Colin Cruddace]

What a sad sequence of events. I sympathise with the Grandad who took his daughter back even though he resented her promiscuous ways, and then accidentally caused her death. It must have been really horrifying for him.

Back to the original query, yes, a death must be registered - but no system is perfect!

If a doctor is in any way suspicious about a cause of death, he would refer it to the County Coroner, and it was for him to decide if a post-mortem was necessary. Either way, when he was satisfied that he had sufficient grounds to determine cause of death, he could then issue a certificate for disposal of the remains. The family could then proceed with burial arrangements, even though there was no death certificate. The Coroner was then obliged to register the details with the local Registrar of the district where the death occurred, and I am reasonably sure that some registrations were never made, and some that were registered many months after they should have been.

Regards,
Colin

[Valda]

Hi

If the baby had a birth certificate issued (then someone registered the birth - who?).
If a post mortem was considered then a Coroner must have been involved and would make the decision a post portem was not necessary. You would then have expected the Coroner to register the death (it might not have always happened in the early days of registration but by the C20th even in a rural isolated hamlet you would expected that it did).
The Coroner would also be involved in an inquest on the mother since her death was not by natural causes. Again the Coroner would be the one registering her death after the inquest.

If the baby didn't have a name on her birth certificate, she may have had a name on her death certificate even if the events were registered at the same time. Bizarre though that seems it sometimes happens but more often the other way round.
Since there is some confusion over who was the father there might be a chance birth and death could be registered in a different surname or the surname has been mispelt.
It might also be worth checking with the local registration office to see whether the death is missing from the GRO index but was still registered. The GRO index isn't proof the event wasn't registered.


Regards

Valda

[Viktoria]

Many thanks everyone. For obvious reasons I have been economical with relevant details and so you are not fully in the picture, but your suggestions are very helpful.
Suffice it to say there were witnesses to the accident which caused the death of the baby`s mother
and her father had a very short sentence more to do with negligence I think.
I`ll need to re-visit the office where I obtained the baby`s B.C and mother`s D.C. and double check that the info re no death cert was available, is correct.
                                                                       Thanks again to you all. Viktoria.