BMD Mystery

[jbarrett]

Hi

I'm looking for the marriage of Joseph Brown and Caroline Haywood, first child was born 1874 in Birmingham. Have been unable to find it - but have found three names on a page, one being Caroline Haywood. Is it possible that a name i.e. Joseph Brown could be missed off? Is there often three names on a page?

Thanks for any light you can cast on this.

Jenny

[AMBLY]

Hi Jenny
In a word, yes... if the place you found Carloline HAYWOOD is on the FREE BMD site - this tool /site, while very useful & "what would we do without it", is an ongoing project and is not complete.

The index page with the groom of Caroline HAYWOOD, if he is not the 1 groom on the page,  may not yet have been transcribed.  That said, I have come across numerous incidences on the site of mistranscriptions of a Vol Nr or page Nr which can result in the entry not appearing where it should.

Have you tried looking for Josph BROWN same year and Quarter as Caroline?
He may pop up in a different district with the VOl/Page nr, partially the same.  Then, if the image has been scanned, you can check to see if it has been correctly transcribed.

Alternatively, 1837 Online is complete I believe, so should be found there - though it does cost:
http://www.1837online.com/Trace2web/

Cheers
AMBLY

[Nick Carver]

Jenny

Agree totally with the above answer but you may have an alternative source of information. If the county or district for which you are seeking a record has its own BMD project - e.g. YorkshireBMD, then that is a separate transcription project and it might have both parties for your marriage. I have found a number of entries in one but not the other. It generally doesn't mean an error, usually just that the records haven't been transcribed yet. You can look at a page on FreeBMD that tells you the progress of transcription however.

Good luck
Nick

[corinne]

If you apply directly to the registrar of that district, you can request the marriage certificate for Caroline Haywood specifying that you only want it if the groom is Joe or Joseph Brown.  If it isn't then they don't send you the certificate and you get all or most of your fee refunded.  You do need to be sure that Joseph Brown is exactly the right name, because if it is written as something a bit different (even though it is the person you want) they won't send the certificate either.  Examples are something like John Joseph Brown, who might be known as Joseph, but be down on the certificate as John Brown.

[casalguidi]

It might just be worth mentioning that many registry offices won't supply marriage certificates unless you know the exact date and place of marriage.  In many instances, they have to search registers for each church & chapel in their district if they have no full index and, understandably, this could be a mammoth task.

Best wishes

Casalguidi

[janetm]

Just had a quick look on 1837 0nline,
  there are 3 marriages of a Caroline Haywood, Dec Q 1874 v 6c p 879, Sept Q 1874 v6c p 665. and Sept Q 1866 v 6d p 582,  (from FreeBMD) none of these cross reference with a Joseph Brown marrying in these volumes and pages

Jan

[jbarrett]

Thank you very much for your help and the look ups - I've followed each of your suggestions and zilch. However there is a possibility that Caroline was only 16/17 when she gave birth in 1874 so maybe they didn't marry. I've read through some of the boards and it seems to be quite common.

Unfortunately leaves me less than a 100% certain that the Caroline Haywood I'm looking into is the right Caroline...

Thanks again for helping out.

Jenny

[katerimmer]

Or could it be that Caroline married somebody else, then was widowed, then married Joseph?  In which case her marriage to Joseph will be listed under her first married surname.  Difficult to track, though.
Kate.

[AMBLY]

Hi Jenny

Have you tried looking for their marriage after 1874?
If they were very young, or at least Caroline was, when the firstborn came along, maybe they weren't married until afterwards, maybe even well afterwards - also a lot more common that one would imagine for the times!

You say its a possibility Caroline was only around 16 or so when child born in 1874 - meaning you are not sure even on Caroline's identity?

Have you tried finding death certs and later Censii  to try sort out her age and identity? Maybe if you let us know somemore about your mystery, we can try to help you more   


Cheers
Anne