OPR double birth entry .....

[Mike]

I looked up the birth record of an ancestor's eldest son, to see if it had useful information about the parents. GRO returned two records for him:

25/01/1828 WOOD JOHN JOHN WOOD/ELIZABETH HENDERSON FR9008 M ST CUTHBERT'S EDINBURG 685/02 0034 No Image
25/01/1828 WOOD JOHN JOHN WOOD/ELIZABETH HENDERSON FR4321 M EDINBURGH 685/01 0056 No Image

Would there be any benefit in ordering both certificates?

[LesleyB]

Hi Mike
...and a warm welcome to Talking Scot.

Information in OPRs can vary from informative to very basic indeed!
So...

If you are near one of the LDS Family History Centres you could order the microfilms from them if they don't already have them in stock (not sure where you are) and have a look at the records. You can also take a print out at the LDS centres. The cost to order a film is about £2 I think.

If you are near Edinburgh, the Edinburgh Room has films for the area which you can look at for no charge.
http://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/CEC/Recreat ... yhist.html

Both are cheaper options and with the benefit of being able to look up any other births for the same family which might occur on the same film! And you can save your money for other searches on SP!

Best wishes
Lesley

[Mike]

Hi Lesley

Firstly thanks for the welcome.

I think that now I know the existence of the Edinburgh Room, it will make for a good excuse for me to revisit Edinburgh! It's possible that I will find some detail from the births of at least one of their 7 children.

I managed to get a great amount of information from the mother's death certificate in Australia. She joined one of her daughters in Melbourne (and at least 2 others followed her). The father (John/Jno Wood) is much more elusive.

As the children were variously born in Edinburgh or parts of Fife (Monimail, Kilconquhar) can i find records for them all there, or will I have to search further afield for the latter?

Thanks!
Mike

[LesleyB]

Hi Mike
Looks like there is a lot of material at the Edinburgh Room:

The following are the parts of Scotland for which we have census returns and Old Parish Registers:
Ayrshire; Caithness; Clackmannanshire; Dumfries and Galloway; East Lothian; Edinburgh; Fife; Inverness-shire; Kinross; Mid Lothian; Moray; Nairn; Orkney; Ross and Cromarty; Scottish Borders; Shetland; Stirlingshire; Sutherland; West Lothian

best wishes
Lesley

[Linda]

Hello Mike

Don't waste your time ordering certs as there are no certs available for this period. As you will probably know, registration before 1855 was not compulsory, and B.D.M's that were registered were registered in the OPR's and no certificates were given.

If you were to order anything, all you would recieve is a transcription of the entry, which contains very limited information unlike the certificates which were introduced after compulsory registration in 1855.

I visit the search rooms in Edinburgh once or twice monthly, and have had many frustrating days with these OPR's

Linda

[Liz from Orkney]

Hello Mike

Don't waste your time ordering certs as there are no certs available for this period. As you will probably know, registration before 1855 was not compulsory, and B.D.M's that were registered were registered in the OPR's and no certificates were given.

If you were to order anything, all you would recieve is a transcription of the entry, which contains very limited information unlike the certificates which were introduced after compulsory registration in 1855.

I visit the search rooms in Edinburgh once or twice monthly, and have had many frustrating days with these OPR's

Linda

That is not true for all counties. Some counties may have basic information, others have lots of info. I received a baptismal record from Orkney that showed my ancestors name, date & place of birth and baptism, and parents names and where they were living. Very useful. My only problem is that I cannot seem to find any marriage entry for the parents in Orkney.

Liz

[lintony]

Liz

Maybe you have been lucky then. Every time I have been to the search rooms and searched for information on microfilmed OPR's I have always found only the most basic of information.

Linda