Death at Sea

[momat]

I have a certificate of Death for my Uncle who died at Sea while returning to New Zealand.
He had been in the UK which is the country of his birth.

All it says is Name , usual Residence ,Sex, Race, Marital Status, DOB , DOD & Place of Death (Ship's Lounge)Cause of Death

There is nothing to state who his parents or wife were ,(There had been 3) ,not at the same time I may add.
This would give me lots of information if I had it.
So my question is, would there be an other Death Certificate issued by either the country he resided in ( New Zealand) or the shipping Company, in this instance the Chandris Line ,a Greek ship.

[Ann In the UK]

I'm sure others are more expert on this than I am. But I'll put my tuppence worth in anyway - was he still a British National, or had he been naturalised in NZ? If he was a British Citizen, even though he wasn't on a British ship, I'd imagine his death would also need to be registered here, wouldn't it?

Worth a look anyway.

[emanday]

When my Great Grandfather was lost at sea on the way to Italy the captain had to register a full report to the British Consulate in the destination port.

I'd imagine this would also apply in your case. If he was a naturalized NZ citizen, then maybe such a report would have been registered with the NZ shipping authorities.

Who knows, being a Greek ship, it might even have been done at the Greek consulate in NZ.

[momat]

Thanks emanday and Ann

Worth a look at those options.
It's a case of any port in a storm here.Literally !!!!

[Currie]

Hello Maureen,

Death registration systems generally speaking are intended for deaths occurring in the country or state where the registration system operated. U.K. law does however require that deaths on board ships travelling to and from British ports be reported. These reports end up as part of the English or Scottish BDM systems.

The obligation to notify was on the Ships master, not the relatives of the deceased. The event occurred outside of the territory of the U.K. and the relatives were not obliged to do anything. There was an option for relatives or anyone else to report a death of a U.K. citizen overseas to a British Embassy but whether or not they did so was entirely their own affair. These reports of deaths by the ships master or consul were not death certificates as such. They did not, for example, add additional information about prior spouses and so on just because Scottish death registrations at home normally required such a thing. All reports were the same, done according to standard guidelines or maybe on a standard form and contained very basic information.

The finer details that appear on Scottish death certificates are not recorded on ships passenger lists, it would be unavailable to shipping lines, unlikely to be known by travelling companions, and often unlikely to come to mind even of family members travelling with the dead person without consultation with others or with family documents. Have a look at even a recent passport to see what information is carried around by travellers.

You seem to be talking about a relatively recent death when onboard refrigeration would probably be available. Was the body brought to N.Z. and was he buried there. I don’t know whether deaths at sea on N.Z. bound ships needed to be registered, or at least reported there in a similar way to as described above but I suppose that if a ship arrived in N.Z. with a dead body on board ready for burial there would have been a few questions asked and more than likely a required registration.

I don’t know how N.Z. death certificate detail compares to Scottish ones but in any case it depends on who did the reporting to the Registrar and what they knew about the deceased. If he didn’t make it to N.Z. where exactly was the ship when he died. Did they have burials at sea in those days, I think not, but I don’t really know when that practice ceased. Was the voyage direct to N.Z. or were there intervening ports where the body could have been off loaded and some paperwork done.

Have you checked available newspaper archives such as the London Times for any reports of death on board and possibly information about the ships planned route and progress. Where did the ‘death certificate’ you have come from? It sounds like the report put in by the ship’s master.

See information on this page regarding Deaths at sea of British Nationals and the section regarding General Register Office. The Birth and Death Registration Act 1874 as it relates to deaths at sea is hereunder. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cata ... ID=246&j=1

British immigrants tended to be a bit slow in acquiring Australian citizenship, that’s if they ever bothered, probably because it made little difference. Maybe it was the same in New Zealand.

That's as far as I know and all I can think of at the moment.

Hope that’s useful,
Alan

1874 (224) Registration of births and deaths. A bill [as amended in committee] to amend the law relating to the registration of births and deaths in England, and to consolidate the law respecting the registration of births and deaths at sea.

Registration of Births and Deaths at Sea.
36. The provisions of this Act, save as is herein expressly provided, shall not apply to the registration of births and deaths on board a vessel at sea, with respect to which the following provisions shall have effect:
(1.) The captain or master of or other person having the command or charge of a British ship shall, as soon as may be after the occurrence of the birth of a child or the death of a person on board such ship, record in his log book or otherwise the fact of such birth or death, and the particulars required by the fourth schedule to this Act to be registered concerning such birth or death, or such of them as may be known to him, and shall, (unless the ship is one of Her Majesty's ships,) upon the arrival of such ship at any port of the United Kingdom, or at such other time or place as the Board of Trade may from time to time with respect to any ship or class of ships direct, deliver or send, in such form and manner as the Board of Trade may from time to time direct, a return of the facts so recorded to the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen.
(2.) Where a ship which is not a British ship carries passengers to or front any port of the United Kingdom as the port of destination or the port of departure of such ship, the provisions of this section shall apply to the captain or master of or other person having the command or charge of such ship, in like manner as if it were a British ship.
(3.) Where the said return is directed by the Board of Trade (whether the ship is British or foreign) to be delivered upon the arrival of the ship, or the discharge of the crew, or otherwise, at any port or place out of the United Kingdom, the Board of Trade may, if they think fit, direct that the return instead of being delivered to the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen shall be delivered, and the same shall accordingly be delivered, if such port or place is within Her Majesty's dominions, to the shipping master or collector of customs at such port or place, and if it is a foreign port or place, to the principal British consular officer at the said foreign port or place, and such shipping master, collector, or officer shall send the same, as soon as may be, by post or otherwise, to the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen.
(4.) Where it appears from any such return that the father of any child so born, or if the child is a bastard the mother of such child, was a Scotch or Irish subject of Her Majesty, or that any person whose death is mentioned in such return was a Scotch or Irish subject of Her Majesty, the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen shall from time to time send a certified copy of so much of the return as relates to such birth or death to the Registrar General of Births and Deaths in Scotland or Ireland, as the case may require.
(5.) The Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen shall from time to time send to the Registrar General of Births and Deaths in England a certified copy of every other such return, or of that part of every such return which is not so sent to the Registrar General of Births and Deaths in Scotland or Ireland;
(6.) A captain of or other person having charge of one of Her Majesty's ships shall, upon the arrival of any such ship in any port of the United Kingdom, or at such other time as the Commissioners of the Admiralty may from time to time direct, deliver or send, in such manner and form as the said Commissioners may from time to time direct, a return of the facts recorded in pursuance of this section to that Registrar General of Births and Deaths to whom a copy of such return would, if the ship were a merchant ship, be sent under the provisions of this section by the Registrar General of Shipping and Seamen.
(7.) Every Registrar General of Births and Deaths to whom a copy of any return or a return is sent in pursuance of this section shall cause the same to be filed and preserved in or copied in a book to be kept by him for the purpose, and to be called a marine register book, and such book shall be deemed to be a certified copy of a register book within the meaning of the Acts relating to the registration of births and deaths in England, Scotland, and Ireland respectively.
(8.) Every captain or master of or other person having charge of a ship who fails to comply with this section shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding five pounds for each, offence; and such penalty may be recovered in the same courts and places and in the like manner, and when recovered shall be applied in, like manner, as a penalty render the Merchant Shipping Act, 1851.
(9.) This section shall extend to all places and persons within British jurisdiction.
(10.) Terms in this section shall have the same meaning as in the Merchant Shipping Act, 1864.

[momat]

This happened in 1977 and he was Buried at Sea.

The data stated on the Certificate of Death would have been taken from his Passport as likely source of information

As the ship was New Zealand bound , I have been in touch with the Department of Internal Affairs in New Zealand and await their response.

This Family have caused no end of headaches as their names are changed so often it is like a " 57 variety of a certain product "
Unfortunately they are my family !