Seeking advice on conflicting birth dates

gerdalt · 13-07-2015 9:58pm #1

For many years I have had the birth certs for two grand uncles born in Roscommon in the 1860s.
With the recent release of the NLI Parish Records I have found the baptism entries for both of these ancestors.
HOWEVER - in both cases the baptism date is several months prior to the date on the birth cert.
I would welcome speculation on why this might be so and which date is more likely correct.
Ger

L1011 · 13-07-2015 10:21pm

As its the 1860s, registration was only new then and people were often unaware / unused to it. As there were penalties for late registration, dates were often fudged, sometimes seriously, to avoid them.

This isn't guaranteed to be the case but it can explain it.

gerdalt · 13-07-2015 11:02pm

Thanks for that L1011.
That would suggest therefore that the earlier baptism record may be the more reliable?
Ger.

pinkypinky · 13-07-2015 11:04pm

You can't have the baptism without the baby! RCs at that stage were very unlikely to wait more than a week to baptise for fear of limbo.

One way to check would be to get a birth cert for a random child or two in the baptismal register and see what they said. If they're off too, you might be looking at a lazy priest, but I think it's most likely as L1011 suggests.

Waitsian · 13-07-2015 11:26pm

pinkypinky wrote:

....you might be looking at a lazy priest...

Perish the thought! Geddit? Perish. Parish.

I'll get my coat, maybe stick to the day job.

gerdalt · 13-07-2015 11:28pm

Just to be clear about what you are suggesting:
The parish baptism record shows the child born May 28 (say) and baptised May 29th. The birth cert says child born the following December 21st.
So parents had child baptised immediately after birth but left the registration for several months due to ignorance or carelessness. Then when asked about birth date, they lied.
Maybe . . . .
Ger

P. Breathnach · 14-07-2015 12:12am

gerdalt wrote: »

Just to be clear about what you are suggesting:
The parish baptism record shows the child born May 28 (say) and baptised May 29th. The birth cert says child born the following December 21st.
So parents had child baptised immediately after birth but left the registration for several months due to ignorance or carelessness. Then when asked about birth date, they lied.
Maybe . . . .
Ger

I'd say it's stronger than maybe. I have several cases in my family of children who were apparently baptised before they were born. I think I read somewhere that the fine for late registration kicked in after 3 months, and the fine was five shillings - enough to make a noticeable dent in the finances of most families.

pinkypinky · 14-07-2015 9:45am

I agree with P.Breathnach - it's much more than a maybe.

The civil records are not considered to be catching 100% (or 99.9999%) until the mid 1870s. Take a modern parallel. Lots of people are not paying their water charges yet, because we're still getting used to the system and some people are being ostriches about it. But in 15 years time, I suspect all or almost all people will be paying them.

Hermy · 14-07-2015 10:08am

pinkypinky wrote: »

...because we're still getting used to the system...

Is that what we're doing?:pac:

Seeking advice on conflicting birth dates

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