Irish mother, birth never registered

MrsPriest

My (now deceased) mother was born in Limerick in 1932. Apparently her birth was never registered because my grandmother did not want her to have mandatory vaccinations, which she believed caused the death of another child. My mother emigrated to the UK when she married my British father and never had a passport. My siblings and I would like to apply for Irish passports but cannot do so in the absence of our mother's birth certificate. So far, online searches for baptism, communion, confirmation and education records have proved fruitless. Im looking for sources of information where we might find the necessary proof of our mother's Irish citizenship.

chattering

My grandparent was born on the island of Ireland. Am I an Irish citizen?
Yes, you can apply for Irish citizenship by descent.

In these cases, you can become an Irish citizen through Foreign Birth Registration.

Once a person is entered onto the Foreign Births Register they are an Irish citizen and entitled to apply for an Irish passport.


From Government website

spurious

You won't find baptisms from 1932 online. Your best bet is to contact all the possible Limerick churches she could have been baptised in and ask them to look through their records for you. The parishes generally don't have staff waiting around to do searches, so you might be waiting a while. A donation may hurry things along.

Whatever about not being registered, it would be quite unusual in those days for a child to not be baptised.

Jim2007

spurious wrote: »

You won't find baptisms from 1932 online. Your best bet is to contact all the possible Limerick churches she could have been baptised in and ask them to look through their records for you. The parishes generally don't have staff waiting around to do searches, so you might be waiting a while. A donation may hurry things along.

Whatever about not being registered, it would be quite unusual in those days for a child to not be baptised.

At this stage many of the parishes don’t even have a priest never mind staff. And as many priests have to administer more than one parish it could be along wait.

Jim2007

MrsPriest wrote: »

My (now deceased) mother was born in Limerick in 1932. Apparently her birth was never registered because my grandmother did not want her to have mandatory vaccinations, which she believed caused the death of another child. My mother emigrated to the UK when she married my British father and never had a passport. My siblings and I would like to apply for Irish passports but cannot do so in the absence of our mother's birth certificate. So far, online searches for baptism, communion, confirmation and education records have proved fruitless. Im looking for sources of information where we might find the necessary proof of our mother's Irish citizenship.

In the absence of anything else you are going to have to fall back on church records, Catholic or Church of Ireland, depending on her religion, but these records are not generally on line.

Do you know exactly where your mother was born and grew up?

MrsPriest

Jim2007 wrote: »

In the absence of anything else you are going to have to fall back on church records, Catholic or Church of Ireland, depending on her religion, but these records are not generally on line.

Do you know exactly where your mother was born and grew up?

Yes, she was born and brought up in Limerick City and I have the address where she was born. I know which church she got married in, so think that is most likely where she was baptized.

pinkypinky

Have you absolutely definitively checked there's no actual birth registration?
Is this the case for your mother's siblings as well?

She'll have been baptised. Lots of people got by in this period on just a baptismal record.
My grandfather was never registered (amongst several other siblings - parents just appear to be a bit haphazard) until he tried to claim the OAP. His elder sister had to swear an affidavit about his date of birth. But he went to school, joined the army, married, etc on the strength of his baptismal record.

However, as Chattering said above, you and your siblings can apply for Irish citizenship on the strength of your Irish grandparents. So just get their records and use them instead.

MrsPriest

pinkypinky wrote: »

Have you absolutely definitively checked there's no actual birth registration?
Is this the case for your mother's siblings as well?

She'll have been baptised. Lots of people got by in this period on just a baptismal record.
My grandfather was never registered (amongst several other siblings - parents just appear to be a bit haphazard) until he tried to claim the OAP. His elder sister had to swear an affidavit about his date of birth. But he went to school, joined the army, married, etc on the strength of his baptismal record.

However, as Chattering said above, you and your siblings can apply for Irish citizenship on the strength of your Irish grandparents. So just get their records and use them instead.

Some of the siblings were registered and others not. Only one of them is still alive. There was definitely no birth certificate/registration. We are assuming that she was baptized in the church where she married my English father so will try there. Failing that, we’re hopeful there are birth records for one of our three Irish grandparents.

pinkypinky

It will probably be easier to go the route of a grandparent who has a legal birth certificate. All Limerick city births should be in the Limerick SRD (super-intendent's registration district).

You should be able to get a copy of anyone's birth prior to 1921 on www.irishgenealogy.ie & then you'll need to order a legal copy of it.

Let us know if you need help finding it.

MrsPriest

pinkypinky wrote: »

It will probably be easier to go the route of a grandparent who has a legal birth certificate. All Limerick city births should be in the Limerick SRD (super-intendent's registration district).

That’s great. Thank you. I’m happy to pay for help (it’s harder trying to do this from another country (especially now). I just need to find birth dates and full names of the grandparents as a lot of details are quite sketchy.

Jim2007

MrsPriest wrote: »

Some of the siblings were registered and others not. Only one of them is still alive. There was definitely no birth certificate/registration. We are assuming that she was baptized in the church where she married my English father so will try there. Failing that, we’re hopeful there are birth records for one of our three Irish grandparents.

Well if she was married in the Catholic Church (anywhere) there was a baptismal certificate, because you can’t be married without one. So you can at least be sure you are chasing something that does exist.

You could try and contact the local parish priest there and see if he responds with anything.

pinkypinky

pinkypinky wrote: »

It will probably be easier to go the route of a grandparent who has a legal birth certificate. All Limerick city births should be in the Limerick SRD (super-intendent's registration district).

You should be able to get a copy of anyone's birth prior to 1921 on www.irishgenealogy.ie & then you'll need to order a legal copy of it.

Let us know if you need help finding it.

How do you prove descent from the grandmother with the absence of the mother's registration?

Jim2007

MrsPriest wrote: »

pinkypinky wrote: »

It will probably be easier to go the route of a grandparent who has a legal birth certificate. All Limerick city births should be in the Limerick SRD (super-intendent's registration district).

That’s great. Thank you. I’m happy to pay for help (it’s harder trying to do this from another country (especially now). I just need to find birth dates and full names of the grandparents as a lot of details are quite sketchy.

Try the census records for 1901 or 1911 to get an idea of the birth dates. And from there search the birth records at https://www.irishgenealogy.ie/en/

pinkypinky

Jeremy Beagle wrote: »

How do you prove descent from the grandmother with the absence of the mother's registration?

Irish marriage certificates have both parents' names on it after 1956.

Also, the OP said they had 3 Irish grandparents, so the one on the father's side might be easier to use.

pinkypinky

You can use one of the registered siblings' births to establish the grandparents' exact names and take it from there.