Genealogy Chat

Well that is curious!

The parents married here in Australia in 1928, had 3 daughters here and then went to the UK where I found 2 sons born. The first one died aged 5 in 1941 and then this son I refer to in my original post was born in the same quarter of that year with same details for mother's maiden name (ROSS). The mother was 18 when she married so was 41 when he was born. The family then returned to Australia in 1948.

The thing is, my mother had a child with him (they were not married so sadly it became a forced adoption, as was the custom in Australia at the time, against her will). Mum says she was told by his mother that he (the child's dad, b. 1941) was adopted in England as a baby!

At first I thought maybe the child was born to one of the daughters and it was a cover story - but their eldest daughter was born 1929 so seems too young to have had a child in 1941! (not impossible I guess!) And then I found the birth reg with mother as ROSS...

It is really very odd. I will ask my mum about it and see what she thinks...if my half-brother is interested (we are in touch) I might get the UK birth certificate.

Thanks everyone :-)

An adoptive child's birth is NOT re-registered replacing the original after adoption. The normal procedure is to make a notation on the index of the original such as "A see xxxx" , this then indicates that at sometime another "Short" birth certificate has been issued. The short certificate will show the child's names which may or may not have been changed but no birth parents details are indicated. If adoption was the cause of events then the adoptive parents details will I believe be shown. This short certificate then replaces the individuals original birth certificate for legal purposes.

One possibility for the circumstances is if the child's birth parents divorced and its mother perhaps then remarried. The child might then have been adopted by the mother's new husband. Under such circumstances the child's name may well not have been changed from its original one. That could depend upon the age of the child when the adoption occurred.

http://www.genesreunited.co.uk/boards/board/genealogy_chat/thread/1325025

see this thread for a similar query

jan

No, an adopted child is not re-registered.

He/she would be provided with an adoption cert, and a short 'birth' cert recording the new name and original DOB

A child can only be born once......................

Hi all

Hoping someone can please help with this question.

I have found a birth reg for someone on FreeBMD (1941) who I had been told was adopted. But the parents names (surname and mother's maiden name) are those of his family as known to us ie who we thought were his adoptive parents. Also his given names are the same.

So...is an adopted child's birth 're-registered' with his adoptive details? And does this replace his original birth certificate? If so would the certificate have any detail of the adoption on it?

Or have we been told porkies? :-)