Genealogy Chat

Following on from Abbess......... also, burying an infant in the coffin of a stranger meant that an unbaptised child would get to be buried in consecrated ground and with the correct burial service being read - this would have been some solace to many parents of unbaptised and stillborn babies. Merry

Cremation has only been an option since the 1880s, and wasn't terribly popular until the early 20th century. It's almost certain that 'your' babies were indeed buried. I think the burial-with-strangers practice tended to be for the very, very young, not toddlers, but I could be wrong.

Since I was a child I had been aware that I had another sister who was stillborn, but it was never discussed. Once I started researching the family I wanted to track down as much information about her as possible. All I knew was that she was born beween 1949 and 1958. The Registrar General office in Southport were brilliant and after a number of searches came up with a stillbirth certificate. The first big shock was that she had been born almost exactly one year to the day before me. It then struck me that she could only have been buried in our local cemetery as there was no crematorium locally at the time. I took a chance contacting our Council about cemetary records and one visit later to our local office I had not only been shown the actual burial record, but been given an aproximate location for her burial. Alas at that time (1958) it was convention to bury in an unmarked grave with another public burial but the wonderful man at the records office had taken the time to study the registers and work out the most likely plot. My sisters and I were able to place some flowers there last year for the first time ever. Sorry to be so long winded, but my point is never give up and try all avenues. Municipal cemetary staff are wonderfully helpful and treat every enquiry with tact and respect.

my mum had a brother that died at 3monthes 1930 her dad carried the coffin she and her mum and siblings follow and he was buried in a small grave by the path she says a baby of familys who were poor or had no money were buried this way do not know if records of these where kept Val