Which one do I buy?

[Wardy]

Hi all,

I have my grandfathers death certificate which states that at the time of death in May 1921 he was 42.
I do know that he was born in Sheffield, but a search on the FreeBMD site for 1879 has thrown up 3 with the same name,one for March another September and another December.
Is it a case of having to buy all three?!!

[Jan1954]

Do you have his marriage certificate?

This should a) provide his father's name and b) give his age at marriage.

The age might help you to narrow the birth down based upon time of year and some calculations.

You could then ask the GRO to check the father's name on the birth registration and end up paying £4.00 instead of £7.00 if it is not the right one.

[Mona]

If you apply to the local register office, they will look up and check parents names or other info to identify a correct registration, and will only charge you if they issue a certificate.
I recently applied to Salford (Lancs), giving two possiblities for a birth certificate, neither had the correct father, and I was not charged.

[Peter Goodey]

Providing you have some criterion to recognise him by, a standard GRO certificate application for £11.50 will provide an extensive search.

Too many people imagine that you can only apply for a certificate if you have the GRO reference. You sometimes read messages on this site where someone has ordered three or more certificates at £7 each before finding the right one. Instead of paying £21, they could have paid just £11.50 and got GRO do the hard work!


PS Don't forget that you would need to check both Sheffield and Ecclesall Bierlow registration districts for someone born in Sheffield

[Barbara Wilkinson]

If you apply to the local register office, they will look up and check parents names or other info to identify a correct registration, and will only charge you if they issue a certificate.
I recently applied to Salford (Lancs), giving two possiblities for a birth certificate, neither had the correct father, and I was not charged.

I can confirm this! I very rarely use the GRO for certificates, because my experiences with local offices has been exactly as Mona describes. The only one that has not either supplied the correct certificate or not charged was one of the London boroughs - and I cannot remember off the top of my head which one without looking back at my notes - and that was for a marriage. I gave the quarter and year, but they replied that there were too many churches to look for it, so I had to resort to the GRO. Manchester, however, who also have many churches, have always come up trumps! I always give as much information as I have and have been very fortunate in only getting one wrong one - and that was not the fault of the local office; the criteria was right, just not the right person!

[Wardy]

Thank you all for the advice.