A further problem with England and Wales Birth Registrations

LegacyUser

Stewart Millar said: In addition to the fundamental error of birth registrations not being attributable by FS to the Birth in the Vitals section . . . .

. . . the record data presented for the birth registrations no longer includes the "Page Number".

The Page Number is an essential element for applying for a certificate . . . and for differentiating between entries for the same named individuals in the same quarter and the same registration district.

This - vital - piece of information now needs to be picked up from either the GRO web site or freebmd etc.

Somebody in FS making these changes has clearly no idea what they are doing - please fix it.

LegacyUser

MaureenE said: The collection is "England and Wales Birth Registration Index, 1837-2008"
https://www.familysearch.org/search/c...

The description says "The index includes name, record type, year, quarter, district, county, volume, and PAGE NUMBER"... These indexes can be used to order a copy of the actual certificate"

If the page number is not there, you can't order the certificate !!

LegacyUser

Christine said: Yes, page number is important, and should be included in the index. However, one vastly more important piece of info is not available on the FS index (and usually not on the Free BMD index) - mother's maiden name, which IS available on the GRO website.

It would be fabulous if FS could work with the General Register Office to link mother's maiden names to FS indexes, but until that happens, I always recommend to those I am helping that they search the GRO index for those valuable mother's maiden names and add those sources to their familytree profiles.

I know I have mentioned it before, but the GRO index is invaluable for completing family groups. I use it to find additional children who were born and died between census records, death dates of children who died early, maiden names of first or second wives to make sure the children are listed with the correct mother, etc.

I would LOVE FS to develop a partnership with GRO to index marriage registrations!

LegacyUser

Adrian Bruce said: Given that both FreeBMD and the GRO Index site ( see https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/ce... ) are free to access, the matter is one of inconvenience.

However, accessing the GRO index data and stuffing it all into one collection is actually not trivial. By 2000, a birth certificate reference looks like this (name omitted):
DOR Q1/2000 in Canterbury with Swale (5601D) Reg D2T Entry Number 123

Now, I've not sat down to see what those items actually represent but an entry number certainly isn't a page number. Deciding what to do with this revised format of data is not a trivial matter. I think that I've previously decided that there are actually three formats that have to be somehow loaded together if you want a single collection. Going for the lowest common denominator won't work - but stuffing subtly different items into one might not work either. And, you have to recognise that there's a problem in the first place.

Who knows, the load process might be unchanged and is simply attempting to copy a page number over for this later data but no-one has realised that the page number isn't there for the later items? Until Stewart?

LegacyUser

Stewart Millar said: Let me illustrate a real problem I have just encountered with this problem . . .

I need to attach a death registration . . . my choices are:



or



I can tell the difference from the GRO web site . . . and I know I want the registration for the 2 year old on Page 133 . . . but the FS version gives me no means of choosing between them.



This is not a mere inconvenience - the change made by FS to exclude the page number is a genuine road block to using these death registration sources.

It needs fixing.

LegacyUser

Adrian Bruce said: Just open the document information bit to the right of your screen shot for Edward Morgans.



But I didn't see that until several minutes had gone, when I opened the document info to look at the citation data for this index. And because I was looking at the citation data, I completely missed the "Document Information - Page" above.

Why was the page number moved there and replaced (I imagine) by "Affiliate Line Number"? I strongly suspect that's the line number on the page of deaths in the actual register - something that's (a) quite useless for ordering and (b) quite useless without the page number?

If "Affiliate Line Number" is there to accomodate later format DCs, (if) then why alter the earlier formats?

LegacyUser

Stewart Millar said: For information with reference to the response from Christine above . . .

FindMyPast are already adding the mother's maiden name to birth registrations - not sure if the task is completely finished - and I have seen no announcement about this feature.

In FMP search there is (as yet) no specific search feature for "mother's maiden name" - but I have found that using the "optional keywords" for the mother’s maiden name does the job - but will include a few other records that that match that name in other scenarios.

I understand that FS uses the FMP registration indexes - from a certain point in time - never sure if the FS versions are updated with FMP corrections - or now, whether or not the FS/FMP partnership will extend to FS having acess to the new FMP indexing of the mother's maiden name.

see example:

LegacyUser

Stewart Millar said: With reference to my impossible choice between death registrations above - the only solution is to ignore the FS death registrations and attach the FindMyPast version of the death registration that I know is the one that I need - the one referencing "Page 133".

I am most disappointed that this topic and the earlier topic - https://getsatisfaction.com/familysea...
. . . . have attracted no FS response - not even a recognition of the problem or an explanation of these seemingly inexplicable changes.

LegacyUser

Stewart Millar said: Thank you Adrian - who would have thought of that? - well spotted!

Addition to my Comment - having looked at the GRO Registration Index page - it appears that the "Affiliate Line Number" is the actual line position on page of index entries - the two in question occupying lines 7 and 8.

LegacyUser

Adrian Bruce said: Yes, it goes against the grain of all the FS User Interface.

Genealogical Information is presented on the left side - as per your screen shot. The document information is just citation stuff, plumbing data if you like. And yet here, a vital component for certificates of this date, has been shunted over there.

Please FamilySearch, bring it back where people can see it!