* Multiple Birth Registry Entries for England and Wales

[edjplummer]

I have run into an unusual situation while researching my contemporary relatives. A female in my family has two children for which I see two birth registry entries for each child; the two children were born in the 1970's in England. Each child has a record which features the first husband's name, and then a second record that features the second husbands name. Whilst the second child was born close to the second marriage, the first child was born a couple of years prior to the second marriage. In both cases the Christian names match, and the volume and pages numbers are the same for both double entries.

I was assuming that every child would have one birth entry and then subsequent legal processes (adoption, name change, etc) would occur subsequently. How can a person have two birth registry entries, each with different surnames?

Fascinated to hear from anyone who has experience of similar cases, or any thoughts on matter. Thanks for your time.

[LornaCraig]

There will be only one entry in the register for each child, giving the child's surname as, for example, 'Smith also known as Jones'. Two entries in the GRO index will then have been created (referring, as you have found, to the same volume and page number) so that the birth can be found by searching under either surname.
In the case of the child who was born a couple of years before the second marriage, perhaps there was reason to believe at the time that the mother's first husband was not the father!

[tatewise]

I have come across double entries before.
My mother's Birth is indexed twice; once with surname FULLER, and once with surname BRADSHAW-FULLER, because her father's name was double-barrelled, but often shortened.

Presumably the same mother's maiden name is recorded on all your four copies?

Are the duplicate pairs both recorded in the same quarter, or in different quarters?

If you Google search: Can a birth be registered twice there are various explanations that you might like to consider.

[Jenny143]

My daughter'birth was registered once with a double barreled surname (Strongitharm-Cornell) - she appears in the indexes 3 times - as Strongitharm, as Cornell and as Strongitharm-Cornell.