Again, remember that?the earliest possible??date for registration of a death in England and Wales is 1st July 1837.??????
The following tips may help you track down that elusive certificate.
1. Registration in another district.
The hints given in ?Why can?t I find a birth certificate?? and ?Why can?t I find a marriage certificate? may help you.? Remember that death might have occured away from home ? at work, visiting relatives, in hospital ? many elderly people died in the workhouse, which for the Victorian period was often the only affordable medical care available for the less well-off ? or indeed whilst on holiday. I spent some considerable time trying to find the death certificate of Theophilus Wedge, who spent his entire life, as far as I knew, in the Black Country:? in fact he died in Bournemouth whilst on holiday.? In this case, the name helped, but you may not be so lucky.
Remember as well that the boundaries of registration districts change over time: if you find a likely match, then check the details of the registration district on www.freeBMD.org ? half an hour then spent with a map of the area and a copy of the Phillimore Atlas may help resolve your problem.
?2.? Death not in England or Wales.
We?ve covered this before ? see ?Why can?t I find a birth certificate?? and ?Why can?t I find a marriage certificate?
3. Death incorrectly indexed.
Check as many alternative spellings of the name as you can think of. If you can?t think of any alternative spellings of a surname, try playing ?Chinese Whispers? ? this really can help!
4. Index transcription incorrect.
Always, always, look at the original index, especially for earlier registrations where the index is hand-written.
5. The information is only as good as the informant?s knowledge.
By which I mean beware:? it was not unknown for the information to be incorrect, although given in all good faith.?
My cousin only found out when he came to register his mother?s death that her Christain name was not ?Patricia?, but was in fact ?Violet Emily?: she had been known as ?Pat? all her life.
Be aware of nicknames: ?Jack? is a nickname for ?John?, ?Kester? was sometimes used for ?Christopher?.?
Also consider that the death?may have?been registered under a middle name: for example, John Arthur Smith might be indexed as Arthur Smith.
Where age at death is given in the index, don?t discard a likely possibility just because the age is wrong, particulary with older people:? if the informant didn?t actually know the age, ?75? might actually mean ?no idea, but looked about 75 to me.?? ?Also remember that the deceased might have lied about their age, particularly a woman who had an illegitimate child in her youth and wanted to hide this fact.? Some people lied about their age in order to increase it (presumably for admiration ? ?I?m 95, you know??). And some people had no idea how old they were.
To address the more grisley aspects: where a body is found and cannot be identified, the certificate will appear at the?end of the relevant index as ?unknown?: and I?m afraid that you will have virtually no chance of identifying your particular relative.
6.? Change of Name.
Is there a possibility that a widow has remarried (or indeed a spinster married)?? Or could a male relative have changed his name for some reason?? Recheck marriage indices; or prepare yourself for a long search through census returns checking first names, approximate ages and places of birth.
7. Stillbirths.
Stillbirths ? where a child was born dead ? do not appear in the register of deaths. There is a separate register of stillbirths, which is only open to immediate relatives, which I believe to be restricted to the parents.
Where a child was born alive but died shortly after birth, the law required registration of the death. However, in my personal experience this was not always the case: I have found records of such deaths in local cemetery registers, but no corresponding birth or death certificate.
8. Coroner?s inquests.
Where a coroner?s inquest was required, the death certificate is not issued until after the inquest, even though the body may be released for burial.? Inquests usually take place shortly after death, but a friend of mine discovered one certificate issued 5 years after the date of death.?
Survival of the papers of coroner?s inquests are patchy, but well worth searching out.? Local newpapers also often reported the coroner?s findings, but without a date of death, registration or inquest, you are in for a long search.
9.? No body, no certificate.
If a body cannot be found, no death certificate can be issued ? for example if someone is lost at sea and the body never recovered, or if they were involved in some sort of disaster, such as a colliery disaster, where the body might remain underground.
A large number of people killed during the London Blitz have no death certificate: for example, many of the people who were almost certainly in the Cafe De Paris in Central London, which took a direct hit.?
Sometimes you have just have to presume that no body was ever found ? this is almost certainly the case with my ancestor Caleb Hartland, who is last recorded in the 1871 census: thereafter his wife is described as a widow.
?o0o?
Consider looking at other sources to narrow down the field of possibilities: electoral registers, cemetery records or the annual Calendar of Wills (this?can be?particularly useful as?the Calendar?gives name, address, date of death and the names of the executors, who are often relatives).
?o0o?
If in doubt: post your query here, and I?ll do my best.
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