General Chat

I'm feeling a bit sad tonight.While collating info for my one-name study I totted up death info over a 25 year period.we glibly talk about a high mortality rate in the past,but this was a shocker.Look at these figures.
total deaths---75

over 80yrs old ---- 1

40--79 -----20

10--49 -----13

0--1 ----41


all those poor babies,and heart -broken mothers.today with a death rate of 8 in a 1000,there would have been at most 1 baby death. with a new grandaughter of4mts old,I can only thank God I live in the wonderful world of modern medicine!!!

It could be half the reason why families were so big back in the 1800s ,one or two of my family groups lost four of their children over a few years leaving only two or three to carry on the family name doubly hard for them if the children they lost were all male leading to the end of a family line,hard to imagine that these days.Fred.

When I first started researching my family I was able to trace,through the parish registers,the sad progress of one little family.

Ruth and Julius married in their late thirties and the baptisms of their three children are recorded over a period of about five years.

A couple of years later the burial of the first of their children to die was recorded.Within a year they had lost all three.

I knew,more or less,where they lived and I could picture Julius walking home from work at different times over those few years.

My gran's maiden name has died out.
Gran had 9 siblings, 5 brothers and 4 sisters - 10 of them in all.
The first born - a boy died at a few months.
The second born (another boy) was given his name, but was special needs. He wasn't sent to an institution and had a job, but couldn't have relationships.
This left 3 boys. All 3 married.
One was killed in the war - and his pregnant wife gave birth 4 months after his death to a stillborn girl.
Brother number 4 had 4 girls.
Brother number 5 had one child - a son - who's gay!!!

My maiden name shouldn't have been mine... my gt grandfather was illegitimate, brought up by his grandparents.... so he took his mother's surname... which was my maiden name. This he passed on to his sons, one of whom was my grandad, and so onto my dad and then us.

One of my brothers was a bit miffy that we had only one boy in the family with our surname.... my other brother's son... however, I pointed out that two of my sisters have sons... one has one, the other two... who have followed family tradition, and their sons and daughters have taken our family name... poor bro said that this didn't matter, and this wasn't REALLY keeping our name alive!, until I asked him what, exactly, he would like to have as his surname, as he was using one that by his own definition wasn't his!!

He did laugh at himself, fairplay!!

My dad was just horrified that his grandad was illegitimate!!

It is this line that has caused me to sob my heart out for the loss of babies.

William's grandparents brought him up... his mother was only one of three survivors of about 10 or 11 siblings... all of the rest died by the time they were three years old.

There is an inscription in Mortehoe churchyard, Devon, that commemorates all of them... I would love to go and see it. When I first read the transcript, I wept for a long time for those poor babies and their parents, what they had gone through!

Love

Daff xxx

We don't realize what we have been spared.Life was probably harder than we could contemplate.

George Orwell wrote in "The Road to Wigan Pier" about the rubber stamp that was used o somebody's clocking in card if they had been killed at work.

Imagine the horror of a job that was that dangerous and the reality of living with a breadwinner who was doing the job with no welfare state.

My great grandmother had 19 children, 9 lived, the others all died before they were two years old.
They were not from a poor family, as great grandad had his own business.
Of those that lived one girl who was going to be a teacher died at 14,
The last one to survive lived till she was 95.

Poor little mites I suppose having so many children one after the other, they were not strong enough to survive.

Dear Shelley on this site, sent me a photograph of their grave. which I was so happy to have, but sad at the same time.

Mo

Back in the late 1940s, I met an elderly great-aunt and asked how many children she had. She answered "seven".

She then drew herself up straight and proud and looked very triumphant and said
"I had fourteen, but I reared seven!!!"
(I think she expected to be cogratulated on her achievement!).

It has been estimated that the average lifespan in England during the Medieval Period was between 20 and 30 years. Things improved but even by the early 19th Century it had only increased by about 10 years.

The average age at death was significantly lower in cities than in rural areas, due to the cramped housing conditions, lack of sanitation and clean water, bad food and the air pollution from the millions of tons of coal burnt annually to feed the factories of the industrial Revolution. In 1811 the average age of death in London was 30 but in the country it was 41.
As the century progressed, sewage and drainage schemes were installed and water supples were taken from rivers ABOVE the sewage outlets. These measures, together with some improvements in housing and the consequential reduction of the main killing diseases, typhus & typhoid, scarlet fever, tuberculosis, measles, cholera, smallbox and dysentery made for a healthier population and gradually the average life span increased. However, it was not that much higher, in 1911 the average age at death in London was still as low as 52, a figure which is unthinkable today. It was not until the great advances in medicine following WW1 that the lifespan of UK citizens began to increase. Today a child born in the UK has an average life expectancy of 78.7 years. Females 81.3, Males 76. 2.

(Source: CIA World Factbook).

It IS sad Maureen......I remember reading once, that they were used to infant mortality in those days.......but surely, as a mother, no-one gets used to the death of a child.....

I know that my Gt.Gt.Grandfather ended up in an asylum, 6 of his 8 children had died.......however can you cope with that......perhaps it wasn't for that reason he was an inmate, but it sure didn't help his mental status....

I have recently found that my Grandfather's baby brother died at 18 months from measles, of all things......and my Gt. Grandmother gave birth to a baby girl two months later........fancy having to cope with the death of one child and giving birth soon after to another.......heart-wrenching stuff.....

So glad I live today.....

x sally

when they talk about average life expectancy of 80,does that mean half of a group of people born at thesame time 80 years ago are still alive,or is there some technical meaning to the term?

Hiya Maureen, it is a bit of a technical term, really... they add all the ages together, then divide by the number of people they have taken the info from... so that means it doesn't really reflect that some folk might die at 20... others at 95.... if those were the only two in the database, your average age would be 20 + 95 divided by 2 so the average age of death would be 57.5...... a bit imprecise, but when you use it for big populations, and follow that through the ages, you get a general picture.

Love

Daff xxxx

thanks Daff, my eyes just glaze over when I hear terms like arithmetic mean,the mode,average etc!!!!

Hi Maureen,

There are 2 things being discussed here.

The first is Average Age At death, which is a precise measurement, it is taken from the Death Registrations reported to the Public Record Office.

The second is "Average Life Expectancy", which can only be an estimate. It is calculated by examining and analysing the trend over each decade on a graph. Throughout history, the line has steadily risen, (despite a blip or two due to disease or war) and this trend can be forecast. It can never be exact but I am sure you will agree that children born today can expect, on average, a longer lifespan than us or our parents.

Bernie, how can Average mean Precise? I was always a bit of a numpty at maths.... but my understanding was that Average is an amalgamation of data... it will give an indication of trends, upturns and downturns in anything, but it cannot surely be precise as it is based on multiple data and stuff like that!! Precise, is surely... you WILL die at such and such an age, cos that is all you are allowed.. Average is surely different to that?

Help!!

Love

Daff xxxx

ps..... I know I have limited understanding... but to me, that would be the same for life expectancy, and average lifespan... the latter is based on exact data.... but it cannot be precise, as it is made up of so many factors.... *gulps* I think!! I am getting more confused now.... off to get a vodka to help me think around corners, lol

Hi Daff,

You are right, an average is an amalgamation of data. However if the data is precise, (as it is with the info given by a doctor when he signs a Deth Cert) then the average is precise.

Take a small example,

10 people die in an area in a year. The DC's, signed by a doctor, give the ages as:

5, 40, 50, 55, 65, 70, 70, 75, 85, 95.

total 610. divide by 10 which gives an average age of 61 for people dying that year in the area.

This is an accurate and precise figure.

Maths is confusing, aint it?

ps. perhaps an easy way of understanding it is that the past can be measured precisely, (if you have accurate records), but the future can only be an estimate.

pps, enjoy your vodka, mine's a pint.

Thanks Bernie....I've had a vodka now *huge grin* so it sorta makes sense, lol......

I don't like averages at the moment..... especially when they are aimed at collating the average date/number of deaths for a given time/period/ailment, lol.... makes for scary reading!

Sorry, Maureen.... I've hijacked your thread!!

Bernie, I'm going to carry on fervently believing that measuring the average death thingy based on precise data, is imprecise in it's results... or I'm a goner, lol!!

Love

Daff xxxx

It seems to me that the only thing the figures prove is that infant mortality is down (thank heavens) and that the average of death is getting higher (which bodes well for us oldies)

I told you my eyes glaze over,now they are crossed as well!!!!
Any way ,I've cheered up a bit now. Looking at another family line,I,ve one ancestor who had 17 children and they all survived.He moved to my home town in the 1850's,bringing with him a substantial number of adult married children,plus their children.
The family profession was glass blowing,and they all lived in adjoining houses,one family unit on each floor.I think they must have had a lot of fun together,so i'm going to think of that tonight.
night-night
maureen