General Chat

One other little snag I just found: I failed to find a relative in one particular census because the digital transcriber had simply misread the age by 10 years: it was OK on the form, but she was not appearing when I set up the search. It was only when I tried 1864 plus or minus 10 years, that I found her.
And the mis-readings of unusual surnames in the census index are mind-blowing!
Rimbaud

Thanks for your replies, much appreciated. He is 15/18 years older than his wife which makes me suspect he was actually younger than he states. Could it be something to do with receiving poor money, I have read that this is a possibility on various genealogy sites? I do know that the family were fairly poor - my dad used to drink out of jam jars and had no shoes at times. Thanks Florence for the suggestion, I have looked closely at the record and I'm 99% sure it says a 4 and a 7 on the other one. I have also considered that he may be an immigrant from England living in Ireland since there is a record in London of a person of the same name yet born 14/11 years after the stated births on the Irish census. This person disappears off the census in London just before his marriage in Ireland. It is an uncommon surname too. I also cannot see any other families of that name living in the Laois/Tipperary area where they are living apart from in Dublin. Yet his wife has a wide extended family in the area.

melanie, what about if the 7 was really a 4. sometimes the writing can be hard to see. is it clearly a 7?
florence

My grandmother was born in 1888 and all her life she celebrated her birthday on 13th January. When she went to claim her pension she found out her actual birthday was 21st January. Her mother, (my Gt Grandmother) could not read or write and this was the main cause of incorrect dates. Nothing was written down, it was all word of mouth and like chinese whispers, the facts altered over the years.

It is fairly common.

In some areas it was not the done thing for the wife to be older than her husband by more than a couple of years, so both massaged their ages down and up so they appeared to be of similar age. Problem was ten years later they forgot what they had said last time....!

I think - as Joan has said - that a lot of people just didn't remember when they were born. I suppose they had more to get on with than remembering birthdays.

Sue

I have an ancestor who is 54 in 1901 and 67 in 1911. Why the difference?