Family History Class Notes – Marriage Certificates, Australia -101

In our last class, we looked at Birth Certificates in Australia. We looked at our own full birth certificate and made note of the information it gave to step back another generation.

Remember when researching your family history, you start with yourself and move back generation by generation with documentation.

We learned that on modern full birth certificates the parent’s names, age, and place of birth are recorded. Also on the certificate, you will usually find the date and place of marriage of the parents. Due to the cost of the certificates and with the actual date and place stated on your birth certificate you might be tempted to assume the information is correct and you can skip getting your parent’s marriage certificate.

My answer to that is ‘maybe’, but only if you can find other records which all lead you to the same conclusion.

The parent or the informant on a birth certificate is not required to offer proof of marriage when they register a birth. The information is taken in good faith, but it may not be correct.

In the last class, I said that the parents were responsible to register a birth. However, they are not, nor ever have been responsible for the registration of a marriage.

In Australia, you can only be married by a licensed celebrant. These are ordained ministers or priests, court magistrates, and state celebrants. They obtain their ‘license to marry’ from the Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages in the state where they reside, not the church authority. It is the licensed celebrant’s duty to register the marriage with the Registrar of Births, Death and Marriages offices.

However, just as there is a ‘hundred years rule’ for births, there is a fifty-year rule for marriage. That means you cannot get a marriage certificate unless the marriage is more than fifty years ago.

In Australia, there is no central place for births, marriages, and deaths. Each state has its own Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriage in its capital city.

In recent years each Registrar’s office has built a website where you can search for free the indexes to their historical documents.  These indexes are free to consult. The large subscription sites use ways to link and use these free sites. They do not have access to any more information than is on the free government websites.

Be aware each of these indexes is a little different. For example- In the Queensland Index for marriages, which took place over fifty years ago, it actually gives the date of marriage, while on the NSW Index it only gives the year of registration.

Here are the websites for these indexes.

https://www.familyhistory.bdm.qld.gov.au/

https://www.bdm.nsw.gov.au/

https://www.justice.tas.gov.au/bdm/home

https://www.sa.gov.au

https://bdm.justice.wa.gov.au

https://nt.gov.au/law/bdm/search

Just as you might not be able to find a reference in the index for birth, you may not be able to find a marriage in these indexes, even if the date and place are stated on a birth certificate.

Sometimes this is because you are not using the spelling of the names as given on the registration, but more often or not it is because for various reasons the marriage did not actually take place.

Remember you are looking for information concerning an ‘event’ in the person’s life. There are many records that give information on a person’s marriage or leading up to the event. Some of these you may be able to get even if the marriage is not fifty years ago.

Remember one document is not ‘definite proof’ of an event. You can only get a reasonable proof by a range of documents all pointing to the same conclusion.

Here is a list of records you may use to build a reasonable case for the marriage information for an ancestor:- Certified Civil Marriage Certificate; Marriage Transcription; Church Register Entry for Marriage; Church certificate of Marriage; Banns Register Entry for Intended Marriage; Banns Notice in a Church Newspaper; Statement of Intention to Marry Register; Newspaper Engagement Notice/Kitchen Tea; Newspaper Notice/ Report of Marriage; Photographs of Marriage Ceremony/Reception; Family Register in Bible/Prayer Book; Memorabilia-bucks and/or Hen’s Party/Wedding; Newspaper Report of Tin-kettling/House Party; Official Divorce Papers/Report in Newspaper; Letters and diaries and Oral Stories-Personal Recollections of marriage by family and/or friends.

This list is not definitive and you could possibly think of more. You will not be able to get all these records for each marriage. They are just a guide.

I have used this list to make myself a Data Sheet to put in my files on an individual person.

[A pdf download of this Data Sheet can be found on this website under the Resources and Examples tab.]

Many of these records you may find in family papers and memorabilia. If someone shares these with you please record them as the source of the document with their name, date, and address on your copy of the document. Back or front depending on your skills and preference. Just because you now have a copy, please remember this is not your document to scan and put up on the Internet.

It is good family history manners even if you create your own document, such as a transcription, which is quite legal, you should get permission from the original owner to share the information and give them credit for originally sharing with you. Later down the track, they are then likely to share more with you, and you will feel comfortable sharing with them, as you will expect the same courtesy.

If you have been one of my students in the fifty years I have been teaching family history you know I actually practice what I preach when it comes to records. Here is the Evidence of Marriage Data Form for my mother.

Now just a word of warning about using indexes. They do not have the full information a certificate has. If you only use an index make sure it is the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages website. Transcription errors often creep into copies, which can put your research away off track.

For example- My Maternal Grandmother Harriet May Bell only had one brother, Henry William Bell. According to the index on the Ancestry.com website, he married Hilda Annie Peck at Broken Hill in 1915. If you check the index on the website of the Registrar of Births Deaths and Marriages for New South Wales, the marriage was registered at Bulli in 1915. These two places are approximately 1100 kilometres apart. Which is correct? By making a search in Trove Historical Newspapers on the National Library of Australia website you will find an account in the local newspapers for 1915, which states the marriage took place in the Methodist Church at Thirroul on 21st April. Thirroul and Bulli are less than three kilometres apart. Be very careful and diligent in your research.

Family History Class Notes – Birth Certificates, Australia- 101

In our last class, I invited you to look at your own birth certificate for information concerning your parents. You might think your next step would be to get your parent’s birth certificates using the information stated on your own certificate. This would be a reasonable step towards your own ancestral research plan. However, you might be shocked to know you cannot get another person’s birth certificate unless they were born over a hundred years ago. This is to do with people’s right to privacy and also to stop others using these documents for fraudulent activities such as identity theft.

If your parents are still living, ask them if they have a full copy of their birth certificate and would they be willing for you to make a transcription of the information on it. If they do not have a copy, encourage them to apply for one, even if you actually pay for it. They are the only ones legally able to apply for their own birth certificate. If they are deceased there may be a copy in their private papers. Find out who in the family might have these papers. They may allow you to sight and make a transcription of the document. Even if the person is now deceased you still cannot get a birth certificate unless they were born over 100 years ago.

If your parents, grandparents or another ancestor was born over one hundred years ago in Australia you may find their birth reference number, full name, names of parents and place of birth in the online government indexes.

In Australia, there is no central place for births, marriages, and deaths for the whole of the country. Each state has its own Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriage in its capital city.

In recent years each Registrar’s office has built a website where you can search the indexes to their historical documents for births over a hundred years ago.  These indexes are free to consult. The large subscription sites use ways to link and use these free sites. They do not have access to any more information than is on the free government websites.

Be aware each of these indexes is a little different. For example- In the Queensland Index for births, which took place over a hundred years ago, it actually gives the date of birth, while on the New South Wales Index it only gives the year of registration. This is usually the year of birth but not always.

Here are the websites for the offices responsible for the registration of births in each state.

https://www.familyhistory.bdm.qld.gov.au/

https://www.bdm.nsw.gov.au/

https://www.justice.tas.gov.au/bdm/home

https://www.sa.gov.au

https://bdm.justice.wa.gov.au

https://nt.gov.au/law/bdm/search

Please be aware until recent times the parents were responsible for making sure a birth was registered. Sometimes they just didn’t get around to it. In that case, you may not find the birth reference you were looking for. Another reason you may not find it is that you are not using the spelling which was used at the registration, or the child was registered without a Christian name, so it may be registered as an unnamed male or female.

Now, what if, no-one in the family has the certificate or is not willing to share, or you cannot find in in the index, even if it over a hundred years, and should be registered. No, your research does not need to stop. There are ways around this hurdle.

Remember you are looking for information concerning an ‘event’ in the person’s life. There are many records that give information on a person’s birth or leading up to the event. Some of these you may be able to get even if the birth is not one hundred years ago. For example, the birth date may be on a headstone or plaque in a public cemetery or on a funeral service sheet.

Remember one document is not ‘definite proof’ of an event. You can only get a reasonable proof by a range of documents all pointing to the same conclusion.

Be aware your family tree not only includes your ancestors but your descendants too. This means you should be collecting births for them also. However, it is illegal to disseminate private information on living persons without their consent. Just hold this information in your private records file.

Here is a list of records you may use to build a reasonable case for the birth information on an ancestor or descendant.

Full (Certified) Birth Certificate; Birth Certificate Transcription; Church Baptism Certificate; Church Baptism Register Entry; Christening Memorabilia (mugs, spoons, etc); Family Register in Bible; Newspaper Notice of Birth; Adoption Papers; Newspaper Notice of Adoption; Family Letters & Diaries; Passport; Citizenship Documents; Baby Shower Memorabilia; Ultra-Sound Film; Photographs and/or video of Birth/Hospital Visit; Hospital Crib Tag and/or Leg/Arm Bands; Oral Stories/Personal Recollections of Birth from Family & Friends; Headstone or Cemetery Plaque and Funeral Order of Service.

This list is not definitive and you could possibly think of more. You will not be able to get all these records for any one person. They are just a guide.

I have used this list to make myself a Data Sheet to put in my files on an individual person.

[A pdf download of this Data Sheet can be found on this website under the Resources and Examples Tab.]

Many of these records you may find in family papers and memorabilia. If someone shares these with you please record them as the source of the document with their name, date, and address on your copy. Back or front depending on your skills and preference. Just because you now have a copy, please remember this is not your document to scan and put up on the Internet.

This is the Data Sheet filled in for my mother, Margaret Nola Baxter. This is one way I organize and track my progress with my family history research.

It is good family history manners even if you create your own document, such as a transcription, which is quite legal, you should get permission from the original owner to share the information and give them credit for originally sharing with you. Later down the track, they are then likely to share more with you, and you will feel comfortable sharing with them, as you will expect the same courtesy in return.

Family History Class Notes- Where Do I Start?

You start your family history journey with yourself. Then work backward from yourself slowly, from the known to the unknown, verifying and documenting your information, and if possible from more than one source. If you do not do this you may end up following someone else’s family line, and wasting money and time.

The key family documents for doing a family history are the Birth, Marriage and Death records of our ancestors. Not everyone married but everyone was born and died. There are many records that help us find this information.

Talk to family members and take notes of the information you are told, but remember you will need to verify it all.

This includes getting documents to support your ‘facts’ of birth, marriage and death dates and places. Particularly of interest are the legal documents for these events.

Be prepared to spend money on purchasing full copies of the key birth, death or marriage certificates of your family line. It is a false economy to try to research your family history without referring to your correct key primary documents.

Locating the documents.

Some of you will already have in your possession either by having acquired it previously for legal purposes or being passed down from your parents, a copy of your own birth certificate. However, be aware in Australia there is a difference between an ‘extract of a birth certificate’ and a ‘full birth certificate’.  For example, many years ago most people got an ‘extract of their birth certificate’ so they could get a vehicle license or a passport. This has the full name, place, and date of birth of the individual. Today you need a certified copy of a full birth certificate for many circumstances including applying for a passport, so many people will already have this important document. This full birth certificate will give you clues to other documents you will need as you progress on your quest to find your ancestors.

In Australia, most modern birth certificates will have what we term ‘full information’ however this was not always so for all states. Since civil registration began in  Victoria,(1852)  NSW (1856) and Queensland (1859),  a full birth certificate has not only the full name; place and date of the birth; but also, parents full names, including mother’s maiden name or in case of a widow her former married name; date and place of parent’s marriage; place of birth and age of parents; and all other children previously born into the family, often including both their name and age.

By studying your own birth certificate you can see that it is a stepping stone back to another generation, that is it gives information on your parents, so now you can search for their certificates.

It is at this stage most people use the Birth, Death and Marriage Indexes for their state of interest. Many Internet-based indexes are being released, but due to the privacy laws of each state, their range and availability vary.

Be aware you cannot photocopy and share the Birth, Marriage, and Death Certificates you purchase from the Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages. All certified certificates from the Register of Births, Deaths, and Marriages are legal documents and when you apply for such you undertake not scan or photocopy.

However, you can make a transcription without legal problems and I encourage you to do so to share and include in your family history research notes. I have included a transcription I made of the certified copy of the birth certificate of my Maternal Great-Grandfather, John Bell.[See Above]. A pdf copy under Resources and Examples Tab on this website.

Harriet Hodgett’s Journeys by Sea- Part 1

I have been researching and writing Harriet’s story for some time now. I knew it would not be easy, but the more I do, the more I need to do, to actually to do justice to the project. I have tried to ‘block- out’ the story, and arrange research to build the story in chunks.

In recent weeks I have been concentrating on researching and writing about Harriett’s sea voyages. Progress has been slow, but rewarding.

To my knowledge, in a time-span of thirty years, Harriet made four journeys by sea.

• The first, London to Port Jackson in 1790 as a ‘free’ woman on the convict ship Neptune with a voyage of nearly 7 months.
• The second, from Sydney to Norfolk Island in 1800, a voyage of several days.
• The third, from Norfolk Island back to Sydney in 1805, also taking several days.
• The fourth, from Sydney to Port Dalrymple in northern Tasmania in 1819, also taking about two weeks.

Each of these voyages would have been a very different experience for Harriet. I need to take many things into account, as I ponder and write her story.

For instance, let us take the first voyage. I believe it is not enough to just say she got on board in London in 1789 and arrived in Port Jackson, several months later on 28 June 1790. There are no documents with Harriet’s name on it. In fact, there are very few surviving documents about the voyage of the Second Fleet, even official ones.

How can I write up her ‘experience’ of the voyage itself? It may be fiction, but it needs to be credible fiction.

From the few scant reports of the voyage at the time, we know it was a horrendous journey, which led to much death and sickness.

When the news finally filtered back to authorities in England, the captains and ship’s officers were blamed for the carnage. However was this really the case, or was there much more to the story?

To answer some of these questions  I need to track down every one of those surviving documents. I need to study the providence and assess the motivation for the creating of such documents.

I also need to consider, if there may have been documents, that for some reason have not survived. What might these reasons be?

Firstly, I needed to research the ships and boats of the era. How they were made, the parts thereof, and how the ‘systems’ on board worked, involving the officers and crew.

Life on board ships was by necessity, very ordered. Everyone was under strict instructions and a rigid routine. It was not a holiday in any sense of the word, even for those ‘free’ passengers.

The Neptune was a large very crowded ship of nearly 800 tons. It has been difficult to clearly establish how many people were on-board when she left England, but it is believed it totaled about six hundred and twenty. There was also a large number of stores, both for the voyage, as well as for the colony.

Thomas Gilbert had been appointed the captain, as he had had experience, being captain of the Charlotte in the First Fleet. However, after the Macarthur fiasco, he was replaced by Donald Trail. Trail an experienced navy captain, and later in transporting slaves, had originally been appointed to the Surprize.

John Marshall was captain of the Scarborough. He had also been her master on the voyage of the First Fleet.

How was the voyage in the Second Fleet, so different to cause so much trouble, with horrendous consequences?

How did Harriet get that free passage in the first place? Where did she sleep on board and who were her friends?

It takes a lot of work to put together a possible story. Who, how, when, where, and why are always the questions I need to ask before setting down my thoughts.

I then need to visualize each section of the story as I put it down on paper. Here is a little taste of the first draft of the story, as Harriet sets out on her sea voyage in 1790.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Fleet_(Australia)#/media/File:Convict_ship_Neptune00.jpg

Harriet lay awkwardly in the narrow bunk and watched the gimbal swing gently to and fro, making ghoulish shadows on the wall. She felt the slight warmth of the child huddled beside her, as it convulsed with heartbreaking sobs, even as it drifted off to a troubled sleep.

It had been a long and exhausting day and now stretched into a cold and numbing night, but sleep would not come to Harriet.

All around her there were unseen souls, coughing, snoring, groaning and crying, but it was difficult to place sounds in the shadowy darkness. Then there were the ship’s groans and creaks as it rocked on the rising tide. The occasional bell and muffled cry, somewhere out there in the moonless night.

Harriet still stared at the wall. Was it really little more than a day, since she had prepared for her daring adventure? As she contemplated what may lay ahead, her heart quickened and she began to feel fear rising in her stomach. Were fear and regret now stealing her heart as had been foretold?

She shut her eyes tight, covered her ears and willed herself to feel the warm sunshine, smell the scented meadows, and hear the twittering birds, with her beloved Tom beside her, in the Staffordshire countryside, far away. She was successful for just a brief moment, and then her fears engulfed her again. What if her ruse was discovered, her dreams dashed, and worst of all, actual imprisonment.

She clenched her jaw and pushed away those dark thoughts again. She finally began to relax and calm herself.

She gently stroked the brow of the sleeping child beside her and thought of the many times she had comforted the little ones, as terrifying nightmares had overtaken them while they slept in their tiny attic room. Someone else would have that duty now.

Her heart started to pound again as her thoughts drifted back to the daring plan Elizabeth and Ann had convinced her could be achieved.

On the docks this morning the damp sea air had smelt of salt and freedom, but tonight in the ship, it only smelt of fetid breath, coal tar, cheap wine, and other more complicated smells.

There was still time to turn back. Tomorrow she could leave the ship and return to John, Ann, and the little ones. They would be angry with her, but she could go back to her former life. A miserable life with no promise. A lonely existence, with her Tom, long gone to the other side of the world. With such difficult times, she now had no prospects of marriage. Only a slow creeping imprisonment, by family and society, in cold dark London.

She had had a home, true, but for how long? John and Ann, who were kin, had reluctantly taken her into their household some years ago, to help with their young children. It was just after her Tom had been sentenced to death. She could still recall in stark detail, that horrible day in the Staffordshire Court.

His sentence had later been changed to transportation and he had been sent to the hulks in Portsmouth Harbour. He had been working as a blacksmith on the harbour works. There had been some hope that he would complete his sentence on the hulks, and then return home. She could wait. However his petitions had been pushed aside, and he was to be transported to New South Wales. He was innocent, but that made no difference to those Judges! He was to be gone!

She looked across at the indistinct mound in the berth opposite, where Elizabeth lay with her youngest child. Was she having doubts too? No, thought Harriet, Elizabeth was resigned to her fate long ago. To go with her husband to faraway New South Wales. Harriet’s dream was only hours old, and still very fragile.

Harriet’s story is a different kind of writing to what I have done before in writing up our family history. Certainly, a challenge and a steep learning curve, if I’m to be anyway successful. I still have to have an outline of facts to base the story on but have to know so much more about the life of those far-off times, to put together the story.  I still have a long way to go, but day by day, I progress slowly.