Can you explain this mysterious birth certificate annotation?
QCould you help me understand the London birth certificate that I got from the General Register Office (GRO).
As you will see, the second name has been struck through and the error code “21” inserted, which is spelt out in the margin with the registrar’s initials.
What does it mean? Peter Badger, by email
AThe number 21 isn’t an error code, but it does show a correction has been made. This is a simple “numbered correction” done while the entry was being created and shows that the registrar has had to strike through one of the names.
Entries were written by hand into printed registers and even the most careful registrar could make a spelling mistake, or enter the wrong information. Perhaps, in this case, the parents just had a late change of mind about the choice of names for their son.
To prevent unauthorised changes being slipped in as corrections later, each correction in a register is given a consecutive number that is written next to the error, noted in words in the margin and initialled by the registrar. A list of these numbered corrections, with the corresponding entry numbers, is kept at the front of each register.
Once the entry has been signed by the informant and registrar, the entry becomes an official record and numbered corrections can no longer be made. Any future change has to go through a much more formal correction process, which needs an application to be made and the necessary authority given.
Births and deaths are now registered using a computer system so this type of correction is rarely seen, but modern marriage registers are still written by hand during the wedding ceremony and the numbered correction system is used in those to this day.