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Anne's Family History

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Anne's Family History

Category Archives: demography

lifespans of 2nd great grandparents

01 Sunday May 2016

Posted by Anne Young in ahnentafel, demography, geneameme

≈ 1 Comment

This week genealogy blogger Randy Seaver has invited followers to look at the lifespans of their second great grandparents.

The mission:

1)  We each have 16 great-great grandparents.  How did their birth and death years vary?  How long were their lifespans?  

2)  For this week, please list your 16 great-great grandparents, their birth year, their death year, and their lifespan in years.  

I maintain an ancestor table spreadsheet using the Ahnentafel numbering system of my own and my husband’s forebears.  Sometimes it is very easy to get distracted by the breadth of the family tree. It is useful to look back at the main trunk.

Mine and my husband’s great great grandparents are the 3*great grandparents of my children.  They are numbered 32 to 63 on the table

Name Ahnentafel number age at death lived
George Edward Young 32 64 1826-1890
Caroline Clarke 33 44 1835-1879
John Way 34 76 1835-1911
Sarah Daw 35 58 1837-1895
James Cross 36 54 1828-1882
Ellen Murray 37 64 1837-1901
John Plowright 38 79 1831-1910
Margaret Smyth 39 63 1834-1897
Sullivan 40 I do not know anything about the parents of Henry Sullivan
? 41
John Morley 42 65 1823-1888
Eliza Sinden 43 85 1823-1908
Isaac Dawson 44 42 1831-1872
Eliza Skerrit 45 65 1834-1899
Francis Gilbart Edwards 46 65 1848-1913
Caroline Ralph 47 46 1850-1896
Philip Champion de Crespigny 48 77 1850-1927
Annie Frances Chauncy 49 25 1857-1883
Edward Walter Hughes 50 68 1854-1922
Jeanie Hawkins 51 79 1862-1941
James Francis Cudmore 52 75 1837-1912
Margaret Budge 53 67 1845-1912
Wentworth Cavenagh 54 72 1822-1895
Ellen Jane Mainwaring 55 75 1845-1920
August Bolz 56 76 1840-1916
Wilhelmine Bamberg 57 82 1844-1926
Karl Bertz 58 78 1854-1932
Henrietta Ritter 59 80 1862-1942
Mathias Manogg 60 74 1851-1925
Agathe Maria Lang 61 74 1852-1926
Gustav [Alfons] Waldemar Karl Peters 62 44 1860-1904
Agnes Helene Louise Stern 63 57 1861-1918

The average lifespan is 65.8. The median, middle of the range,  is 67 to 68. The average lifespan for men was 67.3 (median 68)  and for women was 64.3 (median 64).

My great great grandmother Annie Frances Champion de Crespigny née Chauncy (1857-1883) died at the age of 25 of pelvic cellulitis after a 3week illness.

Greg’s great great grandmother Eliza Morley née Sinden (1823-1908) was 85 when she died of asthenia (weakness) and cancer of the pharynx after an illness of 10 week.

This generation was born between 1822 and 1862. The most recent death of this generation of our family was 1942: my great great grandmother Henrietta Bertz née  Ritter (1862-1942).

My mother with her great grandmother Henrietta Bertz née  Ritter Easter 1941

X, her mark

27 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by Anne Young in A to Z 2014, ahnentafel, demography, genealogical records, statistics

≈ 2 Comments

In 2012 at http://www.lonetester.com/2012/10/family-history-through-the-alphabet-challenge-x-is-for-signatures/ Alona Tester blogged about ‘X is for signatures’. She included examples of certificates where ‘X his mark’ showed that someone could not sign his name.

I looked though my collection of birth, death and marriage certificates for examples of people who could not sign their name.
On the birth certificate of Alice Young, born in 1859, the informant, her mother Caroline née Clark, could not sign her name and made an X. On the birth certificate of Caroline Young in 1867, the informant was her father George Young. He signed his name. In 1878 the birth of James Ernest Young was registered and the informant was Caroline. This time she appears to have signed her name. The informant’s name is in a different handwriting to the details on the rest of the certificate. Perhaps Caroline had learned how to sign her name in the twenty years between the births of Alice and James.

Informant’s details from the birth certificate of Alice Young. Birth registered in Victoria number 4807 of 1859. Caroline was also the informant on John Young’s birth in 1856. She signed with her mark on that certificate too.

 

Informant’s details from the birth certificate of James Ernest Young. Birth registered in Victoria number 20382 of 1878. Other details from the certificate and from the preceding certificate have been left to show the difference in handwriting, which suggests that this might be the signature of Caroline.
Sarah Way née Daw was the informant on the 1868 birth certificate of her daughter Emily Way. She could not sign her name and made a mark. However, in 1896 Sarah’s husband John Way signed his name as the informant for the registration of the death of his son John.

When she registered the birth in 1864 of Henry Dawson at Corby, Lincolnshire, Eliza Dawson née Skerritt, his mother, could not sign her name. Her husband Isaac was able to sign his name when they married in 1855. She signed the marriage register with her mark.

These are the only examples I could find in my family documents of people who could not write their own name. All three women were great great great grandmothers of my husband. Eleven of his other great great great grandparents could sign their name.

These women were all born in the first half of the nineteenth century. All their husbands could sign their own names. In the next generation, their children, both girls and boys, could write their own name.

Some demographers have argued that illiteracy is linked to the size of families, in particular that education diminishes fertility. For example, a study of demographic changes in Britain from the 1850s to the early twentieth century found that “the extension of basic literacy is related to increases in female labour market participation, which is in turn related to fertility reduction”. (Newell and Gazeley) The data from my family does not support this hypothesis. None of the women in the table below were ever in paid employment. I cannot see any link between the literacy of my own and my husband’s great great great grandparents and the size of their families.

 

Age at marriage, children and dates of birth for our great great great grandmothers

 

Name Ahnentafel number literacy number of children age at marriage age when first child born age when last child born age at death lived Notes
Caroline Clarke 33 no 13 18 18 43 44 1835-1879 Includes one set of twins.
Sarah Daw 35 no 10 17 18 37 58 1837-1895  
Ellen Murray 37 passenger list stated she could read and write 11 19 20 41 64 1837-1901  
Margaret Smyth 39 passenger list stated she could read and write 7 21 19 38 63 1834-1897 had a child before she married
Eliza Sinden 43 signature appears on birth and death certificates 8 25 26 41 85 1823-1908  
Eliza Skerrit 45 no 10 21 24 38 65 1834-1899 Includes one set of triplets. This is the only English family. The last child was born at the time Eliza’s husband, Isaac Dawson, died.
Caroline Ralph 47 signature appears on marriage certificate 10 20 21 43 46 1850-1896  
Annie Frances Chauncy 49 yes 2 20 21 24 25 1857-1883 died young
Jeanie Hawkins 51 yes 4 21 22 31 79 1862-1941  
Margaret Budge 53 yes 13 21 22 44 67 1845-1912  
Ellen Jane Mainwaring 55 yes 10 20 20 37 75 1845-1920  

The women in this table were Australian, with the exception of that of Eliza Skerrit, wife of Isaac Dawson, who was from Lincolnshire, England. I have not included my German great great great grandparents as I do not have the relevant data.

A graphical representation of the above data for our great great great grandmothers

click to enlarge

Reference:

  • Newell, A. and Gazeley, I. (2012) The declines in infant mortality and fertility: Evidence from British cities in demographic transition, Economics Department Working Paper Series, University of Sussex, No. 48-2012 retrieved from http://ftp.iza.org/dp6855.pdf 27 April 2014
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