birth certificate with no first name

Question

I am looking at the actual microfilm image (from the New Hampshire birth records online). She is given only a surname, and I have not been able to find any further information on the couple's children (other than a notation somewhere that they had 3 children). Is it acceptable to list her as simply "Baby Girl" [Surname]? Or is there some other way to list such a thing that I haven't discovered yet? Thanks.

Answer 1

The guidelines for the first name field are at https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Name_Fields#Proper_First_Name. If you believe this was a child that died before she could be named, and you haven't found a death record for her, then the convention is to use "Unnamed Infant" rather than "Baby Girl".

Comments

Not all unnamed children were deceased.  Sometimes parents complied with the law and registered their child, but did not name them until the baptism.  (For some it was believed unlucky to name the child before the church blessing of baptism/christening.  For some that thinking went further/deeper to a belief that the devil would take their child if the name was given without the church's sacrament.)

I have dealt with a number of such unnamed-at-registration children where it is clear they were named later.

Answer 2

Also in church books the name of the person baptized is not always mentioned.
In early church books (before 1700) I often experienced it that only the name of the father and the main godparent was mentioned.
However, it was often customary that the person to be baptized was given the name of the godfather, so that one can infer the first name of the person to be baptized.