Just discovered some very helpful information that I was never aware of and thought I would share it with everyone.

Question

I keep getting error notifications whenever I add a sibling who was born within a month or two of another sibling. So I decided to do some research on it to find out if it is possible. Thought I would share the information with everyone in case you ever come across it happening in a family you are working on. I ran a search asking if it was possible for a child to be born/died in November and a living sibling be born in January. I found several sites that reference the possibility of it happening and how it happens. If a mother is carrying twins, but ends up having separate wombs for them then it is possible to lose one in one month and the other be born in another month. It says if the child is lost in the first trimester then usually the mother will just absorb it and may never know she was carrying twins. But if the child survives to the 2nd or 3rd trimester then they child would feasibly be born and die while the other twin survives to be born later. In case anyone is interested here is the information to one of the sites I looked at: https://www.whattoexpect.com/pregnancy/pregnancy-health/complications/vanishing-twin-syndrome.aspx

Comments

I have an ancestor whose children were born August 1, 1915 and September 25, 1915. I added that info several years ago and do not recall any message from WikiTree. There are records of both births, both parents the same. I knew the details before finding the records.  Baby born 9/25 was stillborn, baby born 8/1 was a foundling. But looking at the birth records, one would not know the true circumstances. My unfortunate/fortunate 2nd cousin lost her baby, but had a baby to bring home.

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Thank you for sharing this information on such an unusual birth event.

As for the robot, who is surprised that it cannot understand everything?  The robot does its job and sometimes we have to ignore its recommendations.  The real problem is when humans think the robot is always right and they waste their time trying to fix field information in profiles, whereas an explanation in the form of written text is the only adequate solution.

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Very good idea. I will go back and make some type of a notation in case anyone else works on her profile, they will know. Thank you.

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I would put a note at the top of the page. The robot will always consider there is a problem that needs fixing. And another Wikitreer participating in a weekend event could make the mistake of trying to fix the error. So, a note from the PM at the top of the page should help.

Whew.

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Thank you for the info. Just saw the note at the top of the page and it brought me here. Whoever put it on the profile, thank you.

Answer 1

A far more likely explanation than an extremely rare birth circumstance is that the birth of Lucy was recorded twice and transcribed by someone not paying close attention to the dating in the original records. I have seen this numerous times when there have been images to view and discovered that they have transcribed just the date at the start of a page rather than the actual dates of the event or they have used the date of recording as the date of the event.

The 1900 census would appear to confirm this scenario as it records her birth date as Nov 1871. This means the date of Jan 1872 was probably the date the original birth record was recorded in a second ledger/register and the transcriber misinterpreted the date of recording as the date of birth.

Comments

I've recently run into a rash of these.  The church baptism record contains the date of the baptism event and has a note indicating the actual birth date.  When recording the event in the various databases some use the baptism date and others use the actual birth date.

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Thank you for the star, Susan. 

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Lucy and her deceased twin both have individual birth records. The deceased is the November one and Lucy's is the January one. The census may have had the wrong info included for her birth date. I have seen this many times as well as an indexer. The deceased one was just given the last name and no first name.

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There is absolutely no evidence that there was a deceased twin. As I said, I have seen this repeatedly, and when there are actual images of the records available and not just transcriptions, it is a transcriber error. Every. Single. Time. Unless you have proof to the contrary, transcription error is far more plausible than this rare birth occurrence. Especially considering you’re  likely dealing with a home delivery by midwife in the 19th century. That information given to a census taker that precisely matches the first transcribed record, most likely supplied by Lucy herself, is wrong, as opposed to the second transcribed document, defies logic.

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Well unfortunately we will have to agree to disagree because I also have a Cousin twice removed who has been writing a book on this particular family line and he is the only one still living from close to that generation. I'm afraid I will have to take his judgement call on it until I have proof that the records are in error.

Answer 2

Well, medically  that is an Interesting Discovery and personally falls into MY eeeewww box  but I suspect that the WT Computer isn't going to accept this explanation no way no how -- which is the crux of the matter and the Computer War that the Computer has with the WT PMs ... sigh. 

And surely such a War forces the PM to fudge or cuss or both? If that "closeness" of date of birth is the best info they can locate? And sometimes it is. 

HOWEVER, blessings upon you for sharing. It IS interesting!! 

Comments

Yeah I'm always having a problem with my Great-Grandmothers record because of it. She was born on Jan. 25, 1872, but had a sister with the same name that was born and died on Nov. 15, 1871. Was always curious as to how that could happen and since I'm always getting a warning when I update my Great-Grandmothers records about it I decided I had to know how it was possible. That way I know how to answer the status whenever I get it on my suggestions list.

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Many times the Jan to March dates should also have the next year because of the calendar change over, if they were 1872/73.

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Ah, Linda, I don't THINK that was still happening in 1872/73 ... you ARE talking Old Style and New Style dating, yes? Think it went the way of dinosaurs in the mid-1750s.

Or hopefully you meant the same confusion that afflicts many during Jan of the subsequent year as they adjust to the fact that say 2018 is now 2019? Hopefully that's what you mean.

Because ....

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Our brains write last year for months into new year. They just had a valid excuse for the confusion for a while.

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Could be so, Linda, could be so. I don't actually write the date very often anymore, not for several decades, in fact -- anything I use to communicate is electronic and date stamps itself

And if I have to actually date my signature on anything (which is not very often), I look up at the Other One and ask "What IS the date today?" and then write it down. That's despite the fact the Other One (nearly all of them to date) give me a Look ...

With so many devices dating things and other humans to ask, why should I bother myself keeping track of the date? Eh?

Answer 3

Does anyone know who the perp was that red flagged several answers for no apparent reason????

Comments

They could be accidents - just like the flag I just did - which I immediately unflagged. It was an accident!!

That flag button is a little too prominent and the comment button is not prominent enough!!

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Well you didn't get rid of ALL the flags, Robynne

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Sorry, thought I was flagging them so I would see if anyone responded.My mistake.

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One flag still needs removing.

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Yes, sarah, there's still that red flag there ....

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It needs to be remembered that some newbies to G2G think the flag is the same as an upvote.

Then there is the so-called "fat finger syndrome" where those on touch screens / phones may hit it by accident.

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Flags removed.

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I'm constantly hitting the flag link when scrolling one-handedly on my phone.

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And you got the gold star because I was scrolling the page and hit that by accident.  Lol oh well, you got it!

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Bless your charity Jillaine -- if the red flag is the worst tangle Sarah Saenz gets into while coping with the ever changing software and obscurities built into the Help: and etc she will be THE most fortunate PM at WT. woohoo!!

I have to agree with Robynne, the difference between the flag button and the reply button is that they are not far enough apart .. anyone using a bitty handheld device keyboard is going to "miss" their target sooner or later and who knows what horrors will be unleashed in doing so ... 

IN THE GOOD OLD DAYS it was email and all the bloopers you could imagine in using email ... and those Mail Demons were (and still are) like black crows flocked in the trees awaiting ... 

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 LOL LOL LOL I removed the gold star, Prom Queen and "15 minutes of fame" LOL LOL LOL ... 

Dropped the a gold start on DEB's answer  

Been a very very lonnnnggggggg week so far 

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I tried to click on it again hoping it would remove it, but it didn't. I don't know how to remove the red flag.

Answer 4

ANYWAY, despite random red flags, what is a good solution to apply when there is this conflict in dates of birth?

Mind you, all the notes in used in the text section about this Issue are ignored by the computer ... and somehow having to hit SAVE ANYWAY each time is ... well, makes MY b.p. rise a tad ... it's like counter-productive or something like counter-productive ... very irritating 

Comments

If you are seeing a Suggestion that the mother was too young or something like that, you can select False Suggestion on the Suggestion Status, enter a comment that is appropriate so that if the False Suggestion is seen when another Suggestion is shown for that person, the updater will know why False Suggestion was selected.

If it is just the Red Box when you try to save, you have to select Save Anyway.  It would be a good idea to have something in a Research Notes section with a comment about the discrepancy so if someone reviews the profile before saving it, they will know about it.

A birth that is early, so it is less than 7 months between children will cause the Red Error, but frequently, it is valid because a birth year is incorrect.  it does come up if the mother's death year is the same as the child, ie died during childbirth or shortly thereafter.  Nothing you can do about that, but in most instances, it is valid and the computer is trying to make us check everything.

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Thank you Linda. I figured that was what it was. I always click save anyways whenever I'm working on a profile such as my Great-Grandmothers and there is verification of the different births, etc.

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Linda, I wish you had made that an ANSWER so I could select it for a Big Gold Star

Answer 5

I personally met a couple who had twins about two or three months apart because of the twin wombs.  The first child was larger and much healthier,
more so than just being a bit older.  The younger one was much smaller,
pale and had more health challenges through the three years since they were born.  I assume the older one got more nutrition during pregnancy,
similar to the case of invasive bird species who lay their eggs in other
bird nests and the baby bird is larger than the real mothers babies and gets all of the parents food because it has the biggest open mouth.

Comments

Beulah, that is a sad tale indeed