Genealogy Chat

i came across a mailing list for fife graveyards by chance when googling today and listed were 7 of my rellies. thats great as had no death dates for them. just wondering why 3 children would die within a few months of eachother? leanne x

Maybe there was an illness... smallpox, measles... any number of contageous diseases.

a) and most likely I should think - they succumbed to an epidemic or infectious illness or food poisoning or some other malady. b) they were killed in an accident. As the deaths were spread out, I think this is probably less likely, but with open fires, candles etc around, fires were quite frequent I imagine. You don't give dates, but I imagine if it was an accident of some kind there would be a newspaper report. If on the other hand it was an illness you can probably find out what was about at the time - typhoid, cholera, measles, diphtheria or whatever. nell

thanks tracy and nell, thought it would probably be due to illness. it was between 28/01/1874 and 31/03/1874. there were 8 kids in all and i know of 3 that lived to adults?! leanne x

could it be an inherited problem? Some don't all kick in at the same age. what about all of them having something like asthma, they may have all caught a virus around the same time and succumbed according to their ability to fight it. Diabetes? An inherited heart problem, a bout of bad viruses as in the last winter here and that could carry them off in the same season. Those death certs would make very interesting reading! Abigail

thanks abigail, must order the certs!! leanne x

Hi Madlee, if you go onto Scotland's People, you'll be able to view the certs on there and see the cause of death too. Christine

thanks christine leanne x

Madlee Let us know what you find - I'm burning with curiosity now! nell

aaaah!!! scotlandspeople whats going on? i went in and paid to view a cert and now it wont let me view it! very slow so will try again later. thanks all. leanne x

Hi again, if you've got a pop-up blocker on your PC , you'll have to disable it to be able to view the images on SP. Hope that helps Christine

right, have all three death details now. the two children that died in march had scarlet fever and the 2yr old that died in january was entered as 'disease of spine, seven days' curious what that could be now!! leanne x

Leanne Spina Bifida complications? Meningitis (couldn't bend from inflammation to spinal cord coverings? Tumour I love this bit of the detective work - trying to work out what the diagnosis would be now that we know so much more! Abigail

thanks abigail, have a page on old illnesses and diseases but found nothing for disease of the spine. i thought it might be meningitis. how sad to lose three children so quickly, her husband died two years before them. bless. leanne x

what did the other image turn out to be Leanne? Abigail

hi abigail the image was an 1890 death for another child. thanks to tony i know the cause of death was phthisis pulmonalis. in short tuberculosis. clever man!! im starting to think she'll outlive all her kids. died age 80! leanne x