More Confusing Birth Records

In a prior article, we reviewed the 1877 birth record of a male child, not named, which was in error for a female child named Lucy Lutter. 

In reviewing births of Duryea children, we have two more instances of incorrect sex on the birth record.

On January 10, 1901, a "male" child was born to John Duryea (1866-1940) and Anna Belle Bogert (1865-1957) in Franklin Township, Bergen County, New Jersey.

Birth certificate of male baby born January 10, 1901
in Franklin Township, Bergen County, New Jersey

Layout on microfilm of birth certificate and correction to birth record

Birth certificates are on microfilm. This birth certificate for a male was corrected in 1937. The form for corrections was filmed next to the original birth certificate. The sex was corrected from male to female. The unnamed child became Alice Janette Duryea. Confusion was averted because the correction was available with the incorrect birth certificate.

Correction to birth of unnamed male Duryea to female Alice Janette Duryea
filed January 30, 1937

For Irvin W Duryee, this confusion was not corrected in the birth records.

On February 17, 1900, a "female" child was born to Charles Cruiser Duryee (1850-1927) and Alice Lavalet (1868-1920) in Jersey City, Hudson County, New Jersey.

Birth certificate of female Duryee born February 17, 1900
in Jersey City, Hudson County, New Jersey

In the 1900 federal census, Charles and Alice had four children. The youngest was a son, Irvin W, born February 1900. No daughters.

On August 24, 1900, Irvin W Duryee died. He was 6 months and 7 days old. He was buried in Fairmount Cemetery in Newark.

Death certificate of Irvin W Duryee August 24, 1900
in Jersey City

To figure out this discrepancy of unnamed female birth and male death certificate, I assembled all the children of Charles and Alice.

Nine children of Charles Cruiser Duryee and Alice Lavalet
born between 1886 and 1905 in New York and New Jersey

The couple probably had ten children. I found seven birth certificates.

I do not know when Charles and Alice married. Harry Milton was their oldest child in the 1900 census. He was either their first or second child. He appears in the index of births for the State of New York.

Births for the year 1886 in the State of New York
Database at Ancestry

New York State stopped issuing copies of vital records. Unlike New Jersey, you cannot visit a repository and view and copy the certificates. This entry in the index is the closest we can achieve for the birth record of Harry Milton. He was born September 13, 1886 in Oyster Bay, Queens County, New York. Because we cannot access the actual record, we cannot see if he was child number 1 or child number 2.

Beginning with Mary Elizabeth in 1892, the children were born in New Jersey.

Mary's birth certificate anchors the numbers. She was child number three; two are living. The other living child was Harry; the deceased child's name and date of birth is unknown as of this writing.

Birth certificate of Mary Elizabeth Duryee
born February 24, 1892 in Newark, Essex County, New Jersey.

No birth record for Herbert Hammell Duryee was found for a date of March 7, 1893. He was child number 4.

Child 5 was Charlotte L. Child 6 was Russell Sage.

Child 7 was the confusing female or Irvin/Irwin of 1900.

The child immediately after Irvin was Loraine on December 19, 1901. Although now a female name, this was a male child. The issue was that the birth certificate could not be located because the index from 1901 was illegible.

Index of Births in New Jersey for the year 1901

Birth certificates were filed by certificate number until 1904. Without this number, it is very difficult to locate a particular record among the rolls of microfilm. For years, the only Duryea birth certificate that I had from 1901 was Alice.

Rolls of microfilm containing images of birth certificates
for New Jersey year 1901.
New Jersey State Archives.

The release of the Geographic Birth Index 1901-1929 enables us to find certificates when the handwritten indexes are illegible.

Geographic Birth Index for New Jersey.
Unnamed child of C and A Duryee born in Jersey City December 19, 1901.

Male Duryee was born December 19, 1901 in Jersey City, Hudson County, New Jersey. He was child 8 with 4 still living.

Birth certificate of male Duryee born December 19, 1901 in Jersey City.
This child became known as Loraine Albert.

Thus, we can see that no other child, except "female" or Irvin/Irwin, was likely born between Russell Sage in 1898 and male (Loraine Robert) in 1901. Irvin's birth certificate misstated him as female.

Remember while searching the Geographic Birth Index at Ancestry that not all entries on the typed page appear in the Ancestry index.

This article was written in memory of Richard Alan McCool, researcher of the Duryea families. He helped me craft my skills in genealogical research and inspired me to persist until I linked my "stray" Duryea line to the larger family in New York.

Richard's efforts spanned decades, thoroughly and accurately documenting the Duryeas and collateral lines.

He passed away last month.