Is it possible to search for a 1903 birth record using only a DOB and a mother’s name?
In the main for my 88 year-old mother-in-law’s peace of mind, but also for completeness of my family tree, I am trying to trace what happened to her father in the first 9 years of his life. Known as John (Jack) Walker (1903-1970), he believed he was born on 22nd January 1903 in Maidstone, Kent, but was never able to obtain a birth certificate or passport as his name at birth was unknown to him because his own mother would not give him any information relating to his birth.
John’s mother’s name was Fanny Bonny (1878-1960) but I have found no suitable birth record for a John Bonny around 1903. The surname Walker that he adopted was that of his stepfather Frederick Samuel James Walker (1883-1917), whom his mother married in 1912 in Gillingham, Kent. No suitable birth record for a John Walker can be identified, either. I have, however, found the birth certificate and 1911 Census entry of another illegitimate son of Fanny’s, named Guy Bonny, who was born in 1910 in Maidstone (no father recorded), so it seems unlikely that Frederick Walker was the father of either of the boys, although both did later take his surname after his marriage to their mother.
Is it possible to search for John’s birth record using the only two pieces of information available – his birthday and his mother’s name? If only he had been born after 1913 so that an online search by mother’s name was possible! Is there any hope or is this really a brick wall?