stillbirth

[eventide]

Does anyone know the best practice for recording a stillbirth? I know that we can set the child status, but do we put dates anywhere? If so what field?

[SGilbert]

image_1239.jpg
Of course you would record it, birth & death. Happened to my grandson. Recorded as above.

[edohmann]

I agree with SGilbert. Record whatever information you have in addition to setting the Stillborn flag. If the baby was given a name, I record that; if not I use "baby", "baby boy", or "baby girl" depending on the available information.

[Muriel A]

SGilbert, I am sorry, that must be so hard!
My husband has a cousin who had a stillborn twin sister. I created a "stillborn twin" status for her, and recorded both girls with the same birth date to avoid confusion.

[eric.vanbeest]

when I started building my family tree, I grappled with the same issue. that, and how to name children that you know are there but of whom you do not know the name.
for my purpose, for stillborn children, unless they are named, I name them "n.n." (for nomen nescio) and use the last name of the primary parent. the birth date I record as the same day as the death date. although it is completely feasible that a child may have lived a couple of hours and died on the same day as their birth - so medically actually born - these are a minority. in addition to the name, I do use the "Stillborn" flag to make it clear.
for unknown children I use the basic 'son' and 'daughter', or 'child' if I do not know the sex. if there are multiple children then I prefer to park them under 'children' or 'X children'

[eventide]

Thanks Eric. In my case it was a set of twins- one who died at birth and one who died a few hours later, which is why I asked the question.