Did Thomas Jefferson have a birth certificate?

January 24, 2016 6:46 PM

My daughter just did one of those elementary school projects where you pick a historical figure and assemble a presentation of things from their life. One of the requirements was for a birth certificate. That got me wondering: would someone like Thomas Jefferson have had a birth certificate? When abouts did that become standard in England / British colonies? Is it something only rich people had or did everyone keep that level of records?

Google doesn't help much because it seems the Declaration of Independence is sometimes referred to as the birth certificate of the US, which for some strange reason comes up when you search for Thomas Jefferson.

Thanks!

posted by BeeDo to Society & Culture (9 answers total)

His birth may have been recorded with his parent's church - but birth certificates as a government function wasn't a thing in the Western world until the mid 1800s as I recall.
posted by Suffocating Kitty at 6:51 PM on January 24, 2016 [2 favorites]

No. There may have been a record of his baptism, if he was baptized as an infant in a church.,though:

Pre-1837 birth and baptism records [UK]

Before the government's registration system was created, evidence of births and/or baptisms (and also marriages and death or burials) was dependent on the events being recorded in the records of the Church of England or in those of other various churches – not all of which maintained such records or all types of those records. Copies of such records are not issued by the General Register Office; but can be obtained from these churches, or from the local or national archive, which usually now keeps the records in original or copy form.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:51 PM on January 24, 2016 [2 favorites]

Not birth certificates, but churches kept baptism and birth records that were pretty detailed.
posted by phunniemee at 6:52 PM on January 24, 2016

As far as government records, according the Family Search (the Mormon sponsored ancestry site - a generally very good resource), birth certificates were not common until the twentieth century. Before then, some towns had registries (most common in colonial New England) but the records are incomplete.
posted by metahawk at 6:53 PM on January 24, 2016

Best answer: And here is a more specific answer:
"Virginia counties began recording births, marriages, and deaths in 1853, but stopped between 1896 and 1912. Church vital records often reach back into the 1700's."
posted by metahawk at 6:55 PM on January 24, 2016

Best answer: It was wild west in the US until the early 1900s. 1907 is usually the date after which people born in the US could be expected to have a birth certificate. Prior to that in some states there would be "birth cards" (documents that were made after the fact testifying to the birth) and before 1900 all bets were off, usually you'd see them tracked by churches and sometimes town clerks really depending on where people were from. There is a great book called A Calculating People that talks about how and when people started to keep track of each other in ways like births and deaths and other non-church (i.e early weddings) sorts of things. A lot of pre-1900 people's birth/death information is gleaned via local information and/or census stuff in many cases.

Amusing trivia. Thomas Jefferson was born on April 2nd but the calendar changed from Julian to Gregorian when he was nine years old, so we celebrate his brithday on April 13th.
posted by jessamyn at 7:10 PM on January 24, 2016 [11 favorites]

Slightly off your question's direct focus, but in Catholic countries like Spain you'd have the baptism records in the churches, even if you didn't have any other type of recordkeeping. Here is, for instance, Cervante's baptism record.

I don't know so much about Protestant churches, but I'd be surprised if the Charlotesville Episcopal Church didn't have a record book of all baptisms performed.

Alas, apparently no record of Jefferson's baptism, despite Wikipedia.
posted by kandinski at 7:39 PM on January 24, 2016

Not helpful in terms of a birth certificate, but if you're looking for an "official" document, your daughter might be interested in Jefferson's passport.
posted by Mrs. Rattery at 4:23 AM on January 25, 2016 [1 favorite]

Seconding the book A Calculating People that Jessamyn mentioned. I read it nearly thirty years ago and still recommend it. If I remember correctly from the book one of the big reasons for the US Census was to provide proof of the country's success by compiling not just demographic records but also records of land in cultivation, of livestock, of families' assets, etc.

If your daughter is really interested in history your public library may give access to Ancestry.com in which she could look up Thomas Jefferson or perhaps some of your and her own ancestors.

This teacher surely ought to know that birth certificates for people outside of one's family are not easily obtainable, even if s/he doesn't know that birth certificates are a relatively recent thing.
posted by mareli at 7:24 AM on January 25, 2016 [1 favorite]