Literate?

[trish1]

I have a death certificate 1884 - where a son signed his name at death of father. The same son signed with an X in 1901 at the death of his mother (he was not disabled to the best of my knowledge - emigrated in 1911) Wondering why this would be?

Trish

[runmerry]

I have some like that, a proper signature on the first document and a cross on later ones. As they all seem to be farm servants and not likely to be writing a lot I always thought it was a case of "you don't use it you lose it".

Regards
Jen

[Wee Ann]

Or maybe 'the bloke in charge' said,"Put a X there!" and thats what he did?

[trish1]

Thanks for the thoughts - "losing the ability" I guess is quite likely - just seems a little weird. As for the registrar I do have situations where the paternal grandmother is listed as the mother of a child - and usually think the registrar asked for "mother's name" and the father then gave his mother's name rather than the babe's mother.

All adds to the folklore.