Hi again I have just gotten a birth certificate and have a question about the place of birth. The information reads "5 Portland Mansions, Portland Road U. D." What does that U. D. mean. I have also found that same notation on another cert from Worchester County. Bill in now sunny Gig Harbor

UD means Urban District Assuming that by 'Worchester County' you mean Worcestershire in England. The English never use the word County as a suffix on English county names, it's generally regarded as an americanism where they do append it for most counties in most states. In fact the 'shire' on the end of many county names means 'county' and as a general rule (there are always exceptions), the 'shire is only added when there can be confusion between the county name and the name of the principal city in that county. Sometimes because of name changes that possible confusion has disappeared but the county may still use the 'shire' suffix from tradition. Thus you would never find 'shire appended to Essex, Surrey or Kent etc. Where you do have such as Nottingham (the city) and Nottinghamshire (the county). You can see that Nottinghamshire County would literally mean 'Nottingham County County'. For those thinking of such as 'Surrey County Council' (substitute the county of your choice) this literally means 'the County Council of the County of Surrey ( pause for breath) thus the word County is a prefix to Council not a suffix to the county name. In Ireland you find County as a prefix word to county names and this also applies to one English county; County Durham. MickG On 06/17/2011 12:07 AM, Bill Dalton wrote: > Hi again > > I have just gotten a birth certificate and have a question about the > place of birth. The information reads "5 Portland Mansions, Portland > Road U. D." What does that U. D. mean. I have also found that same > notation on another cert from Worchester County. > > Bill in now sunny Gig Harbor > *************************************** > Send your List messages using **PLAIN TEXT** and always **TRIM AWAY** superfluous old messages in replies. > > List Admin can be contacted at: [email protected] > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message >

Hi. I had similar on a birth certificate from the Isle of Wight. The following was what someone sent to me,. U.S.D (on his Birth Certificate) means Urban Sanitary District. USD was simply a local government term for a given area to be replaced by Urban District Council(UDC) in the 1890 when the proper County Council administration structure was set up with sub division of Rural and Urban District Councils. Most large towns and cities were County Boroughs, and outside the newly creative county administrative structure. Hence USD is not used these days. The term originated with the need to build sewers and provide clean water to the growing towns and villages in Victorian time. Hence the country was divided up in USDs and RSDs. Hope this helps. Ann (NZ) ----- Original Message ----- From: "Bill Dalton" <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, June 17, 2011 4:07 PM Subject: [SRY] A notation on a birth cert > Hi again > > I have just gotten a birth certificate and have a question about the > place of birth. The information reads "5 Portland Mansions, Portland > Road U. D." What does that U. D. mean. I have also found that same > notation on another cert from Worchester County. > > Bill in now sunny Gig Harbor > *************************************** > Send your List messages using **PLAIN TEXT** and always **TRIM AWAY** > superfluous old messages in replies. > > List Admin can be contacted at: [email protected] > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >