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Birth certificates

Bill Oddie’s story was one of the most poignant told on Who Do You Think You Are? as he wished to investigate the background to his mother’s ill health and rumours that he had a sister. The story of his missing sister was quickly established by tracking down his parents’ marriage certificate of 1938, establishing Bill’s mother’s maiden name (Clegg) and looking in the national GRO indexes for the birth of any children with the surname Oddie, mother’s maiden name Clegg, in the Rochdale area, where the family lived at the time.

A fairly quick search revealed that a Margaret J. Oddie, mother’s maiden name Clegg, was born in the March quarter of 1940. On ordering the certificate (above, left), her parents were listed as Harry Oddie and Lilian Oddie, née Clegg – the same as Bill’s. This therefore was his missing sister, and a further search of the death indexes showed that she had died as an infant the same quarter, explaining why Bill never knew about her existence.