What is in a Name

How many family historians have gone looking for an ancestor and refused to acknowledge that because the name is incorrect the record is ignored. I know I have often found that a name has been used in reverse of a registration, such as Mary Jane becomes Jane Mary.

My mother named me Carmel Maree, however, when I sent for my birth certificate it had Carmel Marie. I use this as it makes life easier. Not only that my daughter's mother-in-law's name is Marie so when my granddaughter was born she was named with Marie as a middle name to cover both grandmothers, so very convenient for my daughter, not only that my mother and Marie's mother both had the same name so the next granddaughter was covered as well?

Vera with daughter Monica

However, my grandmother really had her name confused. Her grandmother was the daughter of Bridget and named her own daughter after her mother. Young Bridget died as a teen from consumption so when her granddaughter was born her grandmother insisted that the baby needed to be named Bridget. Her father went into town to register the baby. She was to be named Veronica Mary Bridget Murphy.

Nana told me this was her name and that she was registered as being born on the 6th of December instead of the 5th. When my brother was born on 6 December Nana was thrilled, he was born on her legal birthday.

Nana went to vote once and the fellow had trouble finding her and suggested maybe her name was Mary Veronica! Nana was most upset saying "I think I would know my name!"

She sent for her birth certificate once and was quite surprised to find that Bridget was not in her name at all, she would have been in her 70s at this time.
After Nana died aged 86 years her son came across the birth certificate, Nana had picked up that Bridget had been left out of her name but failed to notice that her name was in fact Mary Veronica and not Veronica Mary as we had known her and she believed.

When her son died his wife registered his mother as Mary Veronica however when my mother passed away I put the name known to us, Veronica Mary.

I then sent for the birth certificate of her younger brother Les Murphy. Born Patrick Francis Lesley Murphy, he was born in his grandparent's house in Fitzroy, registered by his aunt, Dollie (Bedilia) Woodhead and was the younger brother of Thomas and Mary! 

Interestingly I had a copy of the page from the family Bible sent to me. An entry in that says that on 5 December 1899, Veronica Annie was born! Veronica Annie, Veronica Mary Bridget, Mary Veronica?  So what exactly was Nana's name? What do we put on official records?

I have this story in my family tree for future generations but it does prove that when looking at records we all need to be open to discrepancies and misspellings etc. Remember that what is written on a death certificate is what whoever gives the information, thinks they know. Also many were illiterate many years ago, I found a family who had about 10 children and none had the surname spelled the same.
Literacy was not an issue in Nana's family so it is very confusing that she has so many variations, oh and by the by, she was always referred to as Vera!