And how many kids did they have?

        

The William Rose family, based on census records, had six children. We have Julia, Eva, Joseph, William Jenny and the youngest Mabel. Searching for records to validate information showed three more children who were born to them. One is listed on the 1880 census as one month old. The other two aren’t documented. Without the 1890 census, so many people have fallen through the proverbial cracks. Did the two missing children, twins, belong to my family or one of the other William and Malenda/Matilda families. I accepted there were only six children in the family. I recognize that there was one more.  But the other two children bothered me. Who did they belong to? One family tree showed one of those children in their Ancestry tree, but not the other six shown above. Why isn’t there any other record except from a birth or death record?

The census records hold a lot information, as long as you read them with open eyes and an open mind. The 1900 census helped to answer some of my questions. One census question asked were how many children did you give birth to and the next one was how many are still living. Malenda gave birth to ten children, in 1900 six were still living.  

The good news, if there can be on in this instance, is that the children were born in 1880 and the twins in 1887. All three died in 1889. Causes of death included croup, blood poisoning and cholera infantum, most easy to cure in later generations. With the 1890 census destroyed, there would have been no accounting for them. 

So now I have nine children accounted for. Where is the tenth? Could it be a stillborn child not reported, a miscarriage? Will I ever find that last child?