Update on

Twins and Triplets in the Greater Ducklow Family
[Published February 24, 2010]

About a year ago I posted a story in this blog on the known number of twins and triplets in the Greater Ducklow family. Since that post, over 250 new descendants have been identified; the number of descendants now stands at about 1000. Because of the growth in the size of the family tree, I thought it time to look at the multiple birth statistics again.

 

There are now eight known sets of twins and two known sets of triplets born to descendants of Thomas and Elizabeth Ducklow.  The number of sets of twins is up by four from a year ago and there has been no change in the number of triplets.  The sets of twins remains lower than what would be expected—we would normally see 20 to 29 sets for 1000 births. The typical number of sets of triplets for 1000 births is about 1.6, so the two sets in our greater family seems about right.

Here are the years and lines of birth of the twins and triplets:

A set of twins born in 1932; descendants of George Ducklow

A set of twins born in 1935; descendants of Mary Ann Ducklow Good

A set of twins born in 1938; descendants of Mary Ann Ducklow Good
A set of twins born in 1962; descendants of Peter Ducklow

A set of twins born in 1982; descendants of John Ducklow

A set of twins born in 1993; descendants of Peter Ducklow
A set of triplets born in 1996; descendants of George Ducklow
A set of triples born in 1996; descendants of Charles Ducklow
A set of twins born in 1998; descendants of George Ducklow
A set of twins born in 1999; descendants of George Ducklow

There is a possibility too that Thomas and Elizabeth's eighth and ninth children where twins: Infant Elizabeth and Infant Maria Jane, both born around 1855 or 1856. Information is lacking, but at least one fellow genealogist believes that these two infants could have been twins. Both of these children died as infants or toddlers. Maria Jane likely in 1856 and Elizabeth in February of 1857.

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Footnote: The research continues on identifying all descendants of Thomas and Elizabeth Ducklow. 1000 is the number charted so far. 

Footnote: Source of the twin and triplet birth rate information comes from the March of Dimes web site. Link here.

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