[quote BetterThanKleenex]@Saranade4 She was dead when I found out so no, I didn't report her to the police? Most of the children died in hospital so there would be a record of it and it's unlikely she would be murdering her own children in a hospital. There were 3 or 4 children who died from what I think could be SIDS which at the time, where they lived and considering their siblings died, seems to not be suspicious. Pretty sure she wasn't a serial killer, but thanks![/quote]
My grandmother lost a large number of babies. One was post mortemed in 1944 because it was investigated as a suspected killing with all the suspicion that entailed.
Congenital malformation of the diaphragm. He suffocated. Interestingly, despite all the scans and surgery done now, it still carries an up to 62% mortality in infants whilst it is possible for it to go undetected until adulthood in less severe cases.
Odds are that some of her other babies died of the same genetic issue - he was just the one that survived the longest. Except for my mother, who just had heart issues, albeit not life threatening ones.
Some life threatening conditions are always passed on to babies because they're dominant. Some aren't but the parents are unlucky (so very, very unlucky). Some don't show when there isn't the medical care of 2020 available because it's 80-odd years ago that we're talking about.
Then there's also infections - B Strep still kills babies. Antibiotics and antibacterial medications haven't been around that long in the great scheme of things. TB, measles, chickenpox, influenza, medication prescribed to the mother, working with hazardous chemicals, PKU, spina bifida (there's an occult version, which means the skin is closed over - one of my brothers was diagnosed with that aged 20 after he broke his leg), pollution both in the house and in the air from coal fires - so many things that could and did lead to multiple losses.