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Hi Ian, Thanks for the info.

Eliza R Waters in the Rye 1851 Census is my Great Grandmother

There is a curious piece of "family scandal" associated with her. She married in Hastings to a local Rye-born man then moved to London. My grandfather was born in 1871 - but her husband was recorded as dying in 1865! However my grandfather's birth certificate has his name as the father! The "family legend" had it that he faked his death to avoid paying his debts. The 1871 Census shows a different picture. My grandfather's Christian names were John Hamilton - Eliza just happened to have a "lodger" ... named John Hamilton! I understand that at that time there was a strict rule that children born of unmarried mothers and widows could not have the true father recorded on birth certificates, as was done earlier ... but there was no legal barrier to simply including the father's name as a Christian name.

In reality I'm probably not actually related to Eliza Waters, accept on paper. On her deathbed my grandmother claimed that none of her 9 children were fathered by her husband. My father and his other siblings were actually children of a friend of her husband - who had been fully aware of the situation!

This information caused consternation in the family - as their supposed true father was still alive - and they didn't like him! They all thought their father had died 30 years earlier. The family did, however, take him in and support him when he got too old to look after himself.

What kind of documents might there have been if William Spinks acknowledged Elizabeth Abel as his daughter? Presumably he would have paid some kind of child support  ... possibly to the foster mother?

So - where do I look for recorded evidence of what the arrangements were?