Illegitimate child - where to start?

[carrielovesfanta]

Hi all,

I've just come up against the first child in my tree with no known father and I'd love to hear any suggestions about finding him.

The info I have is:

Elizabeth Ann Bevis, born 10/11/1865 in Ongar Union Workhouse to Sarah Ann Bevis. There is no father recorded on the certificate. Elizabeth gives the name George Bevis on her marriage cert but I think she's made this name up.

Elizabeth's older sister Emma gives the name John Bevis on her wedding cert.

Sarah Ann Bevis had 5 children that I know of and I believe that they were all born in the workhouse. They are:

Emma 1863
Elizabeth Ann 1865
James 1868
George 1873
Joseph 1878

Sarah Ann is listed at being in Ongar workhouse in the 1871, 1881 and 1891 censuses. Her place of birth is consistenly given as Willingale Doe. There is a James Bevis in the workhouse too who is of the right sort of age to be Sarah Ann's father.

Thanks very much in advance

Caz

[Gadget]

Hi Caz

I have a similar case in my tree - but with two illegits. Both gave different father's names on their marriage certs.

I have got their mother to three years before the birth of the first child - laundress in a large Estate house. I've listed out all the staff and thought of any of the visitors and their staff. I've checked the names she gave to her son (my grandfather) - the first is a family name but the second, Frederick, is not.

The workhouse records for the period have been destroyed so that's a dead end.

Sometimes the father is named on the baptism record but not on the birth reg. Not in my case though.

So I have 7 great grandparents and A N Other - I've spent my time getting extra info on the mother's line.

Gadget

[Rick]

Ongar workhouse Guardians minutes books - 1836-1930 appear to have survived and are available at The Essex Record Office.

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~peter/workhouse/Ongar/Ongar.shtml

http://www.essexcc.gov.uk/vip8/ecc/ECCWebsite/dis/gui.jsp?channelOid=13813&guideOid=14788

It would also be well worth checking at the ERO to see if an Application for a Bastardy Order was issued.

Rick

[carrielovesfanta]

Thanks for the thoughts guys - I'll try and chase those up 

Caz

[carrielovesfanta]

It's a long time ago now that I wrote this post - I thought I'd let Rick know that I didn't find a bastardy order. I found a note in the minutes of the workhouse guardians with the payment for Elizabeth's baptism, and the record of her baptism in the local parish church.

Thanks everyone for your help

Caz

[Simon G.]

I have this same problem with my 2x-great-grandfather, who was one of at least 3 children born to his mother and an unknown man...and he sadly never gets named.  The only clue in cases like this can often be if one of the children has an unusual surname...such as with the case in my tree, the mother has given one child the middle name of Stockley...perhaps indicating the father's surname.

[ridban]

I, too, have lots of these. Sometimes there is a clue in the middle name. But let's face it, in those days there really was no means of knowing the paternity of your child unless.....well, you know. And even if there was a bastardy order made, it doesn't necessarily follow that the subject of the bastardy order was indeed really the father.

When I first started doing genealogy, I was quite shocked by the amazing number of children born out of wedlock, with unknown fathers. But I read later that illegitimacy was very common and it was the Victorians who demonised it and made it unacceptable. This was purely a pecuniary decision, as single women were far less able to support a child, than a father with a job, and a mother to do the child rearing while simultaneously running the house and probably also taking in washing or doing cleaning or something, so the parish often had to take on the expense for these children.

Linda

[Christopher]

Victorian England: An Introduction throws a little bit of light on the subject of illegitimacy.Premarital sex, for middle- and upper-class men, would have been with servants and prostitutes, since "nice girls" didn't go beyond the small kiss or squeeze of the hand. I'd tend to jump to conclusions if the child's mother worked on an estate or was the servant for a wealthy family.

[Simon G.]

it doesn't necessarily follow that the subject of the bastardy order was indeed really the father.

The same is true of so much in this game.  Unless we've dug up our ancestors literally and done a detailed genetic analysis, it's impossible to say with 100% certainty that every father we've got in our tree is 100% accurate.  Facts are only as reliable as the person providing the information after all, and no doubt we all have people in our trees we call family who in reality were not our genetic forebearers at all.  Illegitimacy and the more, shall we say, "modern" ideas about sexuality are hardly an invention of the 20th century, and lying to hide an indiscretion is certainly nothing new...basically if there are people these days who can't or won't reveal the identity of their child's true father, you can be sure there were people 100-years ago who were the same.  They just were less open about it than we are now.
But then family history is not about names and dates...it's about piecing together people's lives and how they lived.  I'd have hoped whomever is named as a father whether accurate or not would have played a part in that child's life.  It's all part of a rich tapestry where the gray area is just as important as the black and white.