Baptism/Christening

[juju9999uk]

Hi All,
I have just had a thought...
After months of trying to find out births and/or Baptism records and finding none, a thought occured to me. I had to argue with the local vicar in order to get my son christened, he was dead set against it because I was an unmarried mother.
I am wondering if back in 1800's they refused to perform christenings to children who were illegitimate?
Happy Hunting
Regards
Juju

[suzard]

Hi Juju,
I don't think there was a problem baptising illegit children in 1880's - in researching my own family I have found most of the illegit children were baptised very young-whereas married couples very often had a few of their children baptised at the same time when they were older -sometimes 11 or 12 years of age. I have a few cases where all the children of the family were baptised on the day their father/mother  died !
Baptisms didn't always take place at the church nearest to where they were born -some were baptised at the church their grandparents used -even if it is in a different county.

In my opinion that is an area where the church seems to have moved backwards in more recent times.

Suz