1939 register is my great grandmother a bigamist??

[Rosinish]

Hi Pinetree,

"both have M (married?) KPC (the area was Keighley not sure what PC could be)

Could it mean Parish Church?

Annie

[LisaRobinson87]

Thank you very much Pinetree i'm wondering if they just thought she was married to him because they where living together but still unsure.

[dawnkaren]

free bmd has this


Marriages Dec 1929   (>99%)


Fisher  Eric W  Louisa Gibson  Middlesbro'  9d 1327

[LisaRobinson87]

Yes that's her marrying my great grandfather but I want to know how the name Robertson appears on the 1939 register when she didn't or so I believe marry the man but only lived with him

[andycand]

Hi

Louisa could have simply changed her name. The date would be when the NHS noted the change, MID could be the initials of the civil servant noting the change (usually where a number of people have the authority to make notes or changes the person making the note initials it to identify themselves) the CR 283 could be a reference to the source of the information.

Andy

[Ayashi]

My great grandmother left her husband (and four children) and ran off with the lodger. She never divorced her husband but took the surname of the lodger and registered her final son (my grandfather) under his name. When she died, all paperwork and burial was under her married name. I haven't looked for her on 1939 yet but we'll have to see under which name she appears!

Your post just reminded me of that. I don't know exactly how the register was taken but perhaps one person in the household who knew her legal surname gave it truthfully and then she may have corrected it later to her preferred surname.

If they were living together as though husband and wife there's no legal reason why she shouldn't use his surname. As I understand it, there's only an issue with regards to the law if the new name is used with intent to defraud or for similar malicious means. If she was a bigamist and got found out, no doubt there would have been criminal repercussions of it rather than a simple notation. It may have been added as an alias, possibly.

[Malcolm33]

  A marriage certificate can sometimes give us some idea.   My great grandfather gave his status as being a widower on his third marriage to Mary Heslop and for that matter on his fourth marriage to Rosetta Allen though we cannot find out what happened to Mary Heslop.  The thing is that his second wife Anne Eliza Montgomery widow of Robert Millsop was still alive and married bigamously in America in 1885, so he certainly wasn't a widower and he would have known that since the Winter family just a few doors away would have been in touch with their son who married Anne Eliza in America.

[Guy Etchells]

I searched for my great grandmother basically to see if she was with her husband because he was in and out before he actually left for good. Her name was Louisa Gibson and his was Eric Fisher on the register it states Louisa Fisher then has Robertson in green ink above Fisher and has some sort of what i believe to be a ref for something at the side. I couldn't place the Robertson until i remembered that she lived with a man named Alexander Robertson for many years, so could this be because of that? It is understood in the the family she never got divorced from Eric because she wanted to punish him, but i also understand that she never married this Alexander either so why would it have Robertson on there??

The answer is very simple if she was using the name Robertson that was her legal name and the NHS would change the register to show this new legal name.
There was no need for her to divorce or remarry to take a new legal name.

Cheers
Guy