I'm very sorry - I seem to have missed this reply, or at least forgotten to write my own response.
You mean like as in a not-so-poor Papist widow, named Ellen Hauxworth (nee Barraclough), for example?!
My memory of this thread is a little patchy and I may be confusing the generations, but there could well be some issue relating to religion.
Also, would this 'Non-Conformist' record https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FWG4-CZN imply that Ellen was not RC when born? Ergo, if RC present in the fambly, then it came from the Hauxworth line??
These records relate to Dr Williams' Library, which for family history purposes is important because a lot of protestant non-conformist births were registered there, from right across the country. The original records (a registration form and the entry in the register) can be seen at Ancestry, and as well as the information given at FamilySearch, record that Sarah Barraclough (the mother) was daughter of John Hitchen.
Anyway, if Ellen Barraclough had started life as a protestant non-conformist, there may well have been significant family ructions if she'd ended up RC. (This may be where I'm confused about who's who.)
Also interesting to note that none of my Hauworths show in the BMD non-conformist records here http://www.bmdregisters.co.uk/. What does that imply?
Probably that any relevant registers aren't included in that collection. The ones at BMD Registers are mainly (all?) protestant ones, so I'm not very surprised if you haven't found RC ones there.
And, in an unabashed display of almost total ignorance, what exactly is a conformist?
Tx.
Ha! In this context, it would mean a member of the Church of England, though it's never used like that. Those who belonged to other denominations were often called 'dissenters', though these days 'non-conformist' would be more usual. Whatever term was used, it was often prefixed with 'protestant', to differentiate them from RCs.
