Opinions would be appreciated

[Hampshire Lass]

Thanks for the link to the previous interesting thread Gadget 

Unfortunately dawnsh I didn't view an image of her son's baptism but found it on freereg as a transcription so I can compare with the image of her marriage. I will check later on another site if the image is available though. It may seem more credible if it is a different vicar.

[Mowsehowse]

Is the vicar the same on both events?

I was going to ask that, and even if it was the same vicar, how do we know that he was a bright, sober individual. Could have been very hazy of memory for whatever reason? 

And before people start shouting, we are repeatedly told the reason for omissions and mistakes in the registers could be due to poor memory, poor sight/hearing or (less usually,) poor character.

But more importantly, I have an illeg Bap in Totnes church, whose mother was married there by special licence the following year.

[Gadget]

I do not see any possible context in a parish register for using the archiac meaning of 'lowly born' for base born. I don't think there would be any confusion as to what was meant as baseborn in a baptism record ie the mother was one of unmarried, possibly married but had a child with another man, or widowed.

Simon

I agree. The link I gave earlier also supports this.


Gadget

[andrewalston]

Is it possible that the mother had already been widowed before the birth of the child?

That would imply that the 1795 baptism is of another person, or that her first husband had the same surname - not uncommon in rural districts.

[Hampshire Lass]

No I searched a wide window for a marriage to someone of that surname also for his death either side of the child's birth.

[Hampshire Lass]

Just to update......found the images of both the child's baptism and mothers subsequent marriage and it was a different vicar at each ceremony.

[IJDisney]

Is her surname common for the area you are researching? Could you have conflated two individuals?

If this were my research I might wonder at her being 30 when her illegitimate (first?) child was born, and the 13 year gap between known husband and wife. I would wonder whether she could indeed have been a widow when the illegitimate son was born, and therefore whether I have got the wrong baptism name.

Or could she have left the parish in disgrace in 1825, married somewhere else to someone with the same name, and then been widowed and sent back to the parish she came from? Did her son marry and give a father's name on his certificate? (although he too might lie to maintain respectability).

Is there both a marriage banns record and a marriage service record? Do they both call the lady a widow? I have an ancestor who is called a widower on one, and a bachelor on the other (don't know why). Could be a scribal error, or maybe the clerk had a vague memory that she had already borne a child and took it upon himself to define her as a non-spinster in some way.

Or she could have just lied. A new vicar; a young husband; influential friends; overconfidence... Perhaps she thought she'd chance it.

[Hampshire Lass]

Well, thank you for all of your thoughts so far.
Another update......

In 1818, 1820 and 1822 there are baptisms in the same parish. A father is named on the record and the mother would seem to be the lady I am researching.

Then there is the son I found who was base born in 1825.
Then there is another son born in 1828, also base born.

I widened my search and found a marriage in 1815 in a parish 25 miles away.

Absolutely cannot find a burial record for the dad named on the 1818,1820 and 1822 baptisms though!

The research is tricky as the surname is spelt differently on each record and so there could be anther variation which is meaning the result is not appearing.

[Andrew Tarr]

Base Born does not always mean illegitimate. It could denote the lowest social standing. 

Perhaps it might mean that 'everyone' knew the woman's husband/partner was not the father - for example he was away at sea ?