The Life of Hannah Andrew - I'm scratching my head!

[brigidmac]

I suspect Hannah kept her status as married widowed because it suited her
It would give her respectability for the census takers

But the locals and the children themselves might know that for the children born  after marriage Thomas was the legal father but not necessarily the birth father

The priest may have refused to name Thomas as father . Could it also be to do with parish considerations + Thomas not accepting financial responsibility for these children

For those born before marriage  he was maybe their step father for a short while .
+ Could even have been the birth father of some if Hannah + Thomas hadan ongoing premarital affair

DNA tests of descendants could reveal the true birth father

I have an.ancestor who have children by 3 different fathers and match.descentants of all but only descendants of one of the fathers siblings which proved that the man the mother stated as birth father of my.ancrstor  was the correct one .

I don't understand the ANDERSON to ANDREW' Name change
Was her mother Harriet remarried or reverted to a maiden name which Hannah chose to use sometimes
Is her father on any other record as.Henry ANDREW'?

[EBrand]

Jomot,
That's very interesting, I guess DNA would be the only way to work it out, I guess I'm just confused as to why they would marry
a) in the first place, if he is not the father of one of her previous children?
b) if he decides not to be with her at all following their marriage?

Perhaps they had an agreement to be married on paper so she could "live her life" and keep having children (not necessarily his) and he could go and be with/do whoever/whatever he wanted? Hannah was also a labourer so it seems like she was financially responsible for the kids. It's a scenario I've been thinking about recently.

Wivenhoe,
The family seems to interchange between the name ANDREW and ANDERSON, but I have researched the previous generation (Henry and Harriet and their children) to make sure it is the same family and I am quite sure that it is. To me it seems like Hannah is borrowing her father's name. I have uploaded Robinson ANDREW's birth and death certificate here so you can have a look. It does not state that Harriet is the grandmother on the death certificate, I made that assumption from Hannah's family relationship as they lived quite close to each other in Carr Gate.

I am descended from Hannah's third illegitimate child, Joseph ANDREW (although by the time he is married his name changes to ANDERSON and has been passed down through the generations as ANDERSON) and his first wife Sarah SNOWDEN.

Brigidmac,
This does make sense, I hadn't thought that the priest might have a hand in refusing to name the father but it could be the case. I thought that if she was an infamous figure in the area I might find something online, although I did trawl through the gaol records and newspapers and couldn't find anything regarding her.
I agree that DNA would be the way to solve it, although I've not had much luck yet with my own DNA.
Yes the name change is very interesting, I thought maybe she knew that her parents interchanged between the names of ANDREW and ANDERSON so she thought she could get away with naming her kids ANDERSON (as if they had a father) while she used the name ANDREW. Everything points back to Hannah ANDERSON/ANDREW being the same person, it even becomes HENDERSON at one point. The name change went down generations to my great grandmother, whose maiden surname was ANDERSON.
Harriet and Henry are on the censuses together as ANDERSON, when Henry dies his surname is recorded as ANDREW and when Harriet dies her surname is recorded as ANDERSON.