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General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: Windsor87 on Thursday 13 September 07 15:33 BST (UK)
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In today's Daily Mail (Sep. 13, p29) there is an article on the 'family tree boom'. It says that with records coming online, more and more people are having a go at making a family tree but are finding a few surprises along the way.
Here is their given list of 'Top Family Secrets':
1: Illegitimate children - 18%.
2: Changed names - 14%.
3: Secret adoptions - 6%.
4: Missing persons - 6%.
5: Unmarried parents - 6%.
6: Unmarried grandparents - 6%.
7: Links to Royalty - 4%.
8: Convicted theives - 3%.
9: Convicted murderers - 3%.
10: Bigamy - 2%.
11: Other convicted criminals - 2%.
My family fall guilty to number 1, 2 and 7 (that is if number 1 relates to the wider tree). Number 2 was my great great grandfather whom I spoke of before who lied about his name to cover up the fact that he was illegitimate.
I suppose my top family secret doesn't rank. I was rather surprised to find that a pair of my great great grandparents were first cousins.
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Surprised that suicide doesn't rank as one of the family secrets.
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I've got 8/11 .....am I shocked :o :o ....not really , no murderers ...yet !! and I'll leave everyone to guess what the other one is. ;) .
Perhaps my lot were a bit on the bawdy side ,but if they hadn't done what they did ,then I wouldn't be here ,so I really won't complain.
I think the Mail is trying to over sensationalize all this though.It just makes me happy that I have been born now rather than then.
lin
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I have 1, 2 and 3 as well as suicide all of which were never mentioned until I started my family tree research.
Although not all secrets are bad, most are just natural, illegtimacy for example has been around since the dawn of time and will be forever more! and can also lead to further trails of the father's identity. My Grt-Grandmother (pictured) was illegitimate and at the moment we are pursuing a lead over her father which we think could be the Lord of the Manor's son :o (he then was packed off to Canada 4 years after her birth, and passenger records suggest she may have gone to visit him!)
The article is online here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=481492&in_page_id=1770
acceber
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I don't have any of those, at least in family secrets: I've found illegitimacy but not until about 5 generations back, and no rumour has passed down. My GG Grandfather committed suicide but that's about it as family rumours go.
Andrew
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I claim 1,2,4,6,8,10,11 and suicide - also bankruptcy. D*mn but I'm proud of my ancestors!
Philip
(p.s. - is there a prize if anyone has the full set?)
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Don’t have any of the above in my Family Tree – it’s so b-o-r-i-n-g! (just hope it hasn’t rubbed off on me). So far, it appears that my lot are “practically perfect”. ::)
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Just an observation on this subject – I’m currently transcribing the Non-Conformist Baptismal records (pre-1900) onto computer for my local Records Office. Occasionally only the mother is listed.
It’s interesting to note that in the C of E equivalent records beneath the mother’s name it states: “Unmarried” or “Unmarried Mother” (usually in capital letters). Seems as though the C of E really liked to “rub salt into the wound”.
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Don’t have any of the above in my Family Tree – it’s so b-o-r-i-n-g! (just hope it hasn’t rubbed off on me). So far, it appears that my lot are “practically perfect”. ::)
:o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o :o
G'day Musicman,
What are you about to do to change that boring perfection???
EDO
from a less than perfect pedigree
::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::)
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Just an observation on this subject – I’m currently transcribing the Non-Conformist Baptismal records (pre-1900) onto computer for my local Records Office. Occasionally only the mother is listed.
It’s interesting to note that in the C of E equivalent records beneath the mother’s name it states: “Unmarried” or “Unmarried Mother” (usually in capital letters). Seems as though the C of E really liked to “rub salt into the wound”.
The Presbyterian Church of Scotland went one step further allowing the congregation to insult the unmarried mother when the baby was being baptised. She had to walk from the back of the church to the alter with the congregation calling her every name under the sun. I don't know if this was widespread, or just the experience of my great great great grandmother.
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This is boring! I have 4 and 7 and suspect 2 for at least one ancestor but can't prove it. I have a couple of bankrupt gggrandfathers. Did think I had a bigamist, but that proved not to be the case. Suicide of a great-aunt - no-one in the direct line.
MarieC
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The Presbyterian Church in Ireland was just as bad. There's usually a pulpit at the 'front' of the church with communion table and baptismal font (no altar).
Baptisms were usually listed with mother's name and 'illegitimate' in box for father's name.
But here's 2 examples:
(1807) 'charged with the sin of fornication came this day and being spoken to in the session admitted to publick satisfaction and so restored to the privileges of the Church.' No mention of the woman involved.
(17 Jan.1809- same surname) '--- and his wife of --- charged with the sin of antenuptial fornication, came this day before the session and being there spoken to and admonished were restored to the privileges of the congregation.'
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Lots of number 1 - including my Grandmother Roberts and GGGrandfather Colley who was one of 5 illigitimate children (they all appear to have the same father from what I can find out - their father was living with his mother until his death)
Lots of number 4 lol - but thats just normal
Willow x
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I think we ALL have lots of Number 4!!!
in fact - the whole tree is made up of them until we get searching, and then hopefully the number gets less, but there is always an infinite number going further back....
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G'day Musicman,
What are you about to do to change that boring perfection???
Too late m8 - I've already done it! ::)
As the song in "Mary Poppins" says: "I'm practically perfect - in every way".
(Edited by Musicman)
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Thanks for the info re: the Scots & Irish Churches – most interesting.
Makes you wonder if those congregation members had ever heard the line from the Bible: “He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her”.
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And, as Dave Allen told it:
"Mummy! Put that stone down!"
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Just a final comment (well, from me anyway!) regarding entries in a baptismal register for Non-Conformist churches starting from the late 1840s – see my posting #7 on the previous page. I have now reached page 50 (yippee!) – with 10 entries per page - in the register and on that and the previous page, interestingly, are a couple of new phrases which have not been used previously – where the parents are not married, or the father not named.
On page 49 is an entry (April 1851), for a Samuel, where both parents are named but have different surnames – and underneath is written: “Not married”. A few entries later Samuel appears again – (the rector must have had a senior moment!) all details match except that this time he father is not named – and underneath Samuel’s name is “Illegitimate”.
On page 50 is an entry for James who is stated to be: Illegitimate. Both parents are named – different surnames, and the mother’s occupation is given as “Servant Girl”.
John
PS This is my 10th posting - oh the excitement – think I’ll have a glass of Sarsaparilla to celebrate! ;D
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The reason for the C of E noting if the child was a bastard or not is very simple they were very often required to provide for that child under the poor laws.
Cheers
Guy
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What a great list. I have 7 out of the 11. I don't have so much illegitimacy as I do getting married while already pregnant.
Kath
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The reason for the C of E noting if the child was a bastard or not is very simple they were very often required to provide for that child under the poor laws.
Cheers
Guy
I do not think that the reason is as simple as you believe. Nor was it the sole reason for those details to be against a child’s name in the Baptismal Records. The main reason the church would do that is because a child had been born out of wedlock – which, in those days, was a sin. The child had been conceived outside the sanctity of marriage.
Nor must we forget that to be illegitimate carried a considerable social stigma for the child - it could also mean social rejection and poverty – for the child as well as the mother.
This, in turn, also highlights the enormous power of, and held by the Church, per se, and which was wielded over people’s lives in those times.
It’s worth reading earlier comments made on this particular page – Replies #9 (Windsor87) and #11 (aghadowey).
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tbh, I'm not sure what "secrets" I have discovered.. Pretty much everything was unknown.
My grandfather had a brother and sister that died young we never knew about.
I *suspect* that his grandparents may not have been legally married, but there's always the possibility that a certificate may turn up with some mangled spelling.
I think the most horrible things I've discovered are when people end up in the workhouse, and dying there, whilst still "in the prime of life" because of widowhood, abandonment or illness'
There was talk, at a recent family funeral of the legend of a murder, but sadly it was the deceased person who had known the story and no-one else did
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I have recently been transcribing some parish records from the 1850's and note that although there were quite a number of births to single women, for some the register shows that the mother is a single woman but for others there is no additional comment regarding the status of the child or mother. This is in quite stark contrast to some of the other parish records I have looked through.
I wonder whether in a small parish particular circumstances were accepted as they may not have been in a more bustling area.
Beth
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I have recently been transcribing some parish records from the 1850's and note that although there were quite a number of births to single women, for some the register shows that the mother is a single woman but for others there is no additional comment regarding the status of the child or mother. This is in quite stark contrast to some of the other parish records I have looked through.
I wonder whether in a small parish particular circumstances were accepted as they may not have been in a more bustling area.
Beth
I guess it depends on the clergyman... possibility though of people turning "a blind eye" in those cases where men had gone off to the Crimea etc?.. just a thought
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I agree. Some clergy might have been more understanding and open minded. I have an entry in a parish record from New Jersey that states the woman refuses to marry the father because he is "Protestant and useless." Ah, so many ways to read that.
Kath
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I agree. Some clergy might have been more understanding and open minded. I have an entry in a parish record from New Jersey that states the woman refuses to marry the father because he is "Protestant and useless." Ah, so many ways to read that.
Kath
That really made me laugh!!!! :D
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................ a parish record from New Jersey that states the woman refuses to marry the father because he is "Protestant and useless.". ..................
Kath
;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
Hello Kath,
At least it's a welcome variation on the often-vaunted [female] remark about being male and useless!!
:o :o :o :o
BUT THEN, it could well become -
being a useless Protestant male
::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::) ::)
EDO
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Very true, as it could have been a nun who filled it out, and I am sure she wanted nothing to do with useless men, especially a protestant one. :o
Kath
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I have 1,2,3,4, 5, and almost a 10. but with out these we wouldn't have a history to uncover so i guess we should be grateful. and our searches would be so boaring. which reminds me of jobs in the late 1800s and no mention of these jobs in the 1891 census.
bitza
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Another one that might have been included on the list is mental illness - finding someone who had been shut away in some institution is always sad :(
Carole
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Five out of eleven, and three lunatics!!!
That is horrible about the church of Scotland. Can you imagine what that must have been like?
My mam was surprised when I found out that her parents were never married. She was brought up strict catholic by her dad. Her (protestant) mam died when she was 3. I think it was probably something to do with the religion problems why they didn't actually marry. But already being married could have been the problem, as he was nearly 20 years older than her. So bigamy could have also been on my list.