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England (Counties as in 1851-1901) => England => Sussex => Topic started by: THEQ on Saturday 22 September 12 21:31 BST (UK)

Title: Birth Cert
Post by: THEQ on Saturday 22 September 12 21:31 BST (UK)

Hi all,
          I just received my first Birth Certificate. I was surprised to see that the certificate did not list the fathers name, only the mother with her maiden name. Would this be due to the mother becoming pregnant out of wedlock ?

Cheers

Mike

Title: Re: Birth Cert
Post by: danuslave on Saturday 22 September 12 21:37 BST (UK)

Most likely!  As you go on, you will probably find lots more illegitimate children.  We've all got them (in our trees at least)   :)

Linda

Title: Re: Birth Cert
Post by: patrish on Saturday 22 September 12 21:56 BST (UK)

As Linda has said, it was a very common occurance.

Often the unmarried mother would give the child the fathers surname as a second or middle name.

Title: Re: Birth Cert
Post by: Lorraine L on Tuesday 16 October 12 23:28 BST (UK)

I only just discovered that ours did that   :)   It was when we looked at the christening record, it showed the columns as:
Kate / Brown / Moseley.    A very strange middle name to go through life with !

Title: Re: Birth Cert
Post by: danuslave on Wednesday 17 October 12 02:12 BST (UK)

The logic seems to have been that, if the couple married later on, the mother's maiden name could just be dropped   :)