Names in Victorian England

[Simon and Chris]

Here's an interesting factoid...

Having transcribed about 50,000 census entries from 1861 in Sussex - about half of them female - we have found just ONE girl called Victoria.  Victoria had been Queen for nearly a quarter of a century by now; why haven't parents named their daughters after her?  Any suggestions?

[kerryb]

Simon and Chris

Having so much family in Sussex, you got me checking and thinking.  I've got two Victorias in Sussex, one born 1839 and one born 1854 but yes that is it.

Perhaps they just weren't Royalists in Sussex and the reasons for picking children's names had other significance for them. 

Kerry

[Mean_genie]

Looking back over many years of researching in census/BMDs etc, I agree that there don't seem to be as many Victorias as you might expect, and a search on FreeBMD shows that nearly 15,000 girls were given Victoria as their first name, which is not all that many as a proportion of the whole. I suspect that the real reason is that most people stuck to the age-old habit of using family names, and didn't start striking out on their own until late in the century.

Mean_genie

[mazwad]

I was thinking the same thing as in my family the sames names are used all the time until WW2.  In some ways it makes it easier as you can make an educated guess as to the parents names from the children but it becomes very confusing when you refer to them to other people.

[MarieC]

Yes, I too have found lots of reuse of family names.

But I read somewhere (maybe on here!) that Beatrice became very popular after Queen Vic named a daughter Beatrice, and that a lot of girl babies were named after Princess Beatrice.

This could explain a mystery for me, because my grandmother was Beatrice, and I haven't been able to find it earlier in the family.  I'm thinking this might have applied even in Oz!  (Her mother was born in London.)

Does anyone else have Beatrice appearing as a name in Victorian times?

MarieC

[Siamese Girl]

I can think of two family Beatrices - always abbreviated to Beattie.

Perhaps people just didn't like the name Victoria then? It seems to have been more popular in recent times. Albert certainly caught on!

Carole

[Jean McGurn]

Was Albert popular before or after the Prince Consort died?

Perhaps people though it wasn't right to name their children after the Queen whilst she was still alive. I think most people in those days revered the monarchy in as much as they though she was the Mother of England.

Jean

[kerryb]

Perhaps people though it wasn't right to name their children after the Queen whilst she was still alive. I think most people in those days revered the monarchy in as much as they though she was the Mother of England.

Jean

Jean

That is what I wondered but how does that compare to other royal names at the time of other monarchs?

For instance I have a number of Elizabeths born at the time of Elizabeth I reign.  But then perhaps royalty was seen in a different way then.

Kerry

[Mean_genie]

It's difficult to compare the two, and not just because they are 400 years apart. Elizabeth was a popular Christian name for girls long before Elizabeth I was queen, whereas there were very few Victorias around before Queen Victoria came to the throne.

Looking at the English 1851 census, there were 137 Victorias born in the 10 years before 1837, and over 1,000 born in the ten years after that. Even allowing for soem deaths and emigrations in the older group, that is a noticeable jump, although the actual numbers are still quite low.

There were a lot more Alberts around to start with, but it definitely seems to have grown in popularity after ther royal marriage, and then again after the Prince Consort's death.

Victoria never seems to have caught on in Scotland, though.

Mean_genie