1845 birth certificate query. *Completed with thanks*

[ShaunJ]

Mary's brother Thomas Smitton was married twice at the ancient church of St Helen's in Sefton. Per Lan-OPC:
 
5 Jun 1844
Thomas Smitton - Stone mason - Bachelor of Seaforth
Margaret Birckett - Spinster of Seaforth, Sephton
Groom's Father: James Smitton, Stone mason
Bride's Father: William Birckett, Farmer
Witnesses: Margaret Braithwaite; Robert Smitton; Margaret Jones
   
12 Oct 1854
Thomas Smitton - Stone mason -Widower of Seaforth
Margaret Gillbanks - Spinster of Seaforth
Groom's Father: James Smitton, Stone mason
Bride's Father: Joseph Gillbanks, Grocer
Witnesses: John Tyson; Jane Lawson; George Gatley
   

[ShaunJ]

And Mary was buried at St Helen's Sefton as Mary Wilson
 (From Lan-OPC)


Burial: 7 Nov 1864 St Helen, Sephton, Lancashire, England
Mary Wilson -
    Age: 48 years
    Abode: Litherland

[Doddie]

Hi ShaunJ, thank you for you replies. I know it's not the first time you have helped me with my queries so your input is always much appreciated. The fact that the death notice in the Liverpool Mercury is so clear in emphasising that Mary was the wife of Robert Wilson niggles me even more. Surely there must have been a marriage. Or maybe, as has already been suggested, Robert and Mary just lived all their lives as a 'married' couple without actually going through the actual ceremony of a wedding.

Regards

Doddie

[coombs]

Yes when a registrar was told the details of a birth he did not require proof of the parents marriage. He just wrote what he was told.

"And what is the baby's name my good man?"
"Joseph"
"Surname?"
"Bloggs"
"Full name and occupation of father"
"Frederick Bloggs, tin plat worker"
"Name, surname and maiden surname of mother"
"Mary Bloggs formerly Smith".

He did not then ask for the marriage proof of Fred Bloggs to Mary Smith.

[Sloe Gin]

In one of my families, all three of the children, born in the 1880s, had their grandfather's name and occupation on their birth certificates and baptism entries.  I don't know why this was, possibly their father couldn't get time off work to attend the registration or baptism.  The parents were married, so it seems a bit odd.

Do you mean that the grandfather was the informant, or that his name was given as the father?

[Nick29]

There was a great stigma attached to illegitimacy in those days.  Quite often a daughter's illegitimate child was passed off as a child of her mother, and raised as her sibling.  Because young women often went away to work, it would not seem unusual for a young girl to go missing for months, and the baggy clothes worn by older women meant that few would question the pregnancy of the older woman.

Please note that this is a general comment, and not a reply aimed at any of the posters above.

[sargie]

In one of my families, all three of the children, born in the 1880s, had their grandfather's name and occupation on their birth certificates and baptism entries.  I don't know why this was, possibly their father couldn't get time off work to attend the registration or baptism.  The parents were married, so it seems a bit odd.

Do you mean that the grandfather was the informant, or that his name was given as the father?

His name was given as the father.  I've had another look at the family, and the father and mother were in their teens when the children were born, so maybe the grandfather thought that he had to act as the father for official purposes, as the real father wasn't of full age.

[Sloe Gin]

You don't say whether he was the maternal or paternal grandfather, or whether it was the mother or the father who registered the birth. 

I can imagine a situation where the parent, when asked for the father's details, misunderstands the question and gives his/her own father's details.  Could that have happened in this case?

[sargie]

No, it was the paternal grandfather.  I thought the same thing with the first baby, when I saw that the grandfather's name was on the birth cert instead of the father's, that the mother had made a mistake.  But then I found that the second and third babies had the grandfather's name on their baptism entries, so it wasn't a mistake, the grandfather must have been the one who attended the baptisms, and stood in for the father.  If only I could go back in time and find out why!