Marriage with consent of parents

[BumbleB]

You're right.  The 1815 entry was originally written at the end of the old-format marriage books, and then repeated in the new-format book, which of course only came in in 1813. 

[croxia]

Thank you Stan for your replies. I had asked the question because I have details of a marriage that took place in a register office by certificate and the bride stated her age as 23, she was in fact 20.
She was also not truthful about her late father's occupation either. However as checks were, presumably not carried out, the registrar filled in the details as given. Probably wouldn't get away with theses days though!

Croxia

[paintedlady]

I have gone back to 1698 with a member of the family and it would appear that he was 18 years old and his bride who was born in 1716 was 15 years of age.  I was completely thrown by the fact that the latter was given permission to get married so young, although someone posted on this site that at one time girls as young as 12 (with consent) could marry!  Ancestry  never ceases to amaze me, that particularly would probably not be allowed in 2013.

[stanmapstone]

The legal age for marriage was 12 for girls and 14 for boys until the 1929 Age of Marriage Act which made all marriages carried out from 10 May 1929, void if either partner was under the age of 16.
From The Marriage Law of England 1873.
Sect.4. – Want of Sufficient Age.
The age of legal capacity to marry in England is fixed at 14 years in males and 12 in females; and no persons are capable of binding themselves in marriage until they have attained that age, which is termed the age of consent. Our law agrees in this respect with the civil law, which required that the parties should be of the age of puberty, namely, 14 if male, and 12 if female – a period much earlier than that at which marriage can in any case be prudent or desirable. Derived from the south of Europe, it rests upon the principle that marriage ought not to be made impossible by law between those who are capable by nature of being the parents of children.

Stan

[TheWhuttle]

Hardewicke's Act of 1753 was known to have many overly-strict requirements in it, causing many well-intentioned couples/families to fall foul of its constraints.

One famous protracted legal case in the 19thC involved the legitimacy of the 1795 marriage of the Earl of Belfast (from 1799, the 2nd Marquis of Donegall), George Augustus CHICHESTER (1769-1844).

Doubt was cast on its validity many years after the event, when a marriage of his eldest son in to the Shaftesbury family was being arranged in 1819.

GAC had married the (illegitimate, minor) daughter of the Sovereign of Belfast in some haste.
The full publication of Banns had been properly followed.
Unfortunately she had never had a formal guardian appointed.
Because of her "minor" status, a full conformance to the detailed letter of the Act required that the full formal permission of such a guardian had to be given.
[Her illegitimate status meant that the permission of her father was insufficient.]


After GAC pursued several personal legal law suits over many years, the issue was eventually only  resolved by unusual amendments to the legislation being debated/approved through Parliament.
[It was unusual because its remit was made retrospective in time.]

This finally fully legitimised his 7 offspring, particularly the heir to his titles.

----

Not surprised by those early limits on valid marriage ages.
Visited the Nelson museum in Norfolk last year, where it was stated that boys of 9 years old were meant to be self-sufficient - i.e. no longer a burden on their families.

Capt. Jock