Illegitimate Children in the early 19th Century

Difficult to answer this for every situation. No two cases were the same. Mixed marriages did occur, and were quite common in the counties of Ulster where the numbers of other denominations matched, or even occasionally exceeded, the numbers of the RC population. Such marriages gave the couple and their families some things to think about, both in terms of whether one of them should change denomination and with regard to what denomination(s) to bring the children up in. And no doubt quite a few families didn?t approve of their offspring?s choice. But they did happen, and in not unsignificant numbers. (The records of all the main denominations regularly record adult baptisms, and that was usually a precursor to a marriage that would have been regarded as mixed).

Illegitimate children were usually kept by the mother or her parents. If that was not possible, they were sometimes farmed out to a married sister. Failing that, then an informal adoption arrangement was a possibility, with the child being handed over to a couple with no children or some other couple willing to take it. The baptism records of all the main denominations also contain a steady stream of foundlings, left on the church porch. So that was evidently another well trodden path.

You often see children born well before their parents had married on the 1901 & 1911 censuses, so I think it?s fair to say that in some cases such illegitimate children were included in the married couples family. Formal adoption was only introduced in Ireland in the 1950s (1927 in what is now Northern Ireland). So prior to that there was no formal adoption. You simply looked after the child, and gave it your surname.

I don?t think there were many orphanages in the early 1800s, but obviously as they increased in numbers that was another option (often under the auspices of the church). The creation of workhouses under the Poor Law system from the 1840s onwards was another solution.

I am specifically interested in County Limerick, probably prior to 1835.  If the couple did not marry, would the child have been shown in the baptism records with the surname of his mother?  Would the unofficial adoption have normally taken place at the child's birth or later on?  If the child was unofficially adopted after he/she had been baptized, would his/her surname have been changed to that of the adopting family?

It was up to the priest how he recorded the baptism but in many I have seen it will name the father and the mother but have a comment ?illegitimate?. But of course if the mother kept the father?s name secret, then only her name will appear.  (I can send you an example of an RC baptism of an illegitimate child in the 1800s, if you want).

The adoption could have taken at any time. It depends on the mother?s circumstances.  She might have known from the outset that she couldn?t care for it. But in other cases that problem might not have emerged for a while. (Eg perhaps her parents died and she no longer had their support. All sorts of possibilities).

In most cases if the child was young it would just adopt the new family?s surname. (There were no legal formalities. They just did it).

Thank you very much for this information.  It will be of great help in my search.

This article from History Ireland is also interesting:

http://www.historyireland.com/18th-19th-century-history/a-sexual-revolu…

Best wishes 

Clare Doyle

Genealogy Support 

I am English with an Irish father born out of wedlock in Ireland in 1911 seeking information on what attitudes existed in the early part of the Twentieth Century towards women who gave birth to illegitimate children and indeed to the children themselves. 

I have a rough idea of the differences that have existed between the two churches but I have to say that I was shocked to read the term, "Mixed marriages" but then England has tended to have a rather relaxed attitude to religion at least in my lifetime.

In my boyhood the term “Bastard” was an enormous insult and to call someone that name would inevitably lead to an assault.  As for the mother of an illegitimate the least that would be said about her, normally behind her back, was that she was no better than she should have been but that was about all that happened.  Now the general practice appears to absolutely ignore any form of marital regulation in bringing children into the world.

But to get back to my earlier question.  What was the public attitude towards illegitimacy in the early part of the twentieth century in Ireland towards the mother of an illegitimate child and indeed the child itself?

BML,

I have looked around to see if I can identify any relevant academic sources to answer your question.  One that you might want to look at is: “The Population of Ireland 1750-1845” by KH Connor, published in Oxford, England in 1950.  I read it some years ago and don’t have a copy now but know that it explored the population explosion in Ireland in that period (up from 3 million in 1741 to 8 million in 1841. It’s only 6 million today).  The book goes into a lot of detail about living conditions, pressure to marry for economic reasons, numbers of children etc. It may well comment on illegitimacy rates and attitudes to that. But you would need to read it to know for sure.

There were plenty of illegitimate births in the 19th century. Take any page on the on-line birth registers on the irishgenealogy site and you’ll almost certainly find at least one illegitimate birth. I would say about 1 in 15 were illegitimate but that’s just a crude guess based on what they seem to say to me.

And living in sin was surprisingly common too.  I have attached a sample page of baptisms from the Church of Ireland records for Drumgooland, Co Down in 1833 which lists 2 baptisms to men whose partners were noted as “concubines”.  You’ll also see “bastard” routinely in the baptism records but that word didn’t have the same pejorative meaning it does today. (You’ll find terms like imbecile in the censuses too, but again it was a non-judgmental term at that time).

All denominations had mechanisms to bring the mothers of illegitimate children, (and fathers where known) before the church to account for what they had done. This was driven partially by moral reasons and also by the fact that the church might be obliged to fund an unmarried mother who could not support herself.  So they wanted to scare people to discourage them from having illegitimate children. But there were plenty of illegitimate births for all that. Draw your own conclusions, I suppose. I think that society then accepted births outside marriage much as they do today. There would be some who would be disgusted and many who would have accepted it as a fact of life. But that’s just my opinion.

I’m getting there in my search for an understanding of what societies attitude were towards illegitimacy in Ireland of the 19th century and it’s not a pretty story and it was the same in Britain.  I found the two comments below in “A sexual revolution in the west of Ireland”

 “Here is one of the few instances where a male is mentioned in connection with an illegitimate child. While unmarried and pregnant women suffered stigmatisation and degradation under both the workhouse system and in the larger society, men appear to have largely escaped notice or sanction.”

“A ‘deserted bastard’, she had ‘no friends nor residences’ and was admitted on 10 January 1851, leaving on 28 July 1855. Here is one of the few instances where a male is mentioned in connection with an illegitimate child. While unmarried and pregnant women suffered stigmatisation and degradation under both the workhouse system and in the larger society, men appear to have largely escaped notice or sanction.”

The next comment I found says it all and I have lost the source for the moment.  The general description of the quote blamed the women for being immoral, the men for being feckless whilst for some strange reason it stated that the child was of a poor character. 

By chance I cam across this snippet which is taken from the Ordnance Survey memoirs for Ballymena, Co. Antrim in 1835. So much earlier than I think you are interested in, but all the same it gives a clear flavour of the public view of illegitimate children and their mothers at that time. 

I too am interested in this subject.  After careful scrutiny and with the help of the Kerry archive, I have found what I believe to be the baptismal record for my great grandfather.  It appears to be a quite normal record. I understand that the maiden name of the mother is used in Roman Catholic records rather than the married name so found nothing to suggest my great, great Grandparents were unmarried when they had their children.  Upon further investigation I have found that the baptismal records of my great grandfather's elder sisters are recorded as being illegitimate and I am curious about this (mainly because I scandalised my family by being unmarried when I had my children even though I lived a perfectly united life with their father.)  I cannot find a marriage record for my great, great grandparents except for one in which the names match, but this was many years later when their children were grown up and had children of their own.  I often smile when I think about how they would never have imagined their private business being out there for all to see.