Regency Reader Question
How common was it for the paternity of illegitimate children to be acknowledged in church records in this period?
| Source of Question | Research |
| Additional comments | I’m researching a Regency ancestor who had two children by different fathers within a period of 3 years – one by the young son of a wealthy family and the other by a brother of Harriet Wilson, the well-know Regency courtesan. Both fathers are recorded in the church baptism records. I can find few other church records where this is the case – the paternity of illegitimate children seemingly being unacknowledged in most cases of illegitimacy. I’m wondering if this points to my ancestor herself being a courtesan… |
Thanks for the question, Steve! This is a really interesting question, one I hadn’t thought too much of before, but leads down all sorts of fascinating rabbit holes. So less dive right in.
I should start with a disclaimer that I am not a genealogist or expert in parish records…but I did find some breadcrumbs left by geneaologists and experts to follow.
By all the sources I have located, although record keeping underwent significant changes to practices and procedures, generally illegitimate children were typically recorded in parish registers. Prior to the 1834 Poor Law reform, with its Bastardy Clause absolving the father for responsibility of his offspring, the father was typically recorded as a mechanism to keep him on the hook for what amounts to child support. Local parishes were responsible for the children’s care, so in turn they would often go after the biological father to refund the parish. That means parish records, at least prior to 1834, are often one of the most reliable resources for understanding lineage and illegitimacy.
Following 1834, you would be more likely to run into records where the father’s name was left absent or unknown because there was no direct incentive to understand parentage.
Illegitimate children, when recorded, often fell under the descriptors of “base born”, “natural”, or “bastard” (Pzrecha). Other clues might be when the child has the surname as the mother, and not the listed father.
The article from The Genealogist has some original sources that shows how these records may look. It also discusses the bastardy bonds the local parish, prior to 1834, would demand of the father if they refused to wed the mother. The documents demonstrating the weekly maintenance agreements were known as bastardy bonds, and a guarantor was usually required as a cosigner to ensure the father’s debt. For those men who refused to sign the bastardy bond, parish investigators could seek a bastardy warrant from the local magistrate to seize the suspected father and bring him before the magistrate. The Genealogist article also has some examples of the warrant that are fascinating to examine. The final step would be a bastardy decree ensuring child support to the parish.
As for your ancestor’s profession, I wouldn’t say two illegitimate children is enough evidence to conclude she was a prostitute. One interesting snippet on the Price Geneology page listed in the references, was that the rapid growth in ale houses in the middle Georgian era correlated to an increase in illegitimate births. With limited access to birth control methods, a consenting romantic encounter could easily result in pregnancy.
However, there is some evidence to suggest prostitution was a label applied more broadly than we now think of it. Beyond sex workers, Flanders (2014) suggests that in the 19th century the label might also apply to women who were cohabitating with partners outside of wedlock, unwed mothers, or even women who had sex for pleasure and not money. So even if you were able to find a description of this ancestor and it listed “prostitute”, that still might be suspect.
Women who had children out of wedlock in the Regency era did carry a stigma and often were left with few options, particularly if their family was without resources to send them away. For some unwed mothers without family support, that meant ending up in the streets, the workhouse, or dying. Giving the high rate of mortality during childbirth, generally being an unwed pregnant woman carried with it a high level of risk, shame, and little recourse.
It is possible that a desperate woman with one illegitimate child may resort to sex work to survive, or if she was able secure a more lucrative position as a mistress or courtesan.
So although two illegitimate children is not proof of a sex worker, I would say there is a high likelihood that at some point in time she was at least called a prostitute, if not engaged in sex work to support herself and children.
For a wonderful resource to understand more about illegitimacy, parish support, how to conduct research and the impact of Poor Law reforms, I recommend you start here: https://www.londonlives.org/static/Bastardy.jsp
I hope this has been helpful, Steve, in your quest to understand your family history. Thanks for reaching out and sharing this fascinating piece of personal genealogy with us!
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References:
Bailey, J. (2005). Unfortunate Objects: Lone Mothers in Eighteenth Century London.
Flanders, J. (2014). Prostitution. The British Library: https://www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/articles/prostitution
The Genealogist (2019). Tracing Illegitimate Ancestors Online. https://www.thegenealogist.co.uk/featuredarticles/2019/tracing-illegitimate-ancestors-online-1127/
Jane Austen Center. (2011). Development in Childbirth in Regency and Victorian England. https://janeausten.co.uk/blogs/landscape-and-property/developements-in-childbirth-in-regency-and-victorian-england
McLaughlin, E. (1989). Illegitimacy. Federation of Family HIstory Societies.
Odom, C. (2019). Unwed others in the Regency. Madame Gilfurt. https://www.madamegilflurt.com/2019/11/unwed-mothers-in-regency-by-colin-odom.html
PodgornaA. (2019). Illegitimate Children in the Population Accounting Church Records in the 18th – the First Half of the 19th Century. Eminak: Scientific Quarterly Journal, (3(27), 76-84. https://doi.org/10.33782/eminak2019.3(27).313
Przecha, D. (undated). Illegitamate (sic) Children and Missing Fathers: Working Around Illegitimacy. https://www.genealogy.com/articles/research/52_donna.html
https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Illegitimacy_in_England
