These days illegitimacy is not frowned upon, but in the past it was a big deal. Anyone tracing their family history will have no doubt come across it several times in their tree and with our modern eyes it doesn’t mean much but then? Let’s start with what illegitimacy is. Well according to www.collinsdictionary.com “Illegitimacy is the state of being born of parents who were not married to each other” https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/illegitimacy I suppose up until the 1960’ illegitimacy was frowned upon and the mother was deemed immoral, but now a lot of children are born to parents who aren’t married and no one cares as long as the kids are looked after and happy. But this has not always been the case. In the past it was not unheard of for single women to be sent to the workhouse or worse for having a child out of wedlock, but nothing was ever done to the father of the child. There is some evidence of women being committed to mental institution for being a single pregnant woman especially if the father of the child was an important person. He wouldn’t want the woman to be listened to and people believe he was the father, must think of his reputation and all that.
The laundry’s and homes run by the Catholic Church were another example of how the women were treated. They were sent there to have the child and have it adopted and some never left. They spent the rest of their lives there. The author Steve Robinson covered this subject in his second Jefferson Tayte genealogical mystery novel “To The Grave”. Thankfully most women had the child and raised it with the help of their family and went on to have a normal life and in some cases married the father of the child. In my family illegitimacy is not uncommon. Take my great grandfather for example. He didn’t know he was illegitimate until he had to produce his birth certificate in order to be ordained as a Church of England vicar. When they found out about his illegitimacy they refused to ordain him, even though he had been working as a lay reader for years and thus he became a chemical factory foreman. We have copies of letters he wrote begging for help to achieve his dream of becoming a vicar. It’s a good Christian attitude if you ask me and ironic as if you believe the teachings of the Church. He was baptised so what did it matter. Now the subject of who his father was that is interesting to me. Just 3 years before he was born his mother was in service to the Canon of Norwich and Archdeacon of Norfolk. Now although there is no evidence that anyone in the church was his father, his mother was obviously linked to the church and so could his father have been part of the church? Mind you his mother was pregnant when she did get married 8 years later to the child’s father, so who knows. The other case of illegitimacy in my family which I find intriguing related to my 3 times great grandmother Sarah. She had 2 illegitimate children one born in 1863 and the other in 1864. I’ve found the records of her and her first child entering the workhouse in Stockport in May 1864 and the reason for entering was pregnancy. He eldest daughter was released 2 days later by order of the parish and lived with her grandparents. Sarah and her new daughter were released in October 1864. Now in some respects she at least had the workhouse hospital to help birth the child, but really was it the best thing to do to 17 year old servant girl? I don’t think so, but perhaps it was to scare her into mending her ways? In any case she didn’t have any more until she was married to my 3 times great grandfather and her children lived with them as a family, including her eldest daughter’s illegitimate son! Throughout history the stigma has been on the mother for being immoral, but surely the same should have been placed upon the father. The mother hopefully knew who the father was, so he should have shouldered half the blame, if not more as I reckon some of the girls probably either were too young to understand, too frightened to say no or just given promises he had no intention of keeping. So if you find illegitimacy, don’t judge, just think that without that child I probably wouldn’t be here. We’ve all though of the question which famous person from history would you like to have met. Well I have. In fact I’ve given it much thought. My first answer is always King Henry VIII. I want to know what he was really like. Was he the man history makes him out to be or was he actually a man in a situation he didn’t want to be in (Henry was destined for a life in the church until his brother Arthur died and he suddenly became his father’s heir) and did he became the person he was as a result? The other person I would like to have known was John of Gaunt the third son of King Edward III. This was a man who had at least 14 children by many women, 3 of whom he was married to. I’ve love to know what kind of man he was and whether he realised how much his descendants went to populate Europe. Our present Queen Elizabeth II is descended from John of Gaunt. One of his grandsons was the explorer Henry the Navigator (a prince of Portugal being the son of King John I of Portugal of Phillipa of Lancaster (John’s daughter)).
This led me to think about which of my ancestors I would like to have met. The answer I always come up with is my Grandma. She died 2 years before I was born suddenly in her 60’s from a brain haemorrhage. All my life I’ve seen photos of her and heard stories about her, but I would have loved to have seen her. What did her voice sound like, what did a Grandma hug feel like, am I really as like her as everyone says? All questions I’ll never find the answers to. So which other ancestors would I have liked to have known? Well my Grandma’s mum. She died when my Grandma was 6 so she really missed out on her mum and could possibly have had the same questions of her mother as I have of her. Family story always had that she died in the flu epidemic in 1918. We got a bit of a shock when I purchased her death certificate and found out she had died of an appendicitis. She was 39 years old. Another ancestor I’d loved to have met was my 5 times great uncle Hugh Wardle. He was born in 1802 near Leek in Staffordshire. He had an interesting life. He was a Druggist (the fore runner of a pharmacist although he probably just sold drug rather than made them). He was married twice to women called Elizabeth and the couples had 5 children between them. In 1855 he emigrated to America where along with his 2 sons from his first marriage and they opened a drug store on Warren Street, Hudson, New York State. I would love to know what prompted this move especially since it meant leaving his other children behind. Was it just the adventure, or were times so bad he left for a new life and to give his sons a better change in life? Did he miss his daughter Lady Elizabeth Wardle and his son George Young Wardle? both of whom were friends and colleges of the designer William Morris. Lady Elizabeth’s husband Sir Thomas Wardle was influential in the silk dying industry and George ran the Morris Works in London. Did he ever wish he’d stayed in Staffordshire? Again all questions I will never have answers to. One of the main reasons I would love to be able to meet all of my ancestors is to see what they look like and see if I can see any of myself in any of them. I’ve seen picture of some ancestors and I think I now know where my silly hair comes from, but does any of my other traits come from them. But alas this is all pipe dreams as it will never happen, and even if a time machine was invented I’d be too chicken to go in it, so I’ll just have to continue imagining answers to my questions. I was sad to hear of the death of the actor Peter Sallis. He was an actor who bought much pleasure to many either through Last of the Summer Wine or Wallis and Gromit among others. As I was reading his obituary it also brought up answers to some questions I had regarding my own family history.
The article stated that Peter Sallis was a radio instructor at RAF Cranwell during WW2. This was where my Grandpa was for part of the war. He two was a radio instructor. I knew he was a RAF Yatesbury but I knew he served at the same base as Peter Sallis. So I now know he was at RAF Cranwell as well. My Grandpa ran the lab next door to the one Mr Sallis worked in. Grandpa always used to say what a nice man Mr Sallis was and he used to enjoy watching him in Last of the Summer Wine. From this remembrance I got thinking about what I really knew about my Grandfather’s war. I knew Grandpa joined the RAF, even though he was a reserved occupation being an Officer of His Majesty’s Customs and Excise, and I know my Grandad was in the army and served in India after the war and guarded York race course with a broom handle at one point, but what else did I know? Neither of my grandfather’s used to talk about the war. Grandpa would if you asked and he did try to teach me Morse code a few times (and failed as I was a bad student). Grandad never spoke about it. The only time I heard him mention anything was when he was watching It Ain’t Half Hot Mum and said how it reminded him of his time in India. I have got my Grandad’s military records which I purchased so I do know more now. I suppose the feeling all this thinking brought about was that if we don’t ask questions we lose out on so much of our ancestry. How many of us have a box full of photographs and we have now idea who’s in the photos. Even only back to my Grandparents I have a photo of their wedding day and I have no idea who half the people are! If I don’t know, what do I tell the next generation? This is a photo of your great grandparents wedding day, no idea who most of the people are! Even my parents don’t know who they are and they were people important enough to be at their parents wedding. So the moral of the blog is ask questions and ask them before it’s too late. My Grandma died in her early 60’s before the questions were asked and now we’ll never know some things even though genealogy has given me answers to some things it can’t answer the undocumented stuff can it. I was listening to the ICC Champions Trophy Cricket today and it struck me the wide ranging surnames amongst the cricketers and commentators. There was Tufnell, Agnew, Plunkett, Morgan and Root.
We all have a surname but how many of us actually know what our surname means. Some are obvious such as Smith, Baker, Turner, Taylor and Miller, but what about the rest. Let’s take my surname Dobby as an example. Many may recognise the name thanks to Harry Potter, and no I don’t look like a house elf! But where did the name come from? I always believed it came from a Yorkshire name for a little elf or goblin. This would certainly link in with how J K Rowling saw Dobby. In weaving a Dobby is the shuttle which sews the warp thread and is also a floor standing loom. You can still buy Dobby Spot fabric today (it’s usually white with raised bumps on it). Well to add another theory, Dobby may also be derived from Robert. So which is true? In all honesty who knows? It’s probably a combination off all off them. Being a Yorkshire lass I tend to go with the elf theory or form of Robert. You can also use the time frame for when the surname was first used. According to the Merriam Webster dictionary the word Dobby was first used in 1878. Well that’s fine but the Dobby loom was developed in the 1840’s and my 4 times great grandfather was born in 1784 so the name was around before that. So in reality it must be the elf or Robert connection. All surnames have to have their origins somewhere. They can be nature such as Bird, Hill and Tree. Work based such as Smith, Baker and Taylor or even derived from first names such as Robson, Robertson and Johnson. Until the middle ages most people didn’t have surnames but were just known by their first name and possibly used their home village for a kind of surname, for example Robin of Loxley, as son of their father or their occupation. This was originally called a byname and it eventually became what we know as a surname. A surname can also evolve from a nick name. For example the surname Plantagenet came from the broom plant (planta genista) which was the family’s emblem. So for example a name such as Thick could have related to how intelligent someone was. A person may have been known as, for example John Thick as they were called John and were a less intelligent than others. All surnames have to have an origin somewhere no matter what form they take. They give us our identity but should be no reflection on who we are. I’m a Dobby, but I’m not a loom, called Robert and definitely not a house elf. I’m just me and it’s my surname. |
Hello and thank you for taking the time to read my Family History Ramblings on genealogy and history in general. I hope you find it informative and hopefully funny!
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