ANOTHER ILLEGITIMACY TWIST

Ruth and John had 7 children. An 8th child (now in his 70's) was born with Ruth and John’s names on his birth certificate 4½ years after the death of John. He bears John’s name but obviously he is not John's.


This child is fully aware that he is not John's son but everyone in the family has refused to discuss his illegitimacy. He was raised by Ruth as hers.


I suspect the child could be Ruth's and an unknown individual, or the result of a rape, or the child of one of his older unmarried (at that time) sisters.


I am sure his is a blood relation but whose is a mystery. It is not my intention to find the truth because it isn’t mine but I need tips about how to insert him in the family tree.

 

Hi Maureen, I have several similar and have done the same as DB

 

me too I have done just like Jan

 

Thanks all for your responses. And this would be appropriate if Ruth were the mother like in the first two scenarios I presented. However, if the child is actually from one of her eldest daughters (chronologically feasible), making the child Ruth's grandchild, how would you handle this? The very same way?

 

I have the same scenario in one of my families, where the son is actually the grandson. 'Son' was also baptised as his grandparents' child. On his birth certificate it recorded their eldest daughter as his mother, with father unknown.

Same as DB above.

 

Hi Maureen......Toronto area here. This is not uncommon at all. I swear it happens in every extended family. So handle it as suggested and know this will not be the last. You live in my favourite place I think.....Quebec City?? Welcome to the forum!!

 

There's usually one somewhere in a tree. I've got 2 that I know of.

 

A 2nd cousin once removed was born 6 years after her mother was widowed. She appears in the 1939 register, and were it not for the fact she was buried with her mother in Witton Cemetery Birmingham she would never have been found again. She never married and had adopted her mother's maiden name. My tree lists her as the daughter of an unknown father, status illegitimate.

 

There are a lot of twists and turns to this sort of thing. Would be interesting to see how this sort of thing was handled in different countries and different eras. I recall being told that in the early days in England, women often had a child before marriage to prove to the prospective groom that she was fertile......is this true??

In Jamaica, it was sort of "normal" due to the wives not coming out to the Island and the men would dally with the maids. (fancy word...dally, lol). They were called "outside children".....not illegitimate or worse.....and we have two in Ron's family that did very well business-wise and were richer than the legitimate ones. I knew one of them....lovely man. I did find his birth (90% sure), but there is a mystery there. Raised by Coopers but wasn't one. Odd.

Anyway, just wondered if anyone had things to add to this. Perhaps Oz was different....1500's were probably different........and so on. Have a good weekend!!

PS....my dad told me loads of stories about how this sort of thing and others were handled in PEI.....he and Ron were comparing how similar Jamaica and the Island were due to isolation, I guess. But as Google datamines this Forum, I will not mention names, etc.

 

Happens in most families...Hubby had a first cousin who was raised as a sibling to his Dad. What I don't know is if the surviving real siblings know about him and who his father actually was ... and I am afraid to ask as they are both fairly elderly. He died when he was in his 30's and is buried as the son of his actual grandparents. Neither of his siblings live close by and I think I have only met them once, if at all and that would be nearly 50 years ago. The only person I have ever discussed it with are other cousins, not in that immediate family. Due to Ontario privacy laws I can't find his birth for another 15 or 20 years ( if I am still around by then)

 

I don't think so Figgs, people were people.

 

I thought perhaps at times it was not as big a sin as it was in the early 1900's for instance. Just like it no longer is. Don't know if I am explaining where I am going with that, lol.

 

We have abnormally strict privacy laws, as Sue Y. knows. 90 years. Stupid!! BUT, I wanted to say to Maureen if she is still reading this that a family member of mine put a child out for adoption in QC or Montreal in the early 60's. She used a fake name on all but ONE paper and thought she had scratched it out.

Thank God she didn't.........the daughter found us via the Quebec Gov't. (I think) that way. For what it is worth. And that was 55 years ago that she gave birth. In a hospital. It was a "gray adoption", so perhaps the paper work came that way. Dunno.

 

I'm not sure whether things were 'looked past' way back due to the import of deported persons- convicts- & the assuming that what happened away from the 'old country' stayed away, & so were not broadcast. Maybe just a people thing - if you can get away with it, you do it. eh? Much saving of face etc.

 

So far I have only one proven illegitimacy in my lot, I'm dreading finding more but only in so much as the placing of them, seeing Jan's solution I think that's the way I would go.

Mind you there have been a couple of near misses, one (above) was baptised a couple of weeks before her parents married and in the same parish the parents were married in, read "the daughter of William Fewell and his wife Margaret".

Also probably one or two more that although baptised after their parent's marriage might have been born prior to the marriage.

 

I have one that would drive you bats!! Hubby's g-g-grandfather, one Jose Angel Fig* in the decade of 1840 to 1850 had NINE children by 5 women.......only one being his lawfully wedded wife in the eyes of the RC church!!

FOUR were legitimate (hubby's ancestor being one of 4 males from that union).....the rest were spread between 4 other women of means and class (no maids). This man Jose Angel was a pillar of the RC church in Jamaica........mind blowing!! His father was no "Angel" either....pardon the pun. 2 or 3 women besides his wife from another Island. It appeared to be quite accepted by the wives. Not to mention, the Church. Shaking my head.

I will check to see how I handled all of this, but probably the way Jan suggested!! In my case I had a number of stories to add in private. No one sees my tree anyway, but I certainly don't hide it from relatives......that is the way it was in 1850's Jamaica.

Oops.........I forgot there was another one that he married after Wife #1 died in a cholera epidemic. She had a 5 year old (yes, his). At least he was not considered a child of the marriage, lol.

Double OOPS!!!! Just checked my Family Treemaker and forgot about the one with an unknown female, but christened in the Church of England.......ye gods, he had TEN!! Amorous Spaniard!!

 

Well on those hot steamy Caribbean nights and no Telly!