Can I have opinions please?

[bev&kev]

Would the following have been "normal"???

It is 1948, a couple (I will call them Ann Smith and John Jones!) are living together, as husband and wife, a very long way from home, so no-one knew them.

They have a child, which is registered under the name Jones, with mother calling herself Ann Jones, but no father named.

I don't get that - or am I missing something and/or being incredibly dense?

[brenmac]

remember to have a child out of wedlock was a stigma so maybe the name of the father nameless to avoid trouble,father could have ben an important person maybe just my guess brenda xxx

[Jilly McMad]

would common law marriage occur in 1948?? tho that doesnt really give reason to the father not being mentioned on cert

[bev&kev]

remember to have a child out of wedlock was a stigma so maybe the name of the father nameless to avoid trouble,father could have ben an important person maybe just my guess brenda xxx

Father definitely wasn't important.

[Olde Crone Holden]

No, I don't get it either!

You are pretending to the world to be MRS Jones, but you don't name MR Jones as the father.

Who registered the birth? Mum or Dad?

The only logical explanation is that MR Jones wasn't the father of MRS Jones' child.

OC

[Merry Monty Montgomery]

Registrar asks mum her name. She says Ann Jones as that's the name she uses. He asks her her marital status and she says single, so dad's name isn't entered as he isn't with her. As she has said she is single the registrar doesn't ask her about any former surnames as he thinks she won't have had any.

[Little Nell]

Merry

You take all the mystery out of things!

[bev&kev]

Glad it's not just me!
It doesn't make a lot of sense!
The mother registered the birth, now I would have expected her either to be completely honest and register the child in her maiden name (she already had an illegitimate son - with her maiden name) or give the father's name as John Jones - he brought up the child (and her son) as his own children.

This is someone I know - her mother has just died (father died years ago) and she has just found her birth certificate and got the shock of her life!

I told her there must be a "logical explanation" - wish I'd kept my mouth shut now!

[bev&kev]

Registrar asks mum her name. She says Ann Jones as that's the name she uses. He asks her her marital status and she says single, so dad's name isn't entered as he isn't with her. As she has said she is single the registrar doesn't ask her about any former surnames as he thinks she won't have had any.

I like that Merry. I like that a lot!
That sounds very reasonable.

[Olde Crone Holden]

Well, yes, I can see what Merry is saying....BUT:

Being illegitimate was a terrible disgrace and I don't understand why Mr Jones didnt go to the Registrar with her, then his name could appear on the cert OR why they didn't have the cert amended later.

Very odd.

OC

[Merry Monty Montgomery]

Was there a reason they couldn't be married?

Might she have changed her name by deed poll, making it less likely she would give her original name when asked?

[Little Nell]

Nowt so queer as folk, OC. Why did my blessed Antonetta Trundley have her first 3 children registered with her maiden name and no father when she was living with Mr Browning and registered two child deaths as his children just a year or so later?

[Little Nell]

I think it unlikely she would have bothered with a deed poll, ordinary folk just used the name they wanted.

[bev&kev]

I don't know what was going on with these two.

They married in 1955, then had another child. No idea why they waited so long. John Jones was an officer in the Army, which could have been relevant, but he resigned his commission in 1946.

The poor son has, in the past week, discovered through diairies and other bits of paper that he has been sorting out, that John Jones wasn't actually his biological father - he has spent his entire 60-odd years believing that he was. So they have had a lot to deal with and are quite upset.

The moral here is: if you are going to tell your kids a pack of lies about their origins - destroy all the evidence before you fall off the perch!

[brenmac]

OC i think the same maybe he wasnt the father but took the child on brenda xxx

[Olde Crone Holden]

Bev

I agree...the truth, however awful, is better right from the start and gives you a lifetime to get used to it and ask the right questions.

Half the truth appearing from beyond the grave is cruel. Don't tell children lies.

OC

[Pippa Doll]

I presume you haven't seen the marriage certificate?

[bev&kev]

I haven't seen it personally, Pippa - they have.

The kids had been told mum and dad married in 1945, in fact it was 1955 - definitely - I checked on Ancestry because they thought it might be a mistake!!!!

[Pippa Doll]

I was just wondering if there were any clues on it like widower or divorced.

[Merry Monty Montgomery]

I don't know how to say this without being non-PC, so I'll say it anyway!

Were they from a different class background? Could he have already been married and had to get a divorce?? (or waited for first wife to die?)

I wonder why he resigned his commission?