Register Office weddings

[Charney Jo]

Hi

I admit that I haven't even Googled this yet because you lot are so knowledgable :D

After taking a year and a bit off from my family research while having my first baby (now 5 months old), I have promised my mil to look at her tree for her. I received a marriage cert from the GRO today for her great grandparents Henry Treadwell and Margaret Forster who were married in 1866. They were young when they married - 21 and 20 respectively - and are listed as Bachelor and Spinster. What surprises me is that they got married at the Register Office in Newcastle Upon Tyne. This is definately the earlist Register Office wedding I have, all other 19th C. weddings took place in churches.

Why would they have decided to get married in a Registry Office rather than a church? Would it be for the same reasons as today (i.e. religious beliefs, married before, etc.?)

Many thanks in advance!

Jo

[kylejustin]

i think this thread mentions some of the reasons:

http://www.familytreeforum.com/research-qs/66644-married-certificate.html

[Tom Tom]

There could be any number of reasons.

Perhaps she was heavily pregnant and didn't want the shame of marrying in the church. Maybe they didn't like the vicar in the local church, or for some reason he didn't want to marry them.
They may have been non-conformist, but by this time people could get married in other religious buildings.

[Olde Crone Holden]

Mine were marrying in the Register Office from the word go, almost always because they were non-conformist. A vast improvement on their pre-1837 behaviour, which consisted of not marrying at all.

Another branch married church first time and register office for subsequent marriages - this side deeply religious and I assume something to do with the idea that a second marriage wasn't quite proper!

OC

[Charney Jo]

Thanks for the answers. I know that they had a child some time in the year after they married but I will have to get his birth cert to see exactly when he was born.