What is the greatest number of children you have found in your ancestry

[Orangeblossom]

My largest brood (off the top of my head) is on hubby's side. The mother had been pregnant for 25 years almost constantly! 16 children (no multiple births) from the same marriage - all of whom passed their 18th birthday. I only know of one premature death, and he was 19.

[Olde Crone Holden]

Merry

Aw, shucks, didn't want to show off about my ancestor with 45 (or was it 46?) children as I thought it might make the rest of you feel inadequate, lol.

Not many people have an ancestor who gave birth aged 69 and even fewer have an ancestor who gives birth at 69 AND five years after her death.

OC

[garstonite]

was she a Garston girl OC ?....LOL...Allan:D

[Little Nell]

I have a 2nd gt grandfather who had 15 children between 3 wives. He was nearly 60 when he fathered the last one, with his 3rd wife who was the same age as his daughter by his first (this daur being my gt grandmother)

Husband has grandfather who was one of 12.

In my family the further you go back the larger the family, so I often have instances of mum giving birth to children when the older children have married and produced their own babies.

Mid-19th century 8 seems a normal sized family.

The trend seems to be to produce a baby every 2/3 years.

But my husband's Welsh side tended to have a baby every year so I think they may have stopped breastfeeding earlier.

Babies stopped when the mother either died or became menopausal around the mid 40s.

[Jill on the A272]

12 children in 20 years for my Yorkshire great great grandmother who died aged 46. The last 3 died in infancy, 2 in WW1 and the rest made it to old age.

[Uncle John]

Aw, shucks, didn't want to show off about my ancestor with 45 (or was it 46?) children as I thought it might make the rest of you feel inadequate, lol.

Not many people have an ancestor who gave birth aged 69 and even fewer have an ancestor who gives birth at 69 AND five years after her death.

Doesn't she go on. :(:(

[Olde Crone Holden]

Allan

LOL, no but she WAS a Lancashire Lass!

*Ignores UJ*

OC

[helxx]

On my OH's side - 16 children in one marriage and no multiple births. Sadly though, only 3 made it to adulthood, the others died as babies/toddlers.

How did they cope?????

[Pippa Doll]

23 children!

[Olde Crone Holden]

helxx

I don't know how they coped - it really rocked me when I found mine burying 16 children and then three adult children. I cannot imagine what was going through her mind and how she found the strength to endure it.

She buried the six eldest (all her children at that time) in the space of just over 5 weeks. There was not an unusual number of burials at that time, so it wasn't an epidemic that took them all.

As I went on researching the family and finding more births, I was holding my breath and saying "please let this one survive" but apart from two, they didn't for very long.

OC

[maggiemay]

my greatgreat/grandparents had 12 children 9 boys 3 girls all survivied childhood. But the family got a lot smaller after that as my nan was an only child and so was my mother.

Margaret

[maggie_4_7]

Merry

Aw, shucks, didn't want to show off about my ancestor with 45 (or was it 46?) children as I thought it might make the rest of you feel inadequate, lol.

Not many people have an ancestor who gave birth aged 69 and even fewer have an ancestor who gives birth at 69 AND five years after her death.

OC

:D

That's some tree OC

[Janet]

All my ancestors seem pretty consistent at between 8 and 11 children although one couple back in the late 1600's only had two, but I suspect that was because they moved to another village to have other children and I have yet to find them. It may well be the same with some of mine who have 10 children, maybe there are others around over the border in Hunts which have yet to be found.

Even my Irish families had no more than 10 children.

Janet

[JayG]

My granma was one of 13 children born 1905 - 1924. Only the youngest is still alive, his oldest niece is 4 years younger than him :D

My 2 x great grandmother had 14 children by 2 possibly 3 men. The first 11 by her husband, the last 3 she had as a widow I see other people have men having children by 2/3 wives.

I think the most in my tree is 15 or 16 but I don't think that's a direct line.

[LyndainSpain]

My Great Grandfather was one of seventeen, all with the same parents. It is amazing how large the families are when you look back in time compared to these days.

Lynda

[Anne in Carlisle]

My GG Grandparents in a Yorkshire mining village had 15 children.

Elizabeth was 18 when the first was born and 46 with the last. The last 4 all died as infants, although all the others reached adulthood. I have often thought Elizabeth must have been getting weaker as she aged so the babies were not so strong. However Elizabeth lived until she was 73! she must have had a new lease of life when she stopped being pregnant!

Anne

[maggie_4_7]

We're really spoilt now compared to the lives they had to endure.

We can now choose how many to have in most cases.

I think they had so many because

a) not much contraception or medical care if any at all available especially to poor people the rich or well off always had access to both of some description

b) the mortality rate was so high that probably a few had died before they had the others plus in farming communities it was about working the land for a living and the more hands you had the better it was.

Although having said that all my big families including my mother's were in inner city areas.

Edit to say: probably just poverty and ignorance and women didn't have a say in most things that happened generally (although when I knew my grandmother she was 76 when I was born and died when I was 15 no one would mess with her and get away with it) she was very strong.

[kathsgirl.48]

The 1911 Dublin census revealed that my Irish Gt Grandparents had 18 children born alive but only 8 still living at that time. (Between 1873 -1894)

Then another 2 sons lost their lives in 1919.

I've located the birth/baptism of 12! We know that at least 6 reached adulthood.

[Jen Red Purple]

My dad's mum was one of 15 and 3 are still alive. Apparently one died as a boy in a horse and cart accident and one died on active service in the war.

I have only recently met my gt uncle Sooty (the surname is White!) and he is very close in age to my dad.

A sister born in 1914 just looked at a tiny tree I wrote out for Sooty and a week or so later she listed all the names of her siblings' spouses and children and confirmed her maternal grandfather's name - Ephraim (great name!)

I just received her parents' marriage cert so will be writing to her via Sooty and hope she will come round to me visiting her next time I go North.

(can you tell I'm chuffed?)

[JBee]

Recently found that FIL was one of 14 children roughly one every 2 years. His mother died when she was 60 in 1933.

A twin died at 3 days her sister when she was 77
a boy died age 13 and a sister age 15 - the rest lived to good ages.

However only 6 had surviving children - 4 had 1 child - 1 had 2 children and 1 had 3 children. 2 others lost all their children at an early age.