Children of irregular marriage

Jang · Post by **Jang** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 2:48 pm

I've just come across my first irregular marriage in 1915. If I've understood it correctly, the parties "declared" they were married in front of witnesses (in this case the wife's brother and sister) and it was registered by Sheriff's Warrant.

If the couple had children before they were married, would they be registered under the father's name, or the wife's maiden name or both?

The place of the marriage was 16 Bank St Dundee. This wasn't the address of the couple - would it refer to the "registry office"?

Jan

Post by **AndrewP** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 2:53 pm

Hi Jan,

Usually, pre-marital children were registered under the mother's maiden surname. If the father attended the registration of the birth, then his name would go on the certificate in the parents column. If he was not there to sign his name as father, then his name would not be included on the certificate. If was there and named on the certificate, then the child would normally be indexed on ScotlandsPeople by both surnames.

All the best,

AndrewP

Jang · Post by **Jang** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 2:56 pm

Thanks Andrew. So to be on the safe side, I should look for children under both names.

Regards
Jan

Montrose Budie · Post by **Montrose Budie** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 3:03 pm

Jang wrote:I've just come across my first irregular marriage in 1915. If I've understood it correctly, the parties "declared" they were married in front of witnesses (in this case the wife's brother and sister) and it was registered by Sheriff's Warrant.

If the couple had children before they were married, would they be registered under the father's name, or the wife's maiden name or both?

The place of the marriage was 16 Bank St Dundee. This wasn't the address of the couple - would it refer to the "registry office"?

Jan

16 Bank St couldn't have been the address of the Registrar as the sequence of events was, -

- marriage at 16 Bank St
- visit to the Sheriff Court to obtain the Warrant (within 30 days)
- visit to the Registrar to have the marriage entered in the Register Book of Marriages.

16 Bank St was probably somewhere convenient to hold the marriage celebration.

David

Rach · Post by **Rach** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 3:52 pm

Hi Jan,
The only pre-marital birth I have in my records has both parents' signatures. The birth certificate states that he was illegitimate. On the left hand side beside this it says that the child was legitimated by the marriage of his parents. This must have been entered 8 days later when their marriage was registered with the Sheriff Court.
Rae

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Sat Dec 30, 2006 5:03 pm

Rach wrote:Hi Jan,
The only pre-marital birth I have in my records has both parents' signatures. The birth certificate states that he was illegitimate. On the left hand side beside this it says that the child was legitimated by the marriage of his parents. This must have been entered 8 days later when their marriage was registered with the Sheriff Court.
Rae

The option was open to the parents, after their subsequent marriage, to request the registrar to make an entry in the Register of Corrected Entries to the effect that the birth previously shown in the Register of Births as illegitimate was now legitimated by the subsequent marriage of the parents; but the absence of such an RCE entry didn't mean that the birth was still regarded as illegitimate, - under Scots Law, whether or not there was such an RCE entry, the wain was automatically legitimated, just as long as the parents were free to marry at the date of said wain's conception !!

Unfortunately, in terms of later generations, this option in terms of an RCE relating to the original entry in the Register Book of Births was only open to the parents, or the wain concerned, - in other words, a descendant of said wain couldn't seek such an RCE entry.

David

Jang · Post by **Jang** » Sun Dec 31, 2006 12:24 am

Thanks for the replies. I haven't started looking for children yet - I wanted to know what to look for first

The date of the marriage, the Sheriff's warrant and registration are all the same - 28 December 1915 - which is what made me think that the Bank St address might have been the Registry.

Jan

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