Genealogy Chat

Merry Yes, we tend to think of our ancestors as more moral and devout than nowadays, not sure that's always true. I have some ancestors who didn't seem to spend much time in church at all and they don't appear to be non-conformist. nell

I wish I had kept a note of the details, but I was browsing The Times newspaper archive the other day and reading one of those ''letters to the editor''.....circa 1850/60's The writer said he was horrified to attend a City of London church when a Christening service was going on. He implied the babies were from ''working class families'' and that there were over 50 babies and their families waiting (must have been noisy?!!). The vicar arrived (late) and spent less than 30 seconds on each family.....when he had baptised the last child he left the church immediately, leaving ''a clerk'' to write down the details (for the PR's). The object of the letter to the paper was to condem the lack of solemnity and gravitas at this Christian ceremony.....but it certainly conjours up a quite different picture to what I had imagined, even for a busy church! Merry

I have one where the two eldest are born in Nottinghampshire 1860-1865, then the next two are born in London 1866-1869, where they are living on the 1871 census, but in 1870 all four children are baptised in Hereford! Why? Guess I'll have to ;look at the original entries and see if I can gain some clues from that!

can you imagine all those kids I would love to have seen that ,

Today I came across a family with 8 children christened on the same day which raised an eyebrow. Rita

I believe sometimes it was a travelling Vicar so did all at once while they had him there

I have come across this. It seems that it was the habit of some vicars to 'do' all the children of a family together, so in the parish record you will get five Smith siblings one week and four Jones's the next.

It may have been a new vicar who wouldnt marry one of the kids or something unless the whole family got baptised.

It's useful to have your children baptised, even if you're not religious, or don't believe in baptism, to ensure that they can get poor relief if they need to. If you are nonconformist, then a job lot means you only have to step inside the church once, rather than seven times. Another clue to nonconformism is a regular pattern of couples marrying by licence - again you are in church as little as possible.

it could be for any reason - perhaps teh family wanted to re-assert their devotion to god for some reason. I have a family who were all re-baptised on th eday oftheir MOther's funeral - no need for it - they probably just feltthey wante dto Zoe

I have multiple christenings when my grandad was christened along with older siblings who had been missed. I myself was part of a mass christening in 1952 although I was born in 1941 I think this was due to the war years though. Pauline

Might have fallen out with the chapel, as one of my families did, and had the 3 eldest 'done again' (previously bp at the chapel) along with the next 2, all five at one go. Jay

Or there was an earlier set of septuplets than the Waltons! Merry

perhaps they had never got round to it before! or new keen vicar rounding up flock

Why would a couple have all 7 of their children christened on the same day? The Newton's on the IGI Batch C107611 were all christened on 23 Jan 1825 in Drighlington. Why?