Genealogy Chat

hi i'm quite new to this site and have not been doing my tree long I've just got my gt grandfathers marriage cert from the gro and his father has a different surname and there is no parent given for gt grandmother why could this be it says after banns on the cert

Hi I expect there'll be other ideas but... If the husband were illegitimate but acknowledged, then his surname could be different from his father's. As for the bride: sometimes the father's name wasn't included if he'd died, although more commonly it does give his name but "dec'd" - i.e. deceased. The usual reason for no father's name on a marriage cert is that the father's name was unknown, generally as a result of illegitimacy. Hope, for your researches' sake, that that isn't the reason on the bride's side because it tends to create the notorious "brick wall"! I have a couple - but there's also one where the father was known and he was knobbled with a "bastardy bond" - a bit like CSA. Christine

thank you christine i'm sure my dad will be pleased to hear that not especially as we already know he died a destitute alchoholic

If you marry in the church of England, most people will marry after banns. These are read in church on three successive Sundays to announce to the world that a couple are about to get married. The alternative way of marrying in a church was by licence, but it cost more. You might marry by licence for various reasons. These include marring more quickly and not letting the neighbours know your business beforehand. Brenda

Hi Alcoholism (like any addiction) is a desperately destructive disease. It destroys not only the alcoholic but his/her relationships and damages (temporarily or permanently) all those who care about him/her. It has also been suggested that there may be an inheritable genetic disposition towards addiction - not to say that having the gene = alcoholism, just that there is an increased risk. From this you may gather that I have had brushes with this in my own circle and was exceedingly glad to have had the support of AlAnon (the parallel organisation for relations & friends, where AA is for the alcoholics themselves). On the topic of illegitemacy - at least these days people recognise that, even for those who believe that having a relationship without the blessing of marriage is wrong, there is no need for any stigma to attach to the child(ren) who would have had no control over the fact of their existence. Christine