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Does anyone know how common it was to leave a child unchristened in 1800s? If I find a record of a christening with the right name how can I be sure it`s the right person?
Terry

If you are lucky, the vicar will have written "son/daughter of parents names " - though sometimes it only gives the father's name. I think most children were christened.
Liz

Hi
Just to say out of my grandfather's brothers and sisters only 2 out of 8 were christened, and these 2 children died shortly thereafter. I have searched nearly every parish in the area of registration but am fairly certain I won't find them in what records are remaining. I also believe my great grandfather and great grandmother were not married!
Val

Dear Terry

This is a difficult one.

Some children were not baptised because their parents moved around and some priests refused if they did not like the family!

What specific date are you looking at and in what district, county?
Can you cross-refer with details of parents, location etc?

The ongoing collation of parish records on
www.findmypast.com are usually pretty accurate.
More districts are adding to collection all the time.

Best wishes

After about 1812 / 1813 registration of baptisms in Church of England churches were recorded on a standardised form.
These should show date of event, child's name and surname and parents' names. Father's occupation should be recorded and 'abode', but in my experience you often get little more than a village name for the address in rural areas.
I have hunted and hunted for a baptism of my GG grandfather around that time. Although there is a family with their unusual surname having children baptised in the right village, there is no sign that my Henry was baptised, so I cannot firmly link him to the probable family and siblings.

Gwyn

sometimes if you know the marriage date it is worth looking for a baptism just before. It is possible that some clergy refused to marry someone who had not been baptised. I have a few who were baptised as adults or as a batch with 6 or so other siblings.

I know the feeling.

Mr grandfather was not registered. Born in 1884. Cannot find any of his siblings either. Cannot find baptism records for them. (Found one but did not give her age so did not help much - she was about 5 at the time.) Found one for a child I never knew about who presumably died before 1901 but again, cannot find birth registration for him.

Also, cannot find my gr grandfather's marriage to gr grandma Eliza(beth)/Lizzie or whatever her name was. All I know of her is that she was born in Dover but no idea when as her age has never shown as anywhere near the same on any of the censuses that she shows on. It's possible that all the children were registered/baptised under her name but I cannot spot any likely patterns of children that match.

Talk about a dead end!

Luckily gr grandfather had been married before so I can track his family back a bit, but I hate the gap that gr grandma has!

Good luck with it - hope you find more than I have!

Jill

Sometimes you will find that a child was baptized years after birth

...... maybe there was not a minister in the village, or they lived too far out. In this case you will sometimes find several children of the same family being baptized together

..... sometimes there was a charge for baptism, and the parents couldn't afford it.

....... You may find someone being baptized very late ............ the thought is that a baptism at the age of 14 or so indicates that the child was going out to work and the employer insisted on baptism, or if older than that maybe a wedding was in the offing.

There doesn't seem to have been a refusal to baptize an illegitimate child ..... the thought was that baptizing the child mitigated the sin the mother had committed.


so don't confine your seach to a few years around the birth year.



sylvia

I am looking for a William Brown born around 1830-1832 at Torrington, Devon,father Samuel. That`s all the info I have.
Terry

My own grandmother (b. 1886) was not christened until just before she got married. She was christened and confirmed on the same day, so if you think your relative was married in church try looking to see whether they hold the baptism record as well.