Baldock/Fagg/Small Family History

No, I’m not talking about burly Welsh coal-face workers! Nor, for that matter, adolescents (necessarily). But I am talking “under-age”.

Many of you have probably already discovered via a marriage certificate the phrase “full age”. Whilst searching parish records you will almost certainly at some point come across the phrase “minor”.

Our ancestors considered “full age”, and thus anyone marrying at the age of 20, 19, 18, … could be considered a “minor”. Full age means they reached the age of majority i.e. they have become an adult. This used to be 21 but is now 18. That’s not to say, of course, that they weren’t adolescent:

“Before Hardwicke’s Marriage Act of 1753 there was no lower legal age of marriage, except during the 1650’s when it was 16 for men and 14 for women. In 1753 it was fixed at 14 for men and 12 for women and remained at that until the Age of Marriage Act 1929 when it was raised to 16 for both.”

Minors tend to be recorded alongside the consenting guardian/father(s).
Also, never forget that some people claimed to be of full age when in fact they were not!
Of course, this also differs from “age of consent” for matrimonial contracts and for sexual intercourse.
Check out the thread at http://www.british-genealogy.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1969.html for example. Much more information can be found from other sources too.

Last night I found a great site whilst Googling some family ancestors (try it – you never know what you may find – but be prepared for anything!)

In searching for Sarah Elizabeth GOLDSACK, I located the site of Larry Goldsack at http://www.angelfire.com/falcon/goldsack/ and located Sarah in the (very full) details page. It tended to suggest that Sarah’s mother was Mary Ann SHARPE, not HORN as I had believed.

This is entirely down to me assuming (again!) the wrong information. Searching on FreeBMD had found a few candidates for the family, around close registration districts; I had picked the wrong one! I should be able to easily verify this via Sarah’s birth certificate (which I do not yet have).

I have therefore updated the tree (go here) to reflect the change – I am a lot more confident in it’s reliability than my attempt!

I now have another great source to progress my mother’s side of the family!

A very belated thankyou must go to Wendy from New Zealand (apologies, Wendy!). Thanks to Wendy, who provided me with photos of some HATTON ancestors and comprehensive WANSTALL and HATTON trees, I have been able to make great inroads into these families. Her information regarding books written by Professor Barry Reay of Auckland University has proved invaluable, and contact with Barry himself lead me to purchase his book titled “Microhistories: Demography, society and culture in rural England, 1800-1930” (ISBN 0-521-89222-8). This focuses on rural society around the Boughton, Blean and Dunkirk areas near Canterbury, and includes wonderful family trees – which include my FULLER and WANSTALL ancestors!

I have started reading another of his books first, though, namely “Rural Englands: Labouring Lives in the Nineteenth Century” (ISBN 0-333-66919-3), which covers rural life in sections of England (hence “Englands”) as a whole.

I have since spent many days (and still am) tracing WANSTALL families – not helped by there being three generations called Benjamin Wanstall, and other cousins/in-laws using the name too! I am also trying to pick my way through a recently found website:
http://wanstallkentandbeyond.com

Go along – and tell them I sent you!

PS. Stats updated