The following is a common story: Mary got pregnant and was forced to marry the guy — they had to raise their child together. That’s what God wanted. That’s what the family needed.
Celibacy was the preferred option, but this didn’t happen. My horny ancestors didn’t play that game well. As a result, rushed marriages (and diversionary tactics) were put in place to quell the scandals that often followed the discovery of a pregnant, unwed mother.
In fact, as archaic as this older social order sounds, it kinda helps modern genealogy a lot. Family trees are easier to follow. There’s one marriage and one surname to look at at a time. There were fewer divorces, re-marriages, stepparents, and blended families. Couples didn’t hyphenate their surnames, and women didn’t retain their maiden names. Tracking ancestors through the ages is comparatively simple.
But just when things make sense and appear easy to follow, a curve ball is thrown.
If the two young lovers didn’t marry, other steps had to be employed to hide their indiscretion. There were many ways unplanned pregnancies were covered up.
Adoption was common practice, but it wasn’t the only way to escape shame and guilt.
Supportive families could absorb the responsibility by building a super-sized lie around it. Young mothers handed their babies over to their married aunts, married older sisters, or sometimes to their mothers to let them raise them as their own. A pact was made, and no one was ever to mention the awful incident again. This dramatically changes genealogy.
In place of where a daughter should be recorded, a niece or a sister takes her place. Baby boys instantly became their mother’s nephews or even brothers.
The inaccuracy it creates for a family line is profound.
On rare occasions, the baby became a friend’s or neighbour’s child, systematically removing (or introducing) a whole different bloodline from (or into) an equation. There’s no paperwork to confirm it, only a hunch based on conflicting research. Birth certificates and census records differ. People weren’t where they were supposed to be when certain events happened.
The amount of children that became detached from their birth mothers and reattached to another woman is incredible. And that’s only in my family tree. This must’ve occurred in everyone’s tree at some point for the very same reasons.
It explains why miracles happened to childless women. A married aunt who, for medical reasons, couldn’t get pregnant managed to conceive a miracle baby. She proved God exists — only because the alternative was unacceptable.
Hallelujah!
And it wasn’t hard to hide or perform a fake pregnancy. Fashions of the day could conceal a baby bump or help make one. Extra padding, loose clothes, and mysterious holidays away in the final weeks of pregnancy ensured that no one familiar could witness any truth.
Who knows the natural parents and where or when the actual birth occurred?
Did I say genealogy was more straightforward when people stayed together and lived by a single surname?
Oops.
Future generations will have their work cut out when researching today’s historical lineages and adding extra space on their family tree for donor-sperm dads, surrogate uteruses, egg-donating mothers, and DNA splicing (my prediction).
Good luck climbing the branches of that mangled species of tree!
I’d like to believe in one thing, though. Fifteen-year-old Mary and her mysterious beau did a wonderful thing behind the old shed on a warm Spring day. Giggles became kisses that became heavy breathing, fear, excitement, and nervous anticipation.
But I’m a writer with a vivid imagination. I like to think of the mysterious things behind our human facade, shame avoidance, guilt, secrets, and the lies we tell to keep the people around us happy.
I like it a lot.
Discover more from Michael Forman – Author of Dark Fiction & Drama
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