Base Born Children

[damo]

Searching my family tree I have hit a couple of brick walls Thomas Cowling Born 3/10/1823 St Ives Base Born and Grace Williams also Base Born
I would like to find out if there was a Bastardy bond paid or if there was any kind of maintenance agreement how would i find this out and were do I need to look

Cheers
Damian Cowling

[Cornish Terrier]

One way would be to do a 'Google Search'.

Just use 'bastardy bonds cornwall' as your search term and there will be quite a number of links presented.

If you take a look through you should get some ideas that will help.

You could also try the following link to the Cornwall Record Office Online Catalogue.

crocat.cornwall.gov.uk/dserve/dserve.exe?dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Search.tcl

You should also be able to navigate to the section on how to order should you find something of interest.

[newlyn]

If you do a search for bastardy bond with the name of the village then info does appear on the internet.
Seems to be plenty for Ludgvan !!

[acra85]

I am also descended from Thomas and Grace, through their son William(my great great grandfather). It's funny, but I was only looking at the information I had on them today. I also hit a brick wall, but what I do know is that Grace is listed as Grace Wall in the 1841 census as living with Richard & Nancy Eddy in Ayr Lane. Nancy was definitely Grace's mother, but if Richard was her father why didn't she adopt his name - also where does the Wall come from? There is slightly more information on Thomas but I don't have it with me today.
Sorry if this is information that you already know, but I thought I would add what I can remember.
This is my first post, registered ages ago, but only found the password today.
Regards
Andrew.

[kerthen]

Andrew, I transcribed the bastardy bonds for Ludgvan and they've been uploaded. Someone else has taken them even further. But someone actually has to do the work for them to be on the internet. If your parish is not, then you need to go to microfilms of the original records.

I found the bastardy bonds among the parish chest records for Ludgvan and got them on microfilm from the Family History Library in Salt Lake through my nearest FHC.

If you check the FHL catalogue for any parish you're interested in -- put the name of the parish and county in the location search box -- you will get a list of all the books, microfilms and maps for that vicinity.

Check the church records to see if the early churchwardens' and overseers of the poor records have been microfilmed. If so, it is possible you will find bastardy bonds included. Sometimes they even make the index. Their appearance is not, however, universal.

I have not found bastardy bonds (except one from the 1840s) in Crowan. And I have gone through those records very thoroughly.

The Cornwall Record Office has microfilms of the parish chest records as well. So if that's more convenient for you than a family history center, you might try there.

[kerthen]

Sorry, it was Damian who was looking, wasn't it? Anyway, the same answer goes, Damian. If you don't find the ones you want already transcribed and online, check the parish chest.

Besides the bastardy bonds, the overseers of the poor records often have entries about payments made to the parish in recompense for payments the parish has made on behalf of the poor (and often baseborn children and their mothers fall into this category). Reading these accounts of expenditures and payments can be enlightening about the whole parish not just the particular individuals we're looking for.

[Cornish Terrier]

Grace is listed as Grace Wall in the 1841 census as living with Richard & Nancy Eddy in Ayr Lane. Nancy was definitely Grace's mother, but if Richard was her father why didn't she adopt his name - also where does the Wall come from

Andrew - thanks for that update which will now be added to my own database for future reference.

Your two questions:-

If Richard EDDY was her father why didn't she adopt his name?

I would suggest that might be because he was not actually her father even though he married Grace's mother.

If Richard EDDY had been the father then I think the marriage would have been sooner.

In fact Grace Wall WILLIAMS was baptised in 1819 and Richard EDDY married Nancy WILLIAMS in 1823 - four years later!

Where does the WALL come from?

My guess is that WALL was actually the family name of the father and there were several of that name at St Ives.

Just 'which' of them was the father I do not know.

CT

[newlyn]

west-penwith.org.uk/ludgbb.htm

Link to Ludgvan bastardy bonds