I agree its worth checking local records. A baptismal record may be found for an illegitimate child perhaps. I understand strenuous efforts were made to discover the identity of the putative father because the Parish Official could extract a payment from him. Before the Poor Law of 1835/37 did Scotland have a Bastardy Bond or Order which served as an Affiliation Order where the father had been found, as they did in England & Wales? Janet ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Hardy" <[email protected]> To: "Aberdeen Roots Web" <[email protected]> Sent: Friday, August 02, 2013 8:28 AM Subject: [ABERDEEN] Poor Law payments > Janet & Goldie > "Poor Law payments? I learned a while back that Inland Revenue and > Pensions records are destroyed when the subject dies so its not > worth checking to see if maintenance had been declared." > If you can get to Edinburgh one source is the Sheriff Court Records - those > responsible for administering the Poor Law would try to find someone else > or another parish to pay the costs of support. Often this meant getting the > mother to sue the putative father for inlying expenses and maintenance of > the child until the age of 12, and the expenses of the process. The case > would be under the name of the mother - "Poor ..". These cases are > relatively common from the late 1790s, though I suspect that often the > families made their own private arrangements. Whether the father paid is a > different matter. > Poor Law records are local rather than national records and have often > survived. > > John