Hello, I have a copy of the registry entry for my great, great grandfather's Anglican marriage in 1825 showing *A* guardian had given his assent and signing to that effect. My problem is since both the bride and groom were minors at the time whose guardian was it who signed? His own father was a rather 'distant' entity so far as my own research goes so it seems more likely the guardian was his rather than hers, a local girl. There is only the one name shown though there were two other apparently unrelated witnesses who signed. Unfortunately I have not yet established if her parents were still living but I am pretty sure they were, She was 'of the parish' he came from a parish about ten miles away. Am I right to assume the Church required the guardian to be present at the ceremony? Any ideas? Thanks, Nick

An interesting one, Nicholas. Under Hardwicke's Marriage Act, the onus was very much on the clergy to ensure they did not marry minors without appropriate consent. Where the bride and/or groom were local parishioners this was not a problem. The parents could be asked outright in advance or they could be expected to object when the banns were called. My money would therefore be on the named guardian being that of the groom. Although the banns would have been called in his parish (if he was actually resident there, rather than just "coming from" there), this might not have been enough for the vicar conducting the ceremony. Added to this was the relative rarity of men under 21 marrying. I think he may well have had doubts about the veracity of the consent and required written evidence. Consent from a guardian would only have been valid if both parents were dead. Whether they were or not is another matter :). So far as I am aware, there was no legal requirement for the person g! iving consent to be present. Caroline Sent from my iPad > On 10 Mar 2015, at 19:50, Nicholas Wilson via <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hello, > > I have a copy of the registry entry for my great, great grandfather's > Anglican marriage in 1825 showing *A* guardian had given his assent and > signing to that effect. My problem is since both the bride and groom were > minors at the time whose guardian was it who signed? > > His own father was a rather 'distant' entity so far as my own research goes > so it seems more likely the guardian was his rather than hers, a local girl. > > There is only the one name shown though there were two other apparently > unrelated witnesses who signed. Unfortunately I have not yet established if > her parents were still living but I am pretty sure they were, She was 'of > the parish' he came from a parish about ten miles away. > > Am I right to assume the Church required the guardian to be present at the > ceremony? > > Any ideas? > > Thanks, > > Nick > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > Please use PLAIN TEXT only when replying to the list, and trim away any excess. > > Any problems, please contact the List Admin: [email protected] > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message