Alice Reid, Eilidh Garrett, & Hanna Jaadla

It is generally accepted that the context of marriage was seen as the proper place for childbearing in historic Britain, and levels of non-marital fertility, or ‘illegitimacy’, were relatively low. Depictions in literature suggest that unmarried mothers were predominantly servant girls ‘taken advantage of’ by their unscrupulous employers or, as was the case for the eponymous Tess of the D’Urbervilles, their sons. Even some historians espouse this view.

But was this really the case? And what do levels and patterns of unmarried motherhood tell us about sexual activity outside marriage? This blog describes what demography can tell us about who was having sex before marriage in the past, who ended up as unmarried mothers, and how these were likely viewed by society. 

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