Average age of child birth etc. in the Victorian Era

[draechaeli]

So I have a character that was displaced from time when he was 25 in 1873 which means he was born in 1848. He is a scholarly character that is a second generation (subject to change) Canadian (United Providence of Canada). I am currently trying to fine tune his ancestry. He has a very English name but his surname in Moraeu so I wanted his British

Comments

[clanwilliam]

An indicator of his social class would be very useful at this point. You say "scholarly character" but not much more. What did his parents do for a living?

[seanchaidh]

OP would be looking at middle class or upper class.

[seanchaidh]

The word is "Province," not providence. The Province of Quebec won't exist until 1867; prior to that, it's Lower Canada and then Canada East. New France ceased to exist in 1761, thereabouts.

Play with the censuses: 1871 census that could give you some information. In my family's history, you've got the first kid being born usually soon after marriage, so it depends when the mother gets married.

Also, be aware of the bigger issues: if you're Catholic in Canada, you're facing major discrimination and limited upward mobility, same with being francophone.

[melannen]

Large families in that period tended to try to have the children spaced out by at least a couple years (if only because if they didn't, they probably wouldn't survive enough to have that many.) So I'd guess his mother would have been around late 20s/early 30s when he was born, especially if you assume (as is probably safe to assume) at least one or two late miscarriages or siblings died in early infancy who aren't counted in the 5

[thelilyqueen]

My suggestion is to seek out statistics on average age at marriage in that area from 1840-1860, and add a year or two for each pregnancy.

HOWEVER - keep in mind that averages are just that. There are people in any era who marry as soon as legally possible and produce a baby or babies virtually every year of their fertile lives, people who marry early and have few or no children, people who marry later in life and manage to have several children, and people who marry late in life who have one or none.

[jayb111]

Average age of first marriage for women in England 1750-99 was just under 25 years. 1800-49 it had fallen to just over 23 years. Average for men was around 2-3 years older. Of course averages were averages and there's always plenty of room for manoeuvre. It's worth bearing in mind however that the popular idea that people, especially women, married very young in the past isn't borne out by research - although of course there were always isolated instances

[syntinen_laulu]

[i]It's worth bearing in mind however that the popular idea that people, especially women, married very young in the past isn't borne out by research[/i]

It was a class thing. As soon as working-class girls grew up they went into service, or factory work, or apprenticeships, or hired themselves out by the year as farm workers; and they expected to work for quite a few years - seven, ten - building up a nest-egg for when they got married in their mid-20s.

But young ladies couldn't work or do anything themselves to improve their financial desirability, so they went on the marriage market as soon as they 'came out' in their late teens. If they had any money they were often snapped up promptly; by their mid-twenties they were considered 'on the shelf'. (Which doesn't mean they never married later than that, of course.)