h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Let me introduce you to Benjamin's new wife Caroline. She needs no introduction to the family, of course, for she is Sarah Mary's younger sister. Benjamin's sister-in-law.

It seems like a good arrangement. As we saw yesterday, Caroline is 32 years old and her prospects may have been diminishing fast. She had been involved in the artificial flower trade for a considerable time, and it is even possible that she had lived with Benjamin and Sarah Mary prior to that lady's sad demise.

She is certainly well known to the children, and if Sarah's last illness had been a long one, may even have been heavily involved in the child care and the running of the home. Definitely a better bet than the step-mother of fairy tale fame.

It is what we moderns term a win/win situation. And Victorian society also felt the same. Between 1835 and 1848, records from five districts of England show that there were over twelve hundred marriages between a widower and his dead wife’s sister.

There was, in fact, only one very tiny drawback to the union.

It was made illegal with the passing of the 1835 Marriage Act.

The couple spent thirteen years together, but had no children. Benjamin died in 1881 and Caroline survived him by thirty years, dying in 1911. Long enough to see the passing of the "Wife's Sister's Marriage Act" of 1907. No I didn't make that up.

Prior to 1835 the law was based on the 1533 statute of Henry VIII fixing the degrees of consanguinity and affinity, and specified that marriages within the prohibited degrees could be annulled at any time within the lifetime of the two spouses by the Ecclesiastical court. Along with the obvious relationships of blood, a man could not marry with: his adopted daughter, wife's mother, wife's daughter, father's wife, son's wife, father's father's wife, nor his father's father's father's wife, nor his father's father's father's father's wife (OK Reg don't labour the point). The law was a little vague when it came to sister's in law as opposed to sisters and half sisters.

What this meant in the years prior to the 1835 Act and the consequences of that legislation we will find out in the next (and last) thrilling instalment, which may even include a reference to Jane Austen's brother, and will certainly involve the seventh Duke of Beaufort, who I hasten to add isn't related to me in any way that I am aware of.

Well, yet another example to prove that the law is, indeed, an ass

Deb

I look forward to the next installment! The Beaufort family tree is fascinating.

[Amy P]

Fascinating