possible black sheep??, help required

[celestine53]

hello,

i have a great grandfather who was married and then from the written evidence left his wife and took up with another woman and had five illegitimate children by her, then when his first wife died in 1881 he married the mother of his five children and went on to have six more. As divorce was not posible for working class people in the mid 19C how could he just leave his first wife like that?, for what reason, would he have made any provision for his first wife?

thanks crh

[Mutley]

Then, as now, they were quite able to live with another woman and bear children with her. They could call themselves by any name, they could live wherever they found work. They could leave wives, remarry, go awol, in fact, do as they pleased far easier than now.

Remember, few could read or write and they did not carry documentation to prove who they were. Wife number 1 may have been pleased to see the back of him and happy to carry on without him.

What was she doing while he was gallivanting?

[Nicolina]

couples living together was quite common back then, although many of the women were called "housekeeper". After his first wife died my own G-G-Grandfather lived with a "housekeeper" for 14 years before he married her, she then appears to have left him and moved from Norfolk to Yorkshire.
So it was not always the man who did the leaving.