Reading the Regency

Family - Children and Childhood

The most reliable method of contraception at this time was abstinence; a concept most husbands would not consider. Wives whose husband was a soldier or a sailor had fewer opportunities to become pregnant. For the wives trapped in a loveless, unhappy marriage, a husband who spends most nights with his mistress could be a blessed relief. The death of a husband or wife would also leave a smaller family than might have been expected.

Once a child came into the world, their chances of it surviving were a little better in a rich family, who had housemaids to clean and provided plenty of food to keep them well-nourished. But overall, you were more likely to die between birth and two years old than at any other time of life. One child in every two hundred died during the birth itself and overall the chance of dying within the first seventeen years of life was 50%.

Children who were sent to wet nurses were also more likely to die than those fed by their own mothers. Smallpox had an eight per cent mortality rate and was more likely to kill girls than boys. Inoculation for smallpox was very effective but limited to those families who could afford it.

Being in a wealthy household didn't guarantee that a couple would have lots of healthy children. Lady Caroline Lamb was nineteen years old when she married, but she struggled with her pregnancies and took time to recover from each one. She gave birth to only three children, two of whom died soon after birth. Her surviving child, a son called William, suffered seizures and was described in the 19th century as "a hopeless idiot". Despite his challenges he was, according to one book, "the object of his father's tenderest love and care."

Taking into account the lack of contraception, balanced against miscarriages, stillbirths and high infant mortality, the average number of surviving children in a household would have been around six. It was unusual for parents not to lose any children during their lifetimes.

"Edward Bridges and his friend did not forget to arrive. The friend is a Mr. Wigram, one of the three-and-twenty children of a great rich mercantile, Sir Robert Wigram, an old acquaintance of the Footes, but very recently known to Edward B."
[Letter from Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra, dated 14th October 1813]

Sir Robert Wigram did have twenty-three children, between two wives. Out of those children, seventeen were sons, six were daughters, and only three died before they reached 21 years. For every family with more surviving children than the average, there would be at least one or two who had lost every child they'd ever had.

Varied experiences of childhood

"To the education of her daughters Lady Bertram paid not the smallest attention. She had not time for such cares. She was a woman who spent her days in sitting, nicely dressed, on a sofa, doing some long piece of needlework, of little use and no beauty, thinking more of her pug than her children, but very indulgent to the latter when it did not put herself to inconvenience."
[Chapter 2, Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen]

It's difficult to describe the kind of childhood children might have experienced in Regency England, because there was no average childhood then, any more than there is today. Any description can only be an oversimplification that doesn't take into account variations between each family and their circumstances.

However, there would have been a number of common influences that affected the kind of childhood someone experienced.

A family's finances would have made a huge difference to the upbringing a child enjoyed. Money, or a lack of it, would affect the clothes a child wore, and whether they went to school, were educated at home, or received no education at all. It would also affect whether they spent their childhood working or not working, whether they were malnourished or well-fed.