Names in wills and/or probate records

Question

How likely is it that someone might of had children that they did not put in their will..... because a lot of people act like if they didn't name them in their will then they couldn't be their child. 

Is it really almost unheard of for someone not to name all of their children in their will?

Comments

Ran across that, about 3 children mentioned but they had about twelve children. You need to ask for the probate records/packets, not just the will, the rest of the children were mentioned there.

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It would not be all that uncommon. In earlier English law the entire estate was normally inherited by the eldest son.

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It depends on where and when.

Answer 1

Often married daughters are not named or recognised in a will. Similarly sons who have already been given property etc. are not mentioned. Sometimes a wife is the sole beneficiary. I looked at a 1911 one today where this was the case. The wife’s will 24 years later leaves most of the estate to one daughter, though others of the family of twelve were mentioned. There are all sorts of permutations and these don’t necessarily mean there was any sort of family disharmony.

Comments

To add onto this, I've seen wills where some children were included and others weren't, and it turned out the ones who were included were not doing so well monetarily at the time. Even back then, one of the questions a parent asked when meting out their belongings before their death was, "which of my children really needs what I'm leaving behind?"

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Also, children who died before the parent may not be mentioned.  If they had children, the grandchildren may get a portion but if there are no grandchildren from that child, it's likely s/he will not be mentioned.

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I agree, married daughters and eldest sons are most likely to be omitted from the father's will as they have already had their inheritance.

When it comes to the mother's will sometimes the property has already been ear-marked for the younger children. If not, you often get more discretionary bequests often to poorer grandchildren (sometimes bypassing feckless parents).

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For an over view of United States Inheritance Laws the following website  provides information on inheritance laws and the changes that have occurred over time from Colonial days to the twentieth century, see: www.loc.gov/law/help/inheritance-laws/unitedstates.php

Answer 2

Depends on the country and the period. In some countries it was and still is impossible to disinherit children and or wives . (e.g. Scotland and France and for a period in England and Wales during the 20th C it was very difficult.) So there can be no, one answer.

In English law, from the mid 1500s until the early twentieth there was some freedom .https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legal_history_of_wills Nevertheless, in the wills I've transcribed (mainly relatively wealthy men, 1500s to 1700s) the testator always seems at pains to mention all his sons and at least his unmarried daughters. (The latter sometimes not actually named, just the number mentioned). A lot of land was still entailed and had to be  passed in a set line of inheritance. (through eldest son and his sons, then 2nd son and his sons etc) .

I have seen a few  wills where the testator specifically excludes one or more sons (saying they have had their share or even they deserve no more) In one case, a wayward son received a token amount,  if he should ever reappear. I've also seen wills where provision is made for any possible posthumous child.  I think that  by including all sons and at least  unmarried daughters,  testators hoped  to prevent costly challenges to the will. (there were enough of these anyway).

So in my experience, for at least this period, wills governed by English law and especially  where the testator held land , and there is no other strong evidence otherwise; then absence from the will is a good indicator that a child had died... or was not part of that family and is wrongly linked to the parent.( Sorry about all the caveats in the sentence. I've come across several instances of emigrants being linked to wealthy families with no supporting evidence and found  a will with no mention of them.Sometimes people argue that the child existed  but was missed out of the will)

Comments

Helen, the best one I’ve had was a wife who left 6 pounds to her second husband. The rest of her estate, over 700 pounds, went to her children. I’ve recently learned that a law was passed in New Zealand in the late 19 century which allowed remarrying women to retain their property so this was obviously what she had done. I wonder if the 6 pounds was just to ensure the will could not be challenged. Her husband was the death certificate informant - I’d love to know the full story.

Answer 3

If the will goes through a list of children and leaves them a shilling each, and one is "missing", that's probably a bad sign.

Comments

I came across one yesterday that mentioned a bequest to two sons "if they come back within 10 years." There are all sorts of reasons a child is left out of a will.

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If a will provides a nominal legacy (such as one shilling) to some of the children (or children of a deceased child), that's a pretty good indication that the decedent wanted to make sure that the children who had already received their shares (or who weren't getting a share) could not claim that they had been denied their due share of the estate. As RJ says, in that kind of case, if a living person thought to be an offspring of the decedent isn't listed in the will, it's a good indication that the person wasn't actually a child of the decedent.

Similar to Lucy's experience, I saw one will that provided legacies to a couple of children "if they still be living," indicating to me that the whereabouts of those children were unknown (and that the decedent hoped to ensure that if they showed up, their claims to the estate could be easily adjudicated).

Answer 4

I can't comment on the probability other than to say it is greater than zero. Since Wills represent that final wishes of the deceased, some wills omit children that parents, for their own reasons, wish to exclude.

Doing genealogy we have all seen the disownment of children for cultural, personal belief, and family feud reasons. Likewise, we have found children with no other record than the will.  Complicating things is that the deceased may have identified a person as their child, when in reality the individual is only thought of as their child.

Wills are a great secondary source, and can reveal so much about life in the day, but to me they are no different than a personal memory. If at all possible, I look for a official record validated created by an arm's length third party.

Comments

I'm not sure what you mean "validated by an arm's length third party". No one validated my grandfather's birth certificate otherwise they would have noticed that he was already one year old on his supposed birth date. No one validates the census, I consider myself lucky if the data is recorded as reported.

As for genealogies and histories they are only as good as the sources they present.

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In validating sources, an arm's length third party is someone (person or organization) who has no interest in the record other than it's accuracy.

Census and birth records are primary sources created by an arm's length third party. (not that the government or church never have an interest in fudging the data, but it is usually monitored in some way.) That is quite different than say me claiming to be a direct descendant of Elvis.

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I'm not sure how Elvis came into this conversation, but your point seems to be that a will which is a legal document usually drafted by lawyers is no different than a personal memory.

To quote our friends at LDS "A primary source is any record created during the time you are researching - an eyewitness account. Primary sources can take many forms, such as newspapers, letters, journals, tax lists, court documents, church records, or a census. Even published books can be considered primary sources if they were printed during the time of your study."

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Not disagreeing that primary sources can come in many forms, and I am certainly not challenging the LDS definition. I just don't see all primary sources as being equal.

To me it's simple, if I think I have found an ancestor, I try to find a second or third source, the more independent the better. It sucks to have spent hours, or days, pursuing an ancestral branch that is later proved an error.

A judgement call on the quality and reliability of the information source is sometimes required. Selfishly, I make mine with a great deal of caution.

Answer 5

I definitely agree with the other comments about it depends on the time/place. But if a child isn't named in the will (or elsewhere in the probate), it is a red flag, and you need to ask what real evidence you have of the child-parent relationship.

I've had a couple of instances where after a child wasn't named in the will it turned out someone had connected a birth record to an adult with the same name.   Upon closer examination, the other facts were a little off for them to be the same person, and the child probably died young.

But like everything, I think you need to look at all the evidence.  Checking deeds as well is important to see if a child's share was given that way, or if the probate record is incomplete, they may be part of a sale of the real estate or the dower portion later.

I've sometimes wondered if children who migrated far away may have been presumed dead, and were excluded for that reason, too.

Answer 6

It does happen.  My 6th great grandfather was married twice and his will names only the children by his second marriage as the children by the first marriage were all grown and their father had given them what he wanted them to have when they married and left home.  We know the names of all of his children from Bible records which records the dates of their births and the date of death for his first wife.  Only with intestate estates can you be reasonably certain of the names of.all of the heirs as the administrator of the estate was required by law to list all heirs and account for the proceeds of the estate.  If the administrator did not name all the heirs and account for the proceeds the heirs not named could sue the administrator for their share of the estate.  If there were deceased children and they left heirs this should be included in the records as they receive their deceased parents share of the estate.  If a child was deceased and left no heirs their name will more than likely not be included in the estate records. I prefer to find intestate estate records as your almost certain to find the names of all heirs.