2 This offense was dealt with more frequently in Virginia than in Maryland, but less so than in Massachusetts. The most frequent prosecutions were in Lower Norfolk County, a center of Puritanism in Virginia until Sir William Berkeley enforced his policy of religious uniformity. See Bruce, Institutional History of Virginia, I, 48-49; for cases of fornication in Maryland, I have drawn from Sheri Keller, “Adultery and Fornication in Massachusetts and Maryland, the 1600s” (paper, Brandeis, 1987).
3 Illegitimate births in two counties of southern Maryland were very common:
|
|
Annual Rates of Illegitimate Births | ||
|
|
Per 1000 |
Per 1000 |
Per 1000 Single |
Place |
Date |
Total Births |
Population |
Women 15–44 |
Prince George’s Co., Md. |
1696-99 |
|
|
|
Somerset Co., Md. |
1666-70 |
|
|
|
|
1671-75 |
|
|
|
|
1676 |
|
|
|
|
1683 |
|
|
|
|
1688-94 |
|
|
|
Sources: Menard and Walsh, “Demography of Somerset County,” 35; Wells, “Illegitimacy and Bridal Pregnancy in Early America,” and Daniel Scott Smith, “The Long Cycle in American Illegitimacy and Prenuptial Pregnancy,” in Laslett et al., eds., Bastardy and Its Comparative History, 349-61, 362-78.