Orphans with Parents: Very Common in the 18th and 19th Centuries

Southside of Chicago, September 1897––Asleep in the street in a neighborhood teeming with saloons, gambling, and prostitution, a young boy named Andrew was “rescued” by one of the newly-minted social reformers on the southside and turned over to the juvenile court system. Although Andrew’s parents were alive and well, they were saloon keepers and not mindful of where their son was spending time; nor did they seem to have any clear plans for his education or future. Andrew was sent to a boys’ school, where he was deemed an orphan. Six months later, the now ten-year-old was handed over, via a train ride to rural South Dakota, to a Russian-German immigrant farmer and his family, with whom he spent the next decade and a half of his life. Andrew's story, and that of many others in our families was all too common in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Read on for more information.

Andrew grew up knowing only his name and not much more about his family. Despite his rocky beginning, he married, moved to California, had a large family, and was a successful farmer. During this time period, there were thousands of boys and girls like Andrew, who were “orphaned,” even though one or both parents were living. Orphans were often, also like Andrew, just neglected or homeless children. And even if a child had a home, orphanages sometimes offered a better way of life than whatever was waiting in a tenement or overcrowded shack.

Every family was different, but typically children were dispersed to orphanages for some common reasons:

• If a woman died in childbirth or when her children were young, her husband might have no one to care for the children while he worked.
• If a man died, leaving a woman with children, she might have no way to earn a living, and, if she did, she might have no one to leave the children with while she worked.
• Jobs open to women were limited. Some required women to be unmarried. Almost all required time commitments that did not include tending to little ones.
• A man might need to travel to find work, and he couldn’t take children with him.
• Large families of young children meant more mouths to feed; quite often the youngest were sent out of the home.
• Children born out of wedlock were frequently sent away so the mother did not have to deal with shame and slander.

What happened to these orphaned children? Child labor laws were almost non-existent until the 1920s, so, like Andrew, once a child was old enough to do a job, he or she became part of the work force. Orphanages generally required children to work for their upkeep. Most adults believed that working built moral character and would reinforce a work ethic. The Industrial Revolution was in its heyday, and there were an abundance of low-paying factory and mill jobs easily filled by children who brought a steady, albeit limited, income to their elders.

In rural settings, work was often farm labor for both boys and girls. They would start working as five or six-year-olds, and chores became more intensive as they aged. In cities, girls might be engaged in housework and caring for younger children. Boys worked as laborers, errand boys, chimney sweeps, stable helpers, or messengers. Kids in cities might work in factories or mills, where conditions were terrible. Rarely did any of these children get much of an education. An exception was sometimes in orphanages run by religious groups, where religion took precedence and children were often trained for leadership roles in the church: priests, nuns, ministers, instructors, missionaries.

Orphans were listed in the federal census as “inmates.” Once you determine if your ancestor was in an orphanage or group home, you may want to see if any records are available, but be aware that these records are private and may or may not be open to you. Many orphanages have gone out of business, and their records are missing. Others that are still open may not have the staff to respond to genealogy queries.

More Resources

Orphans, orphan trains, and orphanages have been frequent topics in this blog and in our Facebook group. 

• Read more about Andrew and orphans in general in our post from 11 March 2024.
• "Finding St. Louis Orphanages in the 1960 Census," our post from 13 June 2022.
• "Updates to Orphanage Care in St. Louis: St. Bridget's Half-Orphan Asylum for Girls," our post from 9 March 2020
• Researching Orphans and Orphanage Care in St. Louis by Viki Fagyal, newly revised in 2024, on sale in the StLGS secure store in both paperback and digital format. (StLGS members, be sure to log in first to get your discount code.)