Female Literacy 1830

Were many working class women particularly literate around 1830? I'm
currently flicking through the 1830 marriages in Great Budworth Parish
Register and page after page reveals both bride and groom signing with
X-marks. Suddenly, I find the marriage of my GGG. Grandparents and the
bride not only signs her name, but she does so beautifully, and in a

Eve McLaughlin...

It very much depends on the place where the child was born, first, and
then on the family's financial position.
Some villages had schools set up under the wills of local benefactors,
and any child could get free education for a couple of years at least.
Some had schools where half a dozen selectred bright children, whatever
their background, could get education.
In general, there was less total provision for girls than boys but some
was equal in distribution.
Some girls learned later in life because of the work they were doing. In
Bucks, lace girls could not work for very many hours at a strecth, so
they did get some education in between. (straw plait girls kept at it).
Some girls who worked as servants in a big house had a fair amount of
spare time in small bites, and either a senior maid or even the daughter
of the house might take an interest in a bright girl and teach her to
read and write.
(A local young Mistress taught her dollies, then taught the maids, and
when she was 16, Papa gave her an infant school as a present. But that
is the sort of things you can do if you are a Rothschild).
One capricious trap is that some young persons evidently were taught to
write just their names, for the purpose of signing at marriage. If they
later got no practice, they might forget how to do this. So if your
ggggmr never writes again, perhaps she had been coached and was fair-
copying from a paper. I recall one pair of such signatures by two
sisters. Jane managed beautifully. Elizabeth's signature looks lovely
and neat, but the longer name was her undoing, and she wrote Eliabth.

Peter Goodey...

A different point that I don't think anyone's made. Church Sunday Schools
might sometimes have taught reading - only the bible of course because
that's all the lower classes ought to have been reading! But it was for a
time a matter of policy not to teach writing. What use would the lower
orders have for writing? Writing one's own name might be OK though.

hand that's far more readable than the curate's illegible scribble. Her
signature stands out like a sore thumb to anybody browsing the register,
even if you're not looking for this couple.

Her mother signs with a voter's X and the groom a definite crucifix.
The tempation to read the Xs like tea-leaves is in itself a temptation. ;)

Chris Newall...

Probably more women were literate than the X-marks in the register might
suggest. Where the groom was illiterate the bride frequently 'made her
mark' whether she could sign her name or not - she would not wish to
humiliate her husband on their wedding day.

Phil C....

I also wonder, while marks remained commonplace, whether some didn't
wish to embarrass themselves by writing with a slow, childish hand and
others didn't wish to reveal their short-sightedness. With copies of
the originals, I also wonder if some signatures were too flowery and
illegible to be recorded as anything but a mark(?)

To change the subject - are you looking through the Great Budworth
registers or the Great Budworth BTs? The latter have been filmed by the
LDS - I assume that the actual registers are only available at the
Cheshire Record Office? Or are they available on film also?

Many thanks as always.