Who Do You Think You Are - Gregg Wallace 22nd Aug

[kiterunner]

Originally Posted by Margaret in Burton

As she was a married woman it is always assumed that the husband is the father surely

Yes, that's right, but if he was filing for divorce on the grounds of his wife's adultery, you would think he would mention that she had had twins by another man!

[Margaret in Burton]

Originally Posted by kiterunner

Yes, that's right, but if he was filing for divorce on the grounds of his wife's adultery, you would think he would mention that she had had twins by another man!

Ah but as his name was on the birth certs and he hadn't had them taken off how would he prove it? I suppose his naval record might have shown he wasn't around when they were conceived but would that have been available to him?

[kiterunner]

I was wondering why he didn't have his name taken off the birth certificate, Marg.

Originally Posted by kiterunner

Here is some unseen footage which sheds some light on why Henry didn't turn up in court for the divorce proceedings:

http://www.whodoyouthinkyouaremagazi.../footage/13764

Thanks Kiterunner, I always want to go into everything if I was the Producer/Director I'd end up with 12 hour long episodes not 1 hour.

Ahh I knew there had to be a good reason I just didn't think that he would not turn up after attempting to divorce Emily and get custody of his son and then of course Emily number two got killed and so by then he probably thought what the hell wasn't any point anymore he couldn't look after his two small daughters let alone another child, not sure why he didn't notify the court though or get someone to notify on his behalf that he was unable to attend.

I feel quite sorry for all the people involved but it seemed trouble didn't half follow Henry about.

[Margaret in Burton]

Originally Posted by kiterunner

I was wondering why he didn't have his name taken off the birth certificate, Marg.

Never occurred to him?
Didn't realise she had named him if he'd never seen the certs?
Didn't know you could have your name taken off?

Originally Posted by kiterunner

I was wondering why he didn't have his name taken off the birth certificate, Marg.

A bit of procrastination perhaps, trouble always followed Henry about but perhaps he wasn't vindictive enough or vindictive at all to take his name off the birth certificate it would be an act against a small child rather than use other evidence re: adultery to gain a divorce and custody of your natural son, by inference the dates and the divorce proceedings would be enough for the court.

Originally Posted by Margaret in Burton

Never occurred to him?
Didn't realise she had named him if he'd never seen the certs?
Didn't know you could have your name taken off?

... and these.

[kiterunner]

Here is Henry's entry from the Royal Canadian Navy Ledger Sheets database. It doesn't look as though the actual Canadian Navy records have been digitised, though.

Henry R Springett

[Rachel A]

Looks like he was long gone by the time the twins were born and when their births were registered by Emily... wouldn't it have been her word to who the father was, probably to hide the shame of her infidelity? Hence the cover story that 'he had cleared off and left her'.

[kiterunner]

It just seems as though Gregg and the research team assumed that Henry wasn't the twins' father on the basis of the date of sailing shown in his navy records, and the twins' date of birth, but we know that dates on service records can be wrong, as shown last week in the Samantha Womack episode where the year was wrong on her ancestor's army record, and dates of birth on birth certificates can also be inaccurate, so I just wish they had shown something more definite!

Even if they are right about Henry not being the twins' father, I'm also worried about their assumption that he joined the Canadian Navy because he had found out that Emily was having an affair - if their dates are right, he sailed for Canada before she got pregnant with the twins, so it could be that he left her for some other reason and that was why she took up with someone else.

But maybe there is more information in the divorce papers than they had time to show us in the programme, such as dates when Emily was supposed to be seeing the other man.