Widows, Widowers and Remarriage in an English Colony: Tasmania, 1838-1899.

Peter Gunn, Independent Scholar

Using civil register records from the nineteenth century this paper describes for the first time the rates and patterns of widowhood and remarriage that prevailed among English, Scottish and Irish settlers and their descendants in nineteenth-century Tasmania and compares those rates and patterns with the demographic features of widowhood in the United Kingdom. It reports on the interval to remarriage for those whose previous marriage partner died in Tasmania. It describes the remarriage ratio and, for selected census years, the remarriage rates for widows and widowers. It offers information on the age distribution of widowers and widows at remarriage. It illustrates in striking detail the impact of the sex ratio on the patters of remarriage over the course of the sixty years from 1840 to 1899 and illustrates how the excess of men affected relative remarriage rates for widows and widowers across the decades.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 133. Union Formation and Dissolution in Historical Perspective