Why is a child described as Mrs

RobertWakefield

UK, England, Middlesex—Parish Registers, 1539–1988 [Part B][MSPD-TYY]

There are instances in this batch where a child is prefixed "Mrs" and also a "young gentlewoman" is pre-fixed "Mrs"; Is this a term of status? Should the term "Mrs" be indexed as the Deceased Prefix when the deceased is a child?

MaureenE123

According to Wikipedia

"Mrs originated as a contraction of the honorific Mistress (the feminine of Mister or Master) which was originally applied to both married and unmarried women."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mrs.

As you have wondered, it is a term of status, so it is is the same as Miss, for a child from a higher status family.