In the 1861 parish baptism record for a probable distant ancestor of mine it gives the parent surname for the baptism of Mary as "NORWOOD alias DOBBS". What precisely does this mean? I guess someone is illegitimate here but I'm not sure who.
From other data I'm fairly sure that the father's name is DOBBS. Mary's GRO birth entry names her as Mary NORWOOD,and in her GRO marriage entry as Mary Norwood DOBBS.
In the 1840 baptism record of the father's sister Jane, the parent surname is entered as "NORWOOD (DOBBS)", which presumably also implies "alias", and suggests that the illegitimacy covers more than one generation.
I can find no record of a marriage between Mary's parents in the GRO, and I have not checked the parish records as they are not online.