Phoebe Beatson's baby was born on 29 August 1802, so she must have had sexual intercourse with George Thorp (and it was he: no doubts here about his being the father) during the pre-Christmas period of 1801. How much more than this is there to say? She was thirty-seven or thirty-eight years old when these events took place, and had been in service to the Murgatroyds for some seventeen years. There is no way of telling whether the holiday season of 1801 brought the two together for the first time, or whether theirs was a relationship of longer standing. (Murgatroyd's diary for 1801 is not extant; there is no mention of the Thorp family of Stockcarhead (Stocker Head) before 1802, though Murgatroyd appears to have known them well.) He cannot have known about her pregnancy on New Year's Day 1802 (she can scarcely have known herself), but his diary entry was uncannily prescient. ‘God for Christ's sake, bless me & my Family thro’ this month & this year if Life is continued', he wrote; ‘we are by Nature prone to do what we should not do but, ye Blessing of thy Grace will be a restraint on Nature so as ye Soul shall not be hurt thereby …’ (Perhaps he did know about what had happened between Phoebe and George.) It is not at all clear what Phoebe's expectations were during her pregnancy and after the child's birth, but very clear indeed what Murgatroyd's were, regarding George Thorp.