Mick Jagger, Marsha Hunt, and the Denial That Lasted Years

Marsha Hunt was already a rising singer and actress when she met Mick Jagger backstage at a 1965 concert. Their on-and-off relationship deepened in the late ’60s, and by late 1969 Hunt was pregnant. She gave birth to Karis Jagger in November 1970. Jagger, however, denied he was the father – and kept denying it publicly for years, even as Hunt insisted.

The denial had practical roots: Jagger was about to marry Bianca Pérez-Mora Macías in 1971 and didn’t want an illegitimate child complicating that image. Under English law at the time, an unmarried father had no automatic rights, and paternity could only be established through a court order. Hunt took Jagger to court, and after blood tests (which weren’t absolute proof but strongly suggestive), Jagger eventually settled privately and began financially supporting Karis in the early 1970s.

He didn’t publicly acknowledge Karis as his daughter until the late