Lorna's research logs and linksJun 2011
2nd: Where the Huttons led & what else I've learnt recentlyLinda and I may not yet have fully confirmed Linda's suspicion that the Robert and Catherine (MITCHELL) HUTTON family she found emigrating to NZ is Robert, brother to the James married into our HENDERSONs, but we've had a lot of fun trying to find out.
As part of that trail I tracked down and contacted a descendant in Dunedin who has put us in touch with several others.
A chance comment along the way has led us to realise that she taught at my secondary school (Columba College), albeit several years after I'd left. I was amazed to hear that some of my teachers from some mumble years ago are still alive, although in their 90s, particularly as, of course, I thought they were about that age back then!
A separate interesting exercise has been a further attempt at unravelling Edinburgh FAIRBAIRN booksellers. The Scottish Book Trade Index on the NLS site has a helpful lot of info on the assorted John FAIRBAIRNs but seemed to be lacking in some vital info.
I've convinced myself that the John, bookseller of 9 Hunter St actually married twice, both to Katherines, firstly BARCLAY, secondly ALEXANDER (relict of James PARLANE).
His second marriage has interesting connections in that Katherine ALEXANDER's niece Catherine WALKER married Jean Francois COINDET, who appears to have a noted place in medicine for treating goitre with iodine, with his son Dr Jean Charles Walker COINDET turning to psychiatry and having patients such as Richard Wagner and Liszt's mistress. Haven't found any reference to the other son as yet, John Fairbairn COINDET other than in Katherine FAIRBAIRN alias ALEXANDER's 1811/1816/1822 will.
May 2011
27th: DAWEs todayNoticed a posting in my Guestbook re the burial at sea of Maria Jane TRUDGEON, formerly PRYOR, nee DAWE, which made me realise I'd not checked for births in the family of her daughter Charity (married Albert BARDEN). Bit of a surprise to find 11 children registered in New South Wales.
The DAWE descendant chart has been updated to include these additional children.
Forgot to mention a couple of days ago that the McEWAN chart had been updated after the recent McEWAN activity.
You'll need to select Expand All to get the full chart in this new interactive format.
After quite a break working on my own extended tree, it's back to FAIRBAIRN DNA, with some new results in (and the desktop not yet fully back in one piece with all the data in place from the backups).
26th: Ross & Cromarty to Winnipeg
Nearly a year on since Ross & Cromarty rose to prominence in my Border SINTONs (see prior post).
This time the activity was prompted by contact from a researcher of the Canadian family of Margaret McRAE & William ROSS. Her research had the exact birthdate for her Margaret as "mine" and wondered if her Canadian family might be a match.
Looks like it to me, not just from the exact birth date, but also from immigration records showing Margaret was from "Ross", when she followed William to Manitoba in 1906, and two of her sisters being known to also have emigrated (1908). So the family of James & Margaret (WILKIE) SINTON continues to grow and spread.
The grandson of Margaret's she was doing the research for is now in touch, so more updates will no doubt occur.
When Margaret died (in Vancouver), her obituary apparently mentioned she had family in Scotland and Eastern Canada, all yet to be identified, particularly which others of the family emigrated to Canada and stayed in the East.
The SINTON descendant chart is being updated as research progresses (click on the + signs to expand the chart and view John's descendants as I currently believe them to be).
25th: TURNBULLs to FAMILTON?
Still digging away at verifying the link back from my McEWAN descendant Sarah Margery JOHNSTON who married a George Miles/Myles TURNBULL, back up George's TURNBULLs to, supposedly, John TURNBULL and Bessie FAMILTON, the latter being of Earlston.
Admit I'm having a bit of trouble with the chain of evidence.
Can spot John and Bessie (FAMILTON) TURNBULL having children in Melrose, with John saying he was a weaver of Gattonside at his 1718 marriage.
Can spot what looks like their son Thomas marrying Peggy FORSAN and having several children in Melrose, including a John in 1769.
The trail back from George Miles TURNBULL reaches a Thomas TURNBULL married to Helen TAIT, with Thomas stated as born Melrose on both 1851 and 1861 census records, about 1804/5.
I've not seen his 1891 NZ death cert (which implies a birth abt 1801), but at least one tree assigns him to a John and Jane/Jean (CURRIE) TURNBULL, who married/called banns at Cavers (John) and Eckford (Jane) and were having children baptised 1794 (Gattonside) through 1806, but with no Thomas recorded.
The Melrose OPRs also record the burial of a John TURNBULL, feuar of Gattonside, aged 73 in 1827 (so born abt 1754), who would seem unlikely to be the 1769 baptism of John son of Thomas and Peggy (FORSAN) TURNBULL, who didn't marry until 1766.
There is a 1753 baptism in Melrose of a John to John TURNBUL & Janet USHER of Gattonside, witnesses James & John BOSTON, which surname also features as witness to the 1794 baptism of John and Jane (CURRIE) TURNBULL's daughter Janet in 1794, and as cautioner for the 1743 marriage of John TURNBULL to Janet USHER (both of Melrose).
Anyone else interested in these TURNBULLs with any comments? Until more info is available, I'll disconnect the link in my WorldConnect database LornaHenderson.
24th: Conversions
The catch up has been hindered a tad by the rebuild of my computer, but now that I'm starting to pop the data back onto it, I found a file I never could read when I first received it.
A recent link in something that went past (sorry, I didn't note the source, tut tut), had mentioned a web site that converts any file - check out Online Convert
Worked a treat for me.
22nd: How to pass time on your military service
The recent string of coincidences which had lead to the TURNBULL/FAMILTON connection (still being investigated/validated) mentioned a few posts ago did lead to further work on my McEWAN relations.
This including catching up briefly with a fellow researcher of the NZ line.
It had been so long since we were in contact that her email address bounced, so a phone call later I was in possession of a new email address and a hint that she'd found James in the 1861 census in Glasgow, as a Chelsea Pensioner, and therefore on Findmypast's military records.
That was enough to set me off again.
What she didn't mention was that James was discharged from the army as "unfit for further service" and "not in possession of a good conduct badge".
These comments no doubt being at least in part because of his four courts martial (one Battalion, one District and two Regimental) and at least four spells of imprisonment, one for forty days. Two of the causes were unstated, but one was for absence without leave, and one for habitual drunkenness.
All in all, he spent 18 yrs and 177 days in the 26th Regiment of Foot, seeing overseas service in the East Indies and China (Wikipedia shows that this regiment was part of the first of the Opium wars in the 1840s, which would fit).
He was one of two James McEWANs from Perthshire of an age in Glasgow and I chased the other one around the records for a while thinking it was him (both had McCOLL connections, either by marriage or residence), even though he gave his birthplace as Port of Monteith instead of Kincardine.
Found that the wrong one's mother was a HENDERSON, and there were FERGUSON connections, which seemed a bit much of a coincidence, but I couldn't spot any links and went back to the miscreant James instead.
17th: Catching up even more
I'm sure it (this catch up mode) will be temporary, but for now, my December edits to published data have been uploaded to OneGreatFamily
Recovery from my PC woes is proceeding, but not without its dramas, of course.
Desktop now working, but not all programs yet re-installed, so not fully functional.
13th: More connections
Yes the LEITH women noted a day or two ago were related, aunt/niece.
And the connections continued!
Sarah Abernethay LEITH married Thomas JOHNSTON, one of my McEWAN rellies.
Their daughter Sarah Margery JOHNSTON married a George Miles, (later Myles) TURNBULL.
An ancestry tree has this family, and shows George's TURNBULL ancestors as being of Melrose, with, wait for it, John TURNBULL and Bessie FAMILTON, who married at Earlston in 1718, at the end of the tree.
Bessie is highly likely to be one of my Earlston FAMILTONs, but we'll likely never prove that given we're back at the start of the Earlston registers here (at least I think we are, yet to fully re-check that bit).
I've not yet checked the reputed link from George's grdfather Thomas TURNBULL (b. abt 1801 Melrose, ROX, d. 1891 Georgefield, Waipahi, Otago) back to John and Bessie (FAMILTON) TURNBULL, but do note that John and Bessie's family were all baptised in Melrose from 1721 to 1737 and John was living at Gattonside when he married Bessie.
A snippet from the 1899 NZ obit of Helen TURNBULL nee TAIT, wife of Thomas, and grdmother of George Miles TURNBULL:
"... born in Berwickshire, Scotland, on the 5th July, 1814, and, with her husband and family, came to New Zealand in the ship Vicksburg in the year 1867 ... the deceased's father, Joseph Tait, an influential farmer on the Borders; sold to Lord Polworth the sheep that formed the nucleus of the world-famed flock of Border Leicesters."
11th: Connections, connections
This HUTTON trail is proving rather fascinating.
John Mitchell HUTTON, son of Robert HUTTON and Catherine MITCHELL shows up on the 1905-6 Electoral Roll in Woodhaugh, Dunedin.
Woodhaugh is where my grandfather Archibald HENDERSON and wife Agnes Manson DAVIDSON set up home in 1908, Archie having moved down Leith Valley slightly from the farm at Helensvale.
I wonder if they actually knew each other, and knew that they were connected, albeit not actually related?
If so, it's a real pity that they didn't pass such information on to their descendants as Margaret McGREGOR nee HENDERSON's fate would have been discovered much longer ago.
The investigation into the NZ HUTTON family is proving to have some other interesting connections.
One Robert HUTTON, civil servant of Wellington, and son of John Mitchell HUTTON, married a Mary Jane Margory/Marjery GEORGESON.
As that is one of my Caithness surnames I did a bit of digging to see where they might come from.
Her father looks like he'll be a Peter GEORGESON, baker in Bluff around 1896 to 1905 (at least), and of Shetlands origin.
That side-track parked I noted that Mary's mother appeared to be a Marjery Morton LEITH, and of an age and place, to possibly be connected to one Sarah Abernethy LEITH who married Thomas JOHNSTON, a descendant of James McEWAN, brother of Margaret McEWAN who married Archibald HENDERSON.
I can spot at least one tree on ancestry who has both Sarah Abernethy and Marjery Morton LEITH in their tree (not sisters), so will dig a little further.
Further connections exist in that descendants of the above James McEWAN were also in Port Chalmers (Helen MILLAR & Arthur FOORD) around the time the HUTTONs were.
Having NZ electoral rolls on ancestry is great!
All of this is taking my mind off a dead Win XP machine - yet another batch of windows XP updates has done for it so it's having to be rebuilt - for the second time in a year.
10th: Linda lucks out - again
Another of Linda's hunches is looking good.
Shortly before heading off on an overseas trip 5 years ago I was contacted by Linda innocently asking if her husbands ancestor Margaret HENDERSON, married McGREGOR, just might happen to be the sister of my James HENDERSON whose fate was unknown to me.
This resulted in a feverish bout of activity, when I should have been packing, with emails and discoveries flying back and forth across the ether finding out all sorts of things we didn't previously know about each other's relations.
This time round it was a tentative investigation as to whether or not one of the HUTTON tribe, Robert, brother of the James HUTTON who married Margaret McGREGOR, daughter of the above Margaret nee HENDERSON.
Looking good. Despite their ages being rather incorrect in the Scottish censuses, by the time their deaths are recorded in the NZ indexes, this has been remedied.
Dunfermline to Port Chalmers, with a few detours to Bluff, Lyttelton and Wellington thrown in to keep us on our toes.
7th: Ancestry.com exceeding their brief
I'm getting rather annoyed with Ancestry.com at the moment.
Some years ago now I finally succumbed to keeping several trees on ancestry, liking in particular the wonderful hints for sources that may be for the people in the trees.
As I research and find someone/something, I generally now pop the results of those searches into whichever tree is appropriate - keeping my master copy of all data on my own pc still, in TMG.
Of late I've noticed that something seems to have changed with how they treat the input suggestions for the data from a source you've just examined and chosen to attach to someone in your tree.
Instead of limiting the information supplied on the lhs of the add screen to what is available from that source, they seem to now also scoop up whatever other information they seem to have for what looks to them like the same person, and present it in the same add screen, with no indication that it has come from some other source, ie one that you may or may not have viewed, and certainly isn't the one currently being used to add data to your tree.
I think this is grossly misleading, and likely to lead to all sorts of stupid errors in already error-prone trees.
Admit to not having selected the death information I was presented with to see what source it would have attached (I was adding data from some Canadian WWI attestation papers and was presented with death information for the spouse, and a string of children, the only connection any of this had to the source document being the spouse's name as next of kin).
5th: Up to Nov at last
Catch up mode continues.
OneGreatFamily
The process I follow for this is to select everyone in my database marked as checked for publication and edited during the month I'm about to upload - my own relations, and the FAIRBAIRN and RUNCIMAN families I research for the one name studies and dna projects.
To put them in context and enable them to hopefully be linked correctly to any existing families already on OneGreatFamily, I then add their spice, and 1 generation of ancestors.
Then I recheck that I really do want to publish all of those people, deleting from the list those where I'm not adding to the sum of genealogical knowledge at all.
It's an interesting way to re-discover bits of research left hanging as I got sidetracked onto following some lead or other instead of finishing off my research, eg connecting a sister to the same parents as the brother she was with in a census, or realising that I'd not finished checking off BDM and census data for whichever family.
So yes, up to November is now there, but the initial set of people from December is shrinking by my May updates to finish off some unfinished research.
2nd: Snippets here, snippets there
I'm in catch up mode.
Emails from February last year have even been actioned (but not necessarily all the ones in between still awaiting attention)! My WorldConnect database LornaHenderson has been updated with all the current BDM data on the rellies and their connections, so that's the last two months of updates published with all the snippets that others have contacted me with, plus whatever I've worked on over that time, whatever that all was.
The most recent was the WOONTON/RICHARDSON info Wayne sent me back in Feb 2010, supplemented by some more digging around in the relatively recently available Australia BDM data on ancestry.
Apr 2011
30th: A DAWE connection?An Isaac DAWE in a recent burst of activity on the DAWE Rootsweb Surname Message Board caught my attention, so I've been fossicking around in his family, that of John DAW (or DAWE) and Grace BEAL.
This Isaac was a shipwright in Stoke Damerel rather than one of the millers who proliferate in my tree, so it's probably a bit of a stretch that his father John, born abt 1791 at Pyworthy (Holsworth) is related to my Isaac, who married in Tavistock in 1796.
However, as I dug I noticed what looks like Sidney FUGE, one of my HAMLEY descendants, boarding with John's Isaac's son Frederick Cornelius DAWE in the 1891 census. Admittedly he was also enumerated on his ship in port, but he was shown as of the right age, birthplace and occupation, so it may well be him.
As a result of all of this, I have done a long overdue update to the patriarchs page of the DAWE Surname DNA project to include a couple more of the DAWE families I have an interest in/connection to, that of the Buckland Monachorum tribe of Sampson and Joan (BLANCHARD) DAWE, and an inter-related William and Johanna (HUNT) DAWE of Blackawton. There's also a stub for the above John & Grace (BEAL) DAWE - just in case.
22nd: The MABON connection
Further to the happenstance a few years ago that found an Alison added into the tree of Walter and Agnes (ROBINSON) FAIRBAIRN, my FAIRBAIRN research into the family of John & Alice/Alison (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN of Swinton has just netted a connection to this latter family.
Alison's daughter Agnes STEWART married a Thomas MABON.
Likewise, Isabella FAIRBAIRN, a grand-daughter of Walter's contemporary, the above John FAIRBAIRN of Swinton, married Thomas MABON's brother James.
This isn't any evidence of a connection to John unfortunately, and may well be simply coincidence.
10th: Robertson or Robinson?
On reflection, I've decided to plump for ROBINSON for Agnes' name.
Reviewing which version (and excluding the slightly less commonly found ROBISON) was more frequently used when she herself could influence what was written down, ROBINSON wins.
So I've updated Agnes FAIRBAIRN nee ROBINSON's page slightly, and had another (brief) look to see if there's any obvious marriage floating around for her parents, cooper John ROBINSON and wife Ann. There's one in Berwick on Tweed, NBL that might fit the bill - and An(n) is a ROBSON !!!
Some day it will get investigated to see if there's something handy like John's occupation stated.
It's all Ed's fault, this bout of activity.
He asked what Agnes' name should be.
And reported that not only had he found John's Civil War Town Clerk's record, which showed his parents, but the same set of records had an entry for John's son Walter - recorded as Watkins FAIRBURNS no less, with New York paying a bounty of $600 for his service. Which seemed a lot, but a quick web search found an article discussing the draft, and indicates that it wasn't my misinterpreting a $6.00 sum at all.
Walter aka Watkins' record adds yet another birth date to his collection, 29 Mar 1843, as opposed to 31 Mar 1842 or about 1841.
Further to yesterday's post re Archibald MILLER & Margaret BAIN's family, I've now confirmed that both sons Archibald and William did indeed go to Canada, as did father Archibald, although he must have returned, given he died in Wick.
The ANDREWS descendant chart has been converted to the new interactive format now too.
9th: Few more twigs
My BAIN descendant chart has been republished, both because it has a few more twigs on it thanks to Caroline who kindly sent me the Pulteneytown (Wick, Caithness) 1911 census for Archibald & Elizabeth (FORBES) MILLER, and because it has now been updated to the newer interactive expandable format I'm gradually converting most charts to.
This inspired me to also tidy up Archibald's siblings by checking his father's 1911 census.
Supposedly 2 of the sons & 1 dtr (Jessie) were in Canada when he (Archibald Snr) died in 1925.
As the 1911 shows 8 children, 3 no longer living, and by 1925 another son had died (WWI), that only leaves Archibald and William for Canada, as Donald was in Scotland.
More digging needed.
8th: Never give up
Proof that you should never give up hope.
Email from Ed awaited me this morning. Short and to the point:
"Hallelujah, Proof positive at last"
Attached was an image of a "Record of Soldiers and Officers in the Military Service enlisted since Jul 1863 and credited to other places". Second entry from the bottom was one FAIRBAIRN, John, of Hardenburg, born June 9, 1812, Scotland being discharged from service for being over age.
The miracle was that it stated his parents as Walter (FAIRBAIRN) and Agnes ROBINSON.
So, after 12+ years we have finally eliminated the other Walter, of an age and place, from being the Walter of Roxburghshire known to be John's father.
Welcome, formally, to the family Ed, we always knew we were cousns, didn't we!
John and Walter have been updated on my web pages, and John updated on the DNA project.
2nd: Transformation
Love what can turn up in this hobby.
I think I've just found a chap aging from 36 to 51 between leaving England 3rd Sep and arriving in Montreal on the 15th, via Le Havre. He and his wife were the only FAIRBAIRNs on the voyage, and the ticket number on leaving England is the same as that arriving in Montreal. When they left England they were both 36, and he was a mechanic.
When they arrived in Montreal, he was 51, coal merchant and horse dealer, and she was 48.
I was looking, still am, for an Alexander FAIRBAIRN, uncle of the artist Andrew Fairbairn AFFLECK, born 1857 Edinburgh who disappears after 1881 (when he was a Commercial traveller, in Edinburgh).
Any inventive explanations for the aging effect of the sea air?
Wonder if they did a swap in France? Or is it a simple case of bureaucratic bungling?
Anyone interested in the family (James and Ann (WALKER) FAIRBAIRN) may care to look at the Patriarchs page of the DNA Project.
Mar 2011
31st: Originals revampMy Originals sub site has been republished to use the newer descendant chart features now available from the program I use to generate these pages from my database (Second Site and TMG respectively).
The actual content has not changed, other than Simon ANDREWS' photo now including a credit to Janice (who provided the photo), this having been missed when I cropped the image for the web, and a few sources citations being tidied to better reflect my current citing practices (I never will finish the umpteen years of clean up needed on my older data).
For the new charts (see lhs menu under Dramatis Personae), have fun trying out the expand/collapse feature to help get a better overall picture of where people fit in relation to others, eg collapse all then click on the + next to the spouse to get just the 1st generation.
Those actually included on the site are highlighted, so a quick scroll down the page will show you those on the tree that you can find more about.
20th: Ahhh Jim lad
Harry drew my attention to another article in the Scotsman, this time one claiming that Jim HAWKINS of "Kidnapped" fame was based on a real life chap married to a Margaret WIGHT of Jedburgh.
Yes, there was a Margaret HAWKINS nee WIGHT living in Bristo Place in Edinburgh, and yes she was born in Jedburgh (dtr of William WIGHT, millwright, and Janet RUSSELL, William being the son of Robert WIGHT and Janet BRACK, who married 1777 in Melrose), no immediately obvious connection to our WIGHTs.
Hubby Jim HAWKINS must have made quite a lasting impression on the people quoted, as by my calcs, and searches, Kidnapped was published 1886, and Jim doesn't appear with Margaret in any census, Edinburgh or otherwise, starting from 1841 when she is at home in Jedburgh with her sisters, and two daughters (born Kelso and Ancrum), and showing up in Edinburgh from 1851 (but not at Bristo Place yet).
19th: Coincidence time
While on the phone to a descendant of the family that includes James FAIRBAIRN, the engraver of all those family crests, an email arrived in from Australia to ask me if I could help with a search for James Henry, son of a James, believed to be connected to the above engraver chap.
Yes I could, James Henry was the grandson of said engraver, and I'd stumbled across him when trawling Australian newspapers earlier this year, becoming curious as to why a chap in Australia had a son in Derbyshire.
I'd only figured out the connection to the crest chap as a result of that investigation, back in January.
The coincidences didn't end there.
The chap I was chatting too used to live in the same town as one of my FAIRBAIRN "cousins" so I asked if he had known him (Clarence Stuart). No, he didn't think so, the only other one he knew was "Mac" from the bowling club, his wife was an artist.
"We have one of her paintings here". It was a small town, and it seemed unlikely that there would be yet another FAIRBAIRN, so he went and checked the signature of the painting, sure enough, Eileen M FAIRBAIRN, so "Mac" was Clarence.
17th: FAMILTONs and LEDGERWOODs
Further to the FAMILTON activity of yesterday, a bit more digging on the Northumberland families unearthed a John FAMILTON marrying a Margaret SENGERWOOD, or so the FamilySearch's England Marriages, 1538–1973 told me.
FindMyPast however has her as LEDGERWOOD, under which name she is indeed shown in assorted census records.
As my FAMILTON connection is on the branch of my tree including RICHARDSON/RUNCIMAN/LEDGERWOOD, I did a bit more digging to see if there might be a connection.
Jury still out, but I did quickly get back to Scotland from Northumberland as her father John LEDGERWOOD was born 1816 in Yetholm, to John LEDGERWOOD and Jean/Jane RIDDEL; John Snr being the son of William LEDGERWOOD or LIDGERTWOOD and Janet STEVENSON. I was interested to note that the 1816 John had a sister Helen/Ellen who married a James RICHARDSON, parents as yet unknown, but born Birgham around 1825, and emigrated to Melbourne, Australia on the "Marian Moore" in 1853.
My LEDGERWOODs hail from Jedburgh, with James, brother of my Walter, being tenant at Lanton in 1714, around which time Walter was at Hundalee.
Walter's last two known children were baptised at Eckford.
16th: John or Albert?
Thought I was onto a lead for some modern day descendants of my rather distant FAMILTON forebears.
One branch had ended up in Racine, Wisconsin, and I'd found what looked like the son John of the family living in Minneapolis in the 1920 census with a wife Margaret, and children Mabel and Winston. Age right, birth state right, father shown as born Scotland, occupation not out of the question.
But no. Tracking back on Winston, the 1900 census had the family as Albert B & Margaret HAMILTON instead of John and Margaret!
Sure enough, FamilySearch Minnesota BDM indexes show Albert as his name, and a family tree on ancestry that cited sources, agreed, and gave his pedigree - not the John I was looking for after all.
This activity being driven by a phone call from Val nee FAMILTON a few days ago to introduce herself.
Her call had prompted me to review where I'd got to with the FAMILTON DNA project, and a few hurried additions to the patriarchs page and a bit of a tidy up led me to add a post to that project diary, and cast around for likely new candidates to prove the assorted lines (my Earlston weavers, the Ancrum weavers, and the Northumberland based families) were related, despite the lack of paper trail.
Love to hear from any direct male line FAMILTONs who may be willing to participate.
11th: BIDGOODs
Contact from a Ross in Australia asking what I knew about the Richard BIDGOODs in my tree.
He had a Richard, supposedly from New Jersey, and 2nd son of a Richard BIDGOOD to try and track, and the nearest candidates in his search were my extended BIDGOOD family there.
Not that there was a Richard, 2nd son of a Richard, in the expected timeframe to marry in Australia in 1884.
Nearest was Richard son of Jacob, who had not been traced in America beyond 1880.
As the 1900 census implied 3 of Jacob and Jane's children had died by then, that may have been his fate.
Not so.
With all the records now available on FamilySearch I was able to identify several births, marriages and deaths for the family from the New Jersey records indexed there, and Richard wasn't amongst them.
However, the Australian chap being investigated was several years older, although well within the normal error rate for forgetful ancestors who never seem to know their ages, and there were still rather too many unanswered questions
. Although Ross is still none the wiser, the Richard son of Jacob and Jane does look to have survived, and continued living in New Jersey as I found a mis-indexed record (as MEYER !!), in the 1900, and subsequent, censuses for Rockaway, New Jersey.
Thankfully a daughter was indexed correctly as BIDGOOD, which helped find him.
Several new twigs will therefore appear in my next WorldConnect db update, which should be soon.
Related names that have turned up in this bout of research include a wonderfully named Seaman Garfield DOGGETT, with son Seaman Leroy DOGGETT.
This activity did make me realise that I hadn't tracked several of the family still in the UK in the 1911 census.
This time round, I've found a few wills and deaths, included one registered Lanchester (Durham), indexed as Lancaster!
10th: Harrow vs Harlow
It really does pay to check the originals.
Two of the marriages for the ANDREWS line I'm working through at the moment were indexed as being registered in Harlow, Essex, which seemed a tad off the expected area of Harrow, Middlesex.
Eileen assured me the marriages did indeed happen in Harrow, so I checked findmypast to see what they said about them.
fmp did indeed have them both indexed, correctly from the image, as being registered in Harrow, not Harlow.
2nd: CREBER vs CREBER
I shouldn't be getting sidetracked from assorted annual accounts, but this is so much more interesting.
Ancestry told me that someone had saved a record I'd used to someone in their tree.
That started me off on quite an update binge (still incomplete) of two lines of my very extended and extensive Devon families.
As both husband and wife were CREBERs, chances are they were related, but it was soon apparent that this brought together descendants of both my BARTER/KING and PIKE families.
I'd not got round to tracing either beyond the 1861 census, so hadn't worked out they'd married, thank you to bonsaitree's Green aka Creber tree on ancestry and his/her work there.
Husband Thomas CREBER and wife Mary CREBER were 1st cousins once removed, 3rd cousins and 4th cousins once removed.
And as I then documented their children, noticed that a daughter, Annie Elizabeth, had married a George PEARSE, so further lights started flashing.
Sure enough, he was already in my database, with a CREBER mother, so they were 1st cousins, 1st cousins once removed, and 4th cousins.
Feb 2011
28th: The rich Andrews relationsA surprise contact a couple of days ago from Eileen has resulted in several updates to the extended ANDREWS tree (which will appear in my World Connect db LornaHenderson in due course).
She is a descendant of Luke, son of John & Tabitha (HUNT) ANDREWS.
I'd never progressed to bringing her particular line right down to present day as I'd hit a stumbling block at Luke's son Hubert, although I had found son Cuthbert heading for Brazil in the 1920s, and prior family information had said he died in Madiera.
With her information, and a bit more digging, the family has now been better documented, including some of the now more readily available information.
Luke apparently made his money as a cheesemaker in London, and returned to his home town to live at Carlton House - which is now a listed building.
The probate index shows his 1916 estate was worth over L2,800, hence the "rich relations" comment.
23rd: Another twig in Canada
Heard from Natalie this week, filling me in on what happened to Jane Henderson BAIN.
She and James GUNN emigrated to Canada around 1920, settling in Tantallon, Saskatchewan.
More details to come, but that's another line from John and Catherine (GRAY) BAIN whose fate is now know.
Updates will appear in my WorldConnect db LornaHenderson in due course.
Most work lately has been on FAIRBAIRNs, trying to resolve the unresolveable - piecing together early families with too little information, and in the current instance, seeing if the view of the Earlston/Smailholm/Legerwood world that some others have that conflicts with my view, can be resolved using the dna view of the families of the time.
Think we're going to have to resort to mitochondrial dna to add to the view of that world, if and only if, we can find direct female line descendants willing to help. See the FAIRBAIRN blog.
20th:Another set of pages updated
The research log version of the blog has been brought up to date, and the wildlife section of Lorna's Links has had another picture added, blurry admittedly, but hey, I didn't get much time to snap the visiting bittern. Couldn't believe my eyes.
Jan 2011
19th: RevampSecondSite, the program I use to generate my web pages from my Genealogy database (TMG), has come out with some interesting new features.
It was a good time to review bits of my main website.
As always, when testing, I find things that are missing, have incorrect links etc etc, so a few of those have been tidied up, some snippets added to timelines and so on.
However, the main change will be added gradually as I review all the charts.
What is now possible, is to produce a dynamic descendant chart that can be expanded/collapsed to help you get the feel for where the person of interest on the chart "fits".
I've defaulted them to "open collapsed", so that the initial view you will see is that of your person of interest, and their relationship to the subject of the chart they appear on, but you can then either open/close individual branches, or nip up to the top of the chart and expand or collapse the whole chart.
I started with the FAIRBAIRN chart for my Archibald, but several others have already been converted.
One thing that was always missing from the existing descendant charts was the spouse at the lowest level of the chart. These now show.
In addition there's an alternate view of a pedigree chart with much the same expand/collapse dynamic view, but instead of being presented in the more normal flying geese formation, this one shows the parents immediately beneath each ancestor on the chart, AND has the ability to show where a person has more than one set of "parents", eg adoptive parents, foster parents, or simply alternates from research where conclusions have not yet been reached.
As yet there's only one of these charts available, and that's my own pedigree on the charts page of my main web site, but it is highly likely that this will be used in the One Name Study pages, where alternates exist on where someone "fits".
Quite apart from the above changes, there may well be some extra snippets on the GRAHAM chart from the branch in Sth Australia (see posting in my Guestbook, 12 Jan), and one or two more snippets on the WIGHT branch in Sunderland, the family of Hector Cowans GRAY and Elizabeth WIGHT on the WIGHT chart, but whether or not anything appears there depends on how many generations down the tree the changes are, as the charts may cut off a generation or two too early.
16th: At last
Now that 2011 is well under way, I'm finally catching up on bits of 2010.
My LornaHenderson database on WorldConnect has had a long overdue update.
Not completely sure what all has changed since the last update (last August), but I do know that I've finally finished checking off the DAW updates Val sent, plus some work on the related families who connect.
This time round (last attempt was 2002) I managed to confirm David's son Thomas' death - ancestry had him indexed as DAN, not DAW, and I've still not managed to find the registration on FindMyPast.
Also managed to reduce the number of "orphans" in the db down to 45. "Orphan" merely means I know the people concerned are related, but not really how.
Never did solve how Elizabeth GRAY was a granddaughter of Hector GRAY and Elizabeth WIGHT, but did manage to extend my knowledge of the latter's family somewhat - adding in some DAVISON, BISSETT, FOSTER/FORSTER & ATKINSON surnames into the family, confirming some earlier suspicions of who married whom, mostly all in Sunderland, Durham.
10th: Millers and publicans
A welcome email arrived this morning enclosing a photo of William Matthias ROWE, found by his great grandson in his mother's photos - and Howard thought I might like it, given he'd found my web pages.
Spurred me into a few updates on that branch of the ROWE/DAWE tree (William Matthias - Matt - is related twice over as his parents Joseph King ROWE and Thirza DAWE are brother and sister to my 2* great grandparents William ROWE and Honor DAWE respectively.
Checking what I had I was reminded that in the ROWE/DAWE letters he is mentioned as having given up being a miller and had moved to Teignmouth to be a publican - for which occupation the family thought he was not well suited.
He obviously came to the same conclusion as the photo was annotated that he moved from Nymet Mill to the Valletort mills, Millbay, (Plymouth) with no mention of his soujourn as a publican at the date they have him as shifting.
Matt is now included in the Originals subsite of my main web pages and I look forward to further updates.
6th: IZON redux
How many John Parnell IZONs can there be?
Or more accurately, why can't I find the one I'm looking for?
In the process of loading some overdue updates to OneGreatFamily
I knew her father was a John Parnell IZON, timber merchant, deceased when Madeline married Douglas Maes TURNBULL (turns out he'd only died 8 days earlier).
But the only census data I could find had a John Parnell IZON with a wife Emma in about the right area and timeframe, but no Madeline/Hilda to be found.
This time round I found the family in 1911 and Emma was relegated to the dustbin of history as Madeline's mother turned out to be a Marion instead - additional proof being supplied by the National Probate Calendar (must have been a reasonably prosperous timber merchant, he left L6,300 in 1914).
Those interested are no doubt following the Fairbairn blog anyway, but I thought I'd mention here that the One Name Study pages have been updated to reflect my last few months of research into how the earlier generations may connect, aided by dna evidence, and a couple of very helpful wills (with some more people from the latter that are not yet identified, so yet to be fitted into the jigsaw, as is the latest exact match to the line closest to the modal for all of the matching Borders FAIRBAIRNs).
If you're wondering where the rest of the research log went, I've archived off the last 6 months of the 2010 log into a new menu item at left - 2010: Jul - Dec