Where is/was Crya, Ontertown, Orkney, Stromness? COMPLETED. Thanks Ruskie

[Ruskie]

I can see mention of Innertown on the internet but any map just points me to an area with absolutely nothing on it - apart from farmland. I can see a path leading to nothing, so perhaps there was a farmstead in the area at some time in the past.

Shame about no parents for John, but that is still worthwhile downloading. Trouble is when families emigrate they must leave their pasts behind and never mention parents, as there are often blanks.

Do you have John and Jessie's marriage back in Scotland? John's birth? Small communities so they should be there somewhere. Yes, Jessie could have been Jean or Janet/Jannet/Jannett etc etc. Scottish used lots of interchangable names.

As well as help finding the children, you might as well see if anyone can find John and Jessie's families. I have had fairly detailed information on some old PRs and some pretty basic - I have no idea about the records in Orkney at this time.

[tedscout]

Well the Scottish naming pattern didn't help me.   

However your wonderful article did give me another child "William". I didn't have him, and he is listed with his brother John on the death cert. The article did make me wonder if the families from Orkney stayed in touch.

I haven't found anything for John and Jessie Isbister on Scotlandspeople. Makes me think she had another name. and with their children having such common names it is hard to find a birth for them that I can pin down.

oh well the hunt is still on.

[IMBER]

This may of some interest:

http://www.orkneyjar.com/placenames/pl-hoose.htm

Imber

[Ruskie]

That's a really interesting site Imber.

[MonicaL]

Don't think I have seen this link mentioned www.orkneyfhs.co.uk/sfndocs/6/6.pdf - page 17. Same lady as before from the previous link that Ruskie included. (Ruskie, you done brilliant on this one  ).

Mention on this link of a 1821 census. From this, possibilities mentioned for Janet with her family in 1821 and also some clues for John.

Just as a by and by, and something Ruskie mentioned earlier which I just wanted to highlight as it is relevant when researching back for women. In Scotland, women never legally 'lost' their maiden name when they married. This is the reason that they used their maiden name frequently: gravestones for man and wife, you will find wife with her maiden name; earlier censuses in particular, very common for a married/widowed woman to show under her maiden name; highly useful feature on SP when searching for deaths of married women is the fact that you are able to search with both the married and maiden surnames.

Monica 

[Ruskie]

Thanks Monica. It was great fun looking over all the maps doing a bit of detective work. Do you have any thoughts about 'Innertown' where the family lived in 1841? I can't find any settlements at all in the area.

Ted has started a couple of new threads related to this search - one to see if she can get a photo of what we believe might be 'Crya', and another to search for the children's births/baptisms. I have had a bit of an attempt at helping, but I'm sure you will be able to make some more progress. There are a couple of useful looking links posted by Skoosh which may help.

It's quite late here for me so I will be signing off in a minute.

[MonicaL]

Skoosh has posted this on the other post for the children www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,635983.0.html (we crossed over posts, Ruskie  Must be getting late for you!)

Ted,   a couple of sites for you, 

 http://www.cursiter.com/

http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/index/ORKNEY/2012-08

Skoosh.

cursiter.com is perfect for what you are trying to do, although there may be some gaps (pity but happens).

Just trying to check on the potential parents for Janet Stockan from that link above - Alexander and Janet Muir. I can see this http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=kosmoid&id=I12669  A number of these children's details show here www.cursiter.com/txt-exe-files/Stokan.txt however, can't see an entry for Janet. Wonder when Janet Muir married Alexander Stockan?

Monica

[MonicaL]

...Do you have any thoughts about 'Innertown' where the family lived in 1841? I can't find any settlements at all in the area.

There looks to be over 140 people showing as living in Innertown at the time of the 1841 census....however, Innertown doesn't show in 1851 or 1861 (only checked those two) 

Included on this Innertown census apart from the Isbister family, there is this family that I thought might connect to John's wife, Janet Sto(c)kan from what we are potentially finding:

Alexander Stokan 55 farmer
Janet Stokan 55
Mary Stokan 25
John Stokan 20
James Stokan 15
William Brown 14

Address: Innertown, Stromness

[MonicaL]

There is a photo here on this brilliant growing resource www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1076895 See also here www.geograph.org.uk/search.php?i=39780303 for general results with 'Crya' on search term. The map at the bottom is key for the location of the photos. Try searching for different names. You might not get the exact place (sometimes yes!) but often enough in these very remote places, you get close enough to places via the photos to get a good feel, such as here maybe www.geograph.org.uk/photo/1077180

What I found of interest is starting to connect some of the name place you have been discussing and the new ones coming along. If you click on the small at the bottom I can see the map point for Crya and also place names that likely connect to Dale and mentions on that 1821 census. Innertown/Outertown, at a guess likely the areas around what we are seeing for Dale/Crya etc.

Monica