Gemmell Family from Scotland and Ireland

[coffieqween]

My Great Grandfather Robert Gemmell was born in Scotland 18/11/1893, he married Jessie (Jeannie) Munro, born 4/8/1894, they were married 29/1/1915 in Partick, Scotland.

From the Marriage record Robert’s parents were Hugh Gemmell and Mary Jane Gemmell (Small), I located their marriage record and confirmed they were married in Partick 25/9/1868. I have located them on the Scottish census records from 1881 and this notes that Hugh Gemmell was born abt 1847/8 in Ireland and Mary Jane was born abt 1850 in Ireland, Hugh’s parents are noted as William Gemmell and Jane Cunningham (noted on marriage and death record for Hugh) and Mary Jane’s parents are noted as Fleming Small and Mary Donnegh or Donnachie (noted on both marriage and death record for Mary).

Hugh and Mary Jane Gemmell had about 10 children as follows:

William – Born abt 1870
Mary J – Born abt 1872
Susanna – Born abt 1875
Sarah – Born abt 1877
Agnes M – Born abt 1880
Elizabeth – Born abt 1884
Frederick – Born abt 1887
Albert – Born abt 1890
Robert (GGF) – Born 18/11/1893

I have looked on Scotlandspeople, ancestry and a couple of websites for Ireland and have been unable to locate any births/marriages for either set of parents. I am placing this on the notice bords for both Scotland and Ireland to see if there is any one researching the Gemmell Family name and recognizes any of the names listed above or could suggest any other websites that could be used to research and Irish connection.

[MonicaL]

Hi coffieqween

An old post, but hopefully further info to add on the family:

www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=402615.0

Monica 

[MonicaL]

I am never sure whether when people talk 'about birth year' whether you have the births, just in case, some show here (lots of spelling variations):

William 1869 https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FQTK-NLC
Mary Jane 1871 https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FQ7F-36P
Susanah 1874 https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FQ7P-HYS
Hugh 1881 https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/XTXX-98Z

Monica

[coffieqween]

Hi Monica

Thanks for the link, I have checked the message and posted a reply.

I have the dates from the Census records provided via ancestry, still looking to confirm the actual dates but thank you for the links to family search will check these out.

coffieqween 

[Forfarian]

I have the dates from the Census records provided via ancestry, still looking to confirm the actual dates but thank you for the links to family search will check these out.

Oh, dear! (The regulars know what is coming!)

Dates of birth taken from the census are wrong in about 3 cases out of 4. Why?

The available Scottish censuses never recorded anyone's birth year. They recorded the age people claimed to be on the day of the census. Now, the census was usually taken about the end of March or beginning of April. So anyone born between April and December had yet to have their birthday in that year, and would have been a year older if the census had been taken on 31 December. That is about three-quarters of people. So 'calculating' the year of birth by subtracting the age from the year of the census gives a wrong answer for 75% of people. I wish A******y and other sites that have census transcriptions would refrain from doing this misleading calculation.

Fortunately you can get many accurate dates of birth from www.familysearch.org as suggested above.

Please, please, don't believe any date of birth you find in any census transcription. Write it down as 'about xxxx' but make sure you look for all the relevant originals to get the correct information. In the case of births in Scotland, check the original census and certificates on www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk - and happy hunting

[coffieqween]

Hi Forfarian

Thank you for the advise, I am still new to family research and welcome any advice that will make the building of my family histroy more accurate and enjoyable, i had noticed that the birth years were a bit out on the census docs of my ancestors that I have located so I have now started to check at least +/- two years when gathering the birth records.

Thank you again and any other advise is more than welcome 

[Forfarian]

Coffieqween, it is worth having a look at www.familysearch.org. This includes what used to be called the International Genealogical Index. It is a superb finding aid for baptisms and marriages in Scotland before about 1875. I would never have got as far as I have with my family tree without it.

It is, as it says, an index; and in spite of calling its contents 'records', they are not 'records', they are index listings, and extremely useful too, but beware!

First, it is not comprehensive; some events are missing for no apparent reason. Second, there is a lot of dubious information in the 'contributed' listings, because they had no way of verifying whether the information people were sending them was correct of not. So use it with caution, as a pointer to where to look for original documents, but don't treat it as gospel.

[soapy1]

Hi

I also have the name Gemmell in my family tree and they also came over from Ireland around 1850s. In Ireland however the surname appears as Gamble - they came from around the Dromore area in County Down

[coffieqween]

Hi Soapy1

On further resarch I have found that the eldest son William was registered as William Gamble. Im still not further forward in locating the family in Ireland. I will take a look at the area your Gamble family came from see if I can find any connection to the area. Thank you.

Will keep looking, one day I may find them