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Scotland (Counties as in 1851-1901) => Scotland => Fife => Topic started by: Duncan32 on Saturday 06 October 18 14:26 BST (UK)
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I have a note that this John ALLAN (d 1784 Elie) died at sea (drowned in the harbour), along with some of his immediate family, and recall seeing a brief text on the incident. Unfortunately, I have lost the reference to this text. Can anyone help with further details? I think he married Elizabeth OVENSTON (b. 1721, m. 1784 Kilconquhar), and think they had 10 children. Thank you.
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The Elie deaths register is remarkably detailed
Harry
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Thanks Harry - guess I should have checked there !!
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John Allan and Elizabeth Ovenstone had a son called David Allan (b.1760, Elie) who married Janet Brown in 1782.
David Allan and Janet Brown had a son called Robert Allan who married Agnes Meldrum in 1827. She was a cousin of my great-great-grandfather John Meldrum.
Harry
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I have been helping a fellow rootschatter with a bit of family history. Thought that record looked familiar. The James Brown who also drowned was his 5 x great grandfather.
hdw -
David Allan and Janet Brown had a daughter called Julia she married a James Paterson in St Monance. James Paterson was owner and skipper of the Beautiful Star. He died in 1875 in what is known as the East Neuk Disaster.
Dorrie
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Here are a couple of photos of the "Beautiful Star" memorial in a cemetery in King's Lynn, Norfolk.
Harry
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Thank you for the photographs Harry.
My 3 x Great Uncle - David Easson - was lost on the Quest.
Have you ever been to St Monans? Its a beaufiful wee village.
Dorrie
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I am originally from Cellardyke, about three miles east of St. Monans, so, yes, been there many times and had classmates from St. Monans at secondary school in Anstruther.
Harry
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I know Cellardyke. Used to take the kids to the Holiday camp in Anstruther in the '70's great memories of the area. Still go over occassionally to visit a cousin of my late mum's in St Monance. The wee cafe at the harbour in St Andrews is run by another cousin.
I think all the Easson's in the Graveyard in St Monance are related to me somewhere or other.
Fascinating isn't it this family history.
Dorrie
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Harry
John ALLAN is my 5th great-grandfather. I am descended from him through his daughter, Anne (b 1757). I'm new to all this, and it seems I have direct line ancestors through inter-marriages between OVENSTONEs and ALLANs in various generations, so looks like I have some work to do !!
It also looks to me like the OVENSTONE surname morphs through the ages (UNSTOUN/UNSTON//UNSTONE/OVENSTON/OVENSTONE)? Do you know whether this is true (as I may well have misinterpreted some of the records)
Regards
Duncan
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(Replying to Dorrie) Yes, and the late Aitken Fyall, a native of St. Monans, wrote a very good book about the village and its history, with a photo of his granny Jenny Easson!
Harry
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Harry
John ALLAN is my 5th great-grandfather. I am descended from him through his daughter, Anne (b 1757). I'm new to all this, and it seems I have direct line ancestors through inter-marriages between OVENSTONEs and ALLANs in various generations, so looks like I have some work to do !!
It also looks to me like the OVENSTONE surname morphs through the ages (UNSTOUN/UNSTON//UNSTONE/OVENSTON/OVENSTONE)? Do you know whether this is true (as I may well have misinterpreted some of the records)
Regards
Duncan
You are absolutely right, the surname has been spelt in many weird and wonderful ways. There are still Ovenstones in the area, and some are mentioned in the Aitken Fyall book which I quoted just now to Dorrie.
Harry
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Duncan - Lots of names have various spellings throughout time. Don't be put of my this.
I have a Helen Ovenstone born around 1835 who married my 1st cousin 4 x removed - David Easson in 1856. Helen's parents were John Ovenstone and Elizabeth Mackie.
Harry - That looks like a good book I must try to get a copy.
Dorrie
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Just do a Google search for Aitken Fyall and you will get several hits for his book.
East Neuk families can be difficult to research as so many people have the same names and cousins and second-cousins marry (I suspect I'm preaching to the converted on this thread!).
I always have to be careful to distinguish between Robert Allan and Agnes Meldrum who were married in 1817 in St. Monans, and Robert Allan and Agnes Meldrum who were married in 1827 in Elie but ended up living in St. Monans. The two women were related, and both relate to me on my grandmother Watson's side.
And just to stir the pot a bit more, the Robert Allan and Agnes Meldrum married in 1827 had a son, William Meldrum Allan, who married Elizabeth Watson of Cellardyke, a sister of my great-grandfather Watson! (Pictured left as my male avatar with his wife and distant cousin Margaret Watson).
Harry
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Thank you both for your advice and the benefit of your experience.
And your not kidding - it's looking very complicated !! I now find my great (etc.) aunt OVENSTONE's marrying their GRAY cousins in Elie in more than one generation.....
....think I need to improve my record-keeping....!!
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Hi folks, thanks Harry for the posting the photograph's of my Great, Great Grandfathers boat the Beautiful Star. I am going to Kings Lynn on Friday to visit the grave along with my wife and sister. On Thursday my daughter and i visited Elie ,Kilconquhar, & St Monace there are Ovenstone's buried in the cemeteries there.
Colin.
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Hi folks, thanks Harry for the posting the photograph's of my Great, Great Grandfathers boat the Beautiful Star. I am going to Kings Lynn on Friday to visit the grave along with my wife and sister. On Thursday my daughter and i visited Elie ,Kilconquhar, & St Monace there are Ovenstone's buried in the cemeteries there.
Colin.
Aitken Fyall's book about St. Monans has 8 entries for Ovenstone in the index and a photo of "The Musical Ovenstones" with their band.
Harry
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Hi Harry, i take it you are related to Tom Watson who used to visit Kings Lynn often.
Colin.
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I can think of two Tom Watsons, and am related to both of them. You no doubt mean the St. Monans one.
Harry
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Harry - I have just received a copy of the book you recommended by Aitken Fyall. Had a quick look and it will be a very interesting read.
By the way his mother Jenny Easson is a distant cousin to me. No surprise there. Must go back and check exactly how we are related.
Thanks again
Dorrie
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Hi Harry - I'm being a bit cheeky here, but I'm guessing you are well-versed in the history of the Elie area, so thought I'd try my luck asking you about another fishing disaster, on May 16 1778 (which may need a separate thread?).
The incident is detailed on the Elie birth record for Andrew OVENSTONE (a girl), on 22 May 1778 (I have to say Elie records are awesome !!). The text details the death of three men, Andrew OVENSTONE and two BLACK brothers (William and Andrew), and details of their inter-related families. And this is where I'm struggling - I cannot seem to confirm each family based on the descriptions in this birth record, using SP records. For example, the Elie record states 'five children lost their fathers..' yet I can only find four children, using SP; also 'one woman lost her husband, her brother and brother in law' - I make this woman the sister of Andrew OVENSTONE who married one of the BLACK brothers, yet it looks like each brother married an OVENSTONE girl (William BLACK m Agnes OVENSTONE; Andrew BLACK m Helen OVENSTONE), and I can't confirm which one was Andrew OVENSTONE's sister (as I can't seem to confirm Andrew OVENSTONE's parents).
Hope you can follow the above (!) - it's like some sort of Chinese puzzle, made all the more infuriating by the fact that I get the distinct impression the answer is staring me in the face ....!!
Regards
Duncan
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Yes, the Elie OPRs are something else. By and large the OPRs of the East Neuk parishes are well kept in comparison with those from remote areas of the Borders, for example.
I haven't seen Andrew as a girl's name before but I do know of an Andrea from Cellardyke in Kilrenny parish:
"James Anderson, Sailor in Cellardike (but now amissing being either lost or Taken at Sea) and Margaret Millar his Spouse had a lawful Daughter born Octr. 22nd. 1797 and baptised on the 24th. of Same month, named Andrea.
N.B. She was named after Andrew Anderson, Supposed to be lost also."
I haven't tried working out all the relationships mentioned in the Elie OPR, but remember that registration of births and baptisms wasn't compulsory at that time, and people sometimes registered some of their children but not others. Quite often I've only been made aware of an individual's existence when they got married or died, and when you look for their birth/baptism, there's no record of it.
Harry
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By the way, I keep meaning to mention that Ovenstone is the name of a farm just inland from Anstruther, Pittenweem and St. Monans, and presumably that's the origin of the surname. So it's about as local a surname as you could get.
I had relatives living there just after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. There's now an artists' colony at Ovenstone, and when my wife and I visited the Pittenweem Arts Festival in August the driver of the shuttle bus from the car park to the harbour apologised for making a detour first up to Ovenstone to pick up some people.
It was the first time I had been there since one day in the 1960s when I walked up to Ovenstone from Pittenweem to sign up for a gang of "tauttie pickers".
Harry
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Thanks for your response Harry. I think I've unravelled the issue (and, even if I'm wrong, I've quite enjoyed the process !!). You may find the record for the birth of Andrew OVENSTONE on 22 May 1778 interesting, so I've attached it below.
I've also sent in an order for the book you mentioned earlier (I hope you get royalties !! - they may be worth more than your wage packet for picking tatties !!)
Dorrie - if you're still reading this, did you get anywhere with the parents or siblings of James Brown (who drowned in the 1784 incident) ? (I ask as I also have some BROWN's in my tree)
Best wishes
Duncan
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The book was by (Andrew) Aitken Fyall, a native of St. Monans, who died in 2011 in Wales.
Harry
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Here's the amazingly informative entry from the Elie deaths register about the death of James Brown in 1784.
Harry
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Hi Duncan,
Sorry no I did not get anywhere with James Brown's parentage. Too many possibilities to be sure.
His daughter Janet Brown was born in 1759 in Elie and the witnesses at the baptism were John Lorimer and George Melvill.
When Janet married David Allan in 1782 the marriage entry states 3rd daughter to James Brown and Catherine Duncan.
Don't know if this helps you at all.
Dorrie
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Thank you both for your responses - you have both provided a lot of information for me to follow up on, so that will keep me out of trouble for a while !!
Best wishes
Duncan
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And just to thank you Harry for the book recommendation - it has now come and I'm enjoying reading it !! Would you know if there are other similar books for any of the surrounding villages in the East Neuk area?
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Good, I'm glad you're enjoying it.
For Elie itself, see Archie Rennie "The Harbours of Elie Bay. A History" (Elie and Earlsferry History Society, 2008).
For Fife villages generally, Raymond Lamont Brown "Discovering Fife" (John Donald, 1988).
My own book "Kilrenny and Cellardyke: 800 Years of History" was published by John Donald in 1986 and is now available from Birlinn -
https://www.birlinn.co.uk/Kilrenny-and-Cellardyke-9781904607083.html
A sister book to that one was Stephanie Stevenson "Anstruther. A History" (John Donald, 1989)
I don't think there is a good up-to-date history of Pittenweem.
There are several books about Crail:
John Murray "A Crail Scrapbook" (Crail Museum Trust, 2010)
Thomas Riis "Crail and its Fisheries 1550-1600" (The Strathmartine Press, 2016)
Crail Museum Trust "Looking Back. Crail in the 1920's and 30's" (2010)
And if you Google Stenlake Publishing, you'll get a full list of their excellent little books of old photographs of Fife villages with very informative captions.
Happy reading!
Harry
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Thanks for these recommendations Harry - that's my Christmas list sorted !!