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Beginners => Family History Beginners Board => Topic started by: what0101 on Wednesday 08 March 17 04:29 GMT (UK)
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I am researching Clara/Ida Mail who was born in Galicia in 1853. The only records I can find about her are from after she moved to New York. On her death certificate it says:
Name of father: Abraham Cantor
Name of mother: Rose Mail
But on both of her daughters' death certificates it says:
Name of mother: Clara Mail
I'm assuming the former means her surname was Cantor, but if that was the case, why would both of her daughters' death certificates say that her surname was Mail? Also, one of the daughters in question died when Clara was still alive.
Here are two of the death certificates:
Clara (aka Ida) (http://i.imgur.com/2c5xghr.jpg)
and daughter Sarah (http://i.imgur.com/IUwjNHZ.jpg)
Moderator's edit: Clara's date of birth corrected to 1853 at OP's request. Spades
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Hi there,
I am not familiar with USA death certificates, but I notice on Clara's at the section 10 (Name of father) that the surname CANTOR seems to be in a different ink and different style of handwriting, so it may be that the surname has been added days/months/years after the registration was completed.
JM
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My immediate thought is that she was the illegitimate daughter of Clara Mail.
But named Abraham Cantor as her father?
Or possible her mother had remarried to a Mr Mail some time after Clara/Ida's birth.
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https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2W5B-B3Q
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WTV-4LN
I think these will be helpful.
JM
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https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2W5B-B3Q
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WTV-4LN
I think these will be helpful.
JM
The info here is transcribed from the death certificates. On the daughter's death certificates it uses the maiden name Mail/Moil, but on her own death certificate (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2W5B-QSC) it says her father's surname is Cantor and mother's surname is Mail.
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I am not familiar with USA death certificates, but I notice on Clara's at the section 10 (Name of father) that the surname CANTOR seems to be in a different ink and different style of handwriting, so it may be that the surname has been added days/months/years after the registration was completed.
I am questioning the entry on Clara's dc. I am suggesting that CANTOR has been added by someone else. It seems to be in a different handwriting from any other hand on that document. It is certainly in a different hand from 'Abraham' which can of course be a SURNAME in its own right.
Do you have Clara on the 1911 US census?
Do you know when she and/or husband and/or daughter migrated to the US?
Would there be a record of her maiden name on any migration paperwork?
I am not familiar with US researching, sorry.
JM
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To me, it looks like Cantor was added at the same time as the burial information which was written a day after the rest of the certificate. Unfortunately there is no naturalization record and the immigration records were after she was married and only have her married name.
The only thing I can think is that the daughter, Sarah, listed a cousin with the surname Mail as her UK contact when leaving Glasgow for New York. Maybe she thought Mail was her mother's maiden name as well? Seems unlikely to me that she wouldn't know her mother's maiden name, but who knows.
I've tried to get more info on the Glasgow Mail family to try and figure out how they are related to Clara/Ida, but so far have hit a dead end. There is a UK naturalization certificate for the cousin, but no other records. Prior to that they were in Galicia/Ukraine and I've not been able to find any records from there (yet).
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Could it be her parents weren't married?
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Could it be her parents weren't married?
It's possible, but I'd be surprised. I'll see if I can find a Ukraine genealogy forum and found out if in a case like that if the child would take the mother's name.
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It doesn't look like the death certificates have an informant listed, so I would take it all with a grain of salt.
Could this be Ida & family in the 1925 New York state census? https://familysearch.org/search/record/results?count=20&query=%2Bsurname%3ASchekowitz&collection_id=1937489 If so, maybe there is son who can be researched.
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It doesn't look like the death certificates have an informant listed, so I would take it all with a grain of salt.
I have the informant on some of them. Unfortunately Ida/Clara did not have the second page with the informant. For her daughter, Sarah, Ida/Clara's grandson was the informant. I am assuming Ida/Clara's husband was the informant because he was still alive, or her son who was still living with them.
I found another one, so now I have found the death certificates for three of her children:
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WYY-Z44
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WTV-4LX
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2W5B-B3S
All of the above say Clara Mail as the mother's maiden name. Unfortunately I only know the informant for one of them.
Also, her husband's death certificate also says the surname is Mail, informant was another son:
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:2WTV-4LF
There are two other children, one is Barnett Shechwitz and the other is Abraham Schiff (he changed his surname). I can't find anything for the former and for the latter the online records don't have parents' names on them.
So I have four documents that say Mail, but her own death certificate says Cantor. I'm perplexed. ???
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Have you considered that CANTOR is not the surname? I understand that Cantor can be a vocation within the Jewish faith. You see, I am not convinced that the hand that wrote CANTOR on that document has written anywhere else on that document.
ADD
Google found this for me : http://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/the-cantors-role-today/
JM
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Yes, that is a possibility -- it may have been his profession. It is also a surname, because when Jews in Galicia were forced to take surnames, they often took the name of their profession (there's a very interesting article (http://www.slate.com/blogs/lexicon_valley/2014/01/08/ashkenazi_names_the_etymology_of_the_most_common_jewish_surnames.html) about this). Because Clara/Ida was born around 1853, she may have been one of the first generations with the surname. So maybe it's related to that.
The thing that bothers me is the section that says mother's maiden name is 'Rose Mail.'
The other possibility is that her children did not know her maiden name, and because they knew other members of their mother's family named Mail (as shown by Sarah listing a Mail cousin on her Glasgow immigration records) they just assumed her surname was Mail. But if her husband was the informant for her death certificate, he may have known her actual surname.
I think I am thinking too much about this. My best course of action is to try and follow up the UK Mail connection and see if I can figure out how they are related to Clara/Ida.