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Hello:

I am looking for any information on John Stuart Scarth (b. about 1809), husband of May Linklater and father of William Baikie Scarth (b. 1834). I have the data from the 1841 and '51 censuses, when the family lived at Stromness and Kirkwall, respectively. I am especially seeking the names of his parents.

Some things we know about him are that he was born 'on the line of march' in Portugal about 1809, when the British army was fighting Napoleon in the Peninsula; he was at some time part of the Kirkwall Volunteers; and he was at some time precentor of St. Magnus Cathedral. He later, perhaps in the '70s, moved with his wife to Liverpool, where they lived with William Baikie Scarth.

I see James Irvine Robertson mentions a John Scarth in his journal of 1851, but it's not clear it's John Stuart Scarth, and probably isn't; but I'm wondering. Also there was a John Scarth, born Kirkwall, Orkney, aged 43, discharged from the 71st Foot Regiment of the Northumberland Fencibles sometime between 1795 and 1819. John Stuart Scarth's father? Is there a list of precentors of St. Magnus Cathedral?

Any leads would be awesome.

Thanks much!

Azurewood

Dear Mr. Mackenzie:

The William Baikie Scarth to whom you refer was the son of John Stuart Scarth and May (not Mary) Linklater (pronounced Linklatter). May L. was known as 'the Scandinavian Lily'. His father John was at one time precentor of St. Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall, and was born 'on the line of march' in Portugal c1809, with the British Peninsular army fighting Napoleon there. May L. may have been born in 1791.

William Baikie Scarth went to India where he served in the British army (or British East India Company army before the Mutiny/Indian war of independence in '57); this presumably c1855 or so. I did not know he was in London in 1861; I thought his service in India lasted til the 1870s. Perhaps he returned temporarily to London. He was reputedly married in India, but I have no information on his family life there. He was in Liverpool by 1875, because our records indicate that he brought both his parents May and John to live with him there, and that one of them was dead by 1875. He remarried in Liverpool, to two sisters successively (Elizabeth Ann and Sarah Beynon I think, from South Wales), and had perhaps 8 children, some of whom were sent to Chicago c1893. (One of them later became a Mrs. Stryker there, and had a son named Russell.) His two youngest children, Harold Linklater Scarth (b. 1892) and Ronald Stuart Scarth (b. 1902), came to Winnipeg, Canada in 1913 and 1920, respectively. Ronald as a youth wanted to go to sea, but his parents were grieved at the thought and he refrained from doing so.

William Baikie Scarth died in November 1918, aged 84, two weeks after retiring from his job as an estate manager in Liverpool.

He had a sonorous voice with a lovely Orcadian accent. He was  a lay reader in church and at one time lectured in Liverpool on life in Orkney, composing a short monograph called 'Life in the North'.

Speculation: Given his middle name, it seems plausible that his father's mother or his mother's mother might have been a Baikie. There was I believe a notable William Baikie at Kirkwall about that time (I think he built Tankerness House). Incidentally, another William Baikie I believe founded the first Scottish public library, the Kirkwall Bibliotheck, about 1653 (an ancestor?). (Please check Linklater's 'Orkney and Shetland' for this.)

Possible lead: Is there a list of precentors of St. Magnus? If so, might this be a clue to some ancestors of John Stuart Scarth and William Baikie Scarth?

Hope to post some more info. in the future.

Happy hunting,

Azurewood