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Hi,

Thanks for the info about the university. The reason is that I have traced them via their marriage and death certs etc and they cannot be him.  I understand that not all the records have survived to be transcribed.......

Thanks again!

I am looking for any descendants of Alexander McKechnie MD, Surgeon R.N. born in Scotland c1803 and his wife Mary Tipping born in London.  After marriage they  lived in the Portsea Island area and he served on various ships, at some time working at the Haslar hospital.

His children were Alexander, b1843, who became a Captain in the R.N.(married Ada Key and appears to have died with no kids); John Anderson Rae b 1845, who joined the marines (married Mary ? and had several offspring) lived in Devon at one time; William Burnett b1847 (dk what happened to him after childhood); Peter George Wallis b1849 (my gg grandfather who was a wine merchant dying in 1936); and Mary J. D. b1851.

I am looking for any connections people have to these families and any old photographs, documents etc that might relate to them. 

I also intend to start some research soon on Alexander's naval and medical career and don't want to duplicate information that someone may already have.

I have a similar "problem".  My G Grandfather, George McKechnie was born in 1874, two years before his parents Peter McKechnie and Sarah Ann Edmonds got married.  They married when she was pregnant with the second child. 

The only thing I could think of was that one of them was married to someone else (I have searched for other marriage entries but not been able to find one), or that she was underage and her father would not consent (she was 20 when she finally married and her father is listed as deceased on the marriage cert, though when he died I don't know). 

I think that co-habiting was not unknown in "bohemian" circles but he was a Victorian middle class business man.  The only other thing I thought of was that she was underage when she had the child and lied about her age later. I have not been able to find a birth record for her in the UK so I can only go by her age on her marriage and death certs. But that does not really make sense either.

I assume both parents registered the birth, as George has his father's surname and his father's name is on the certificate, although she is listed as the informant.  Perhaps they pretended to be married as she was pregnant and didn't actually get round to it until later!

Fantastic, thanks for all your help!