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Messages - Fogmoose

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1
Aberdeenshire / Re: "College" District in Aberdeen?
« on: Tuesday 13 February 24 22:46 GMT (UK)  »
Very helpful everyone, as always! Hello again Forfarian, hope you are well!

So that likely leaves out the College birth, meaning probables are left with Huntly 1954 and Ellon 1952.  A young lady with that name married the same year of my relatives death also in Inverurie. The first and middle name match the Huntly birth, but that would make her barely 18 at the marriage. Perhaps not unlikely considering she was a foster-daughter, so maybe no other family or means of support after my relatives passing? Thoughts?

2
Aberdeenshire / Re: "College" District in Aberdeen?
« on: Tuesday 13 February 24 17:25 GMT (UK)  »
I am afraid that as she is still possibly living you will have to remove her name from your post.

Done. Still wondering about the College thing, Thanks.

3
Aberdeenshire / "College" District in Aberdeen?
« on: Tuesday 13 February 24 16:22 GMT (UK)  »
Hello all the wonderful folks on RC, I have been gone a while but I have returned!
Hope all the great folks are still here and well!

So now that the 50 year privacy rule has expired, I finally was able to obtain the image of the DC for my GG-Uncle who passed in 1972 in Inverurie. Not much useful info but it does give more information about his foster-daughter,********. Her address is listed as Meadow Cottage, Upper Coltown, Kintore. Trying to trace a birth record for her I've hit on three or four possibles. The closest and most likely is in Ellon, but one of the others the RD is listed as "COLLEGE". I am unable to find any further info on this as all the searches just keep coming up with various College's such as the Univerity of Aberdeen. Anyone able to help with this?

I will next try and find if ******* married and had any children. Would love to find her if she is still alive. She would be in her 70's now at least.

Take care all!

4
The Common Room / Re: Multiple illegitimate children: how unusual?
« on: Saturday 07 August 21 22:12 BST (UK)  »
My ancestor lived in rural Berkshire and had 3 illegitimate children inbetween 1822 and 1828. Maybe the father wouldn't or couldn't marry her, that is if they all had the same father. I descend from the one born 1822, Thomas Edgington.

Yes, it's very hard to trace fathers in those years before the civil records. If the parents weren't active in the church, and sometimes even if they were, records were scarce to none. I've gotten lucky with most of my illegitimate ancestors so far. The Scot's occasional practice of using the fathers surname as a middle name has saved me several times. Also I have found documentation in poorhouse records as well as Church records. I even have found valuable family history in a book of traditional songs of Scotland! Of course, not everyone will have a piper or fiddler in the family, but it goes to show that you can find things in the most unusual of places. It's a never ending saga, Family research is!

5
The Common Room / Re: Multiple illegitimate children: how unusual?
« on: Saturday 07 August 21 02:48 BST (UK)  »


"Sometimes people did sell themselves a few times, to earn some money if they were poor and desperate."

Oh, without question that happened on occasion. I'm just saying that the overall rate of illegitimacy had very little to do with prostitution, even though one might think the two were related.

6
The Common Room / Re: Multiple illegitimate children: how unusual?
« on: Thursday 05 August 21 03:15 BST (UK)  »
What options were there for a single woman of little means to support a lot of children? Before the welfare state and not including the workhouse.

My Margaret was a farm labourer. No marriage and no suspected fathers. Could the father(s) be forced to pay for their children's support - and was that likely in reality? I have heard of bastardy bonds but although I have many illegitimate children in my tree, I only found one where the father had actually been identified as financially responsible. Mostly I found illegitimate children born to one mother numbered one or occasionally two (and then they married). 11 is my all time record and I cannot imagine how Margaret could have supported this many without ever marrying.  Her father was also an ag lab. Small North Yorks rural community.  I can't find the children anywhere, no deaths, marriages or appearing within other households.

Intriguing.

In a word, few. You could apply for the poor rolls, or go to a workhouse. Neither was an appealing prospect.

7
The Common Room / Re: Multiple illegitimate children: how unusual?
« on: Thursday 05 August 21 03:13 BST (UK)  »
I myself likewise have found many illegitimate ancestors, and in only one case so far was the father brought to court and even in that case the women in question still ended up in the workhouse, so she apparently never collected anything substantial from the father. You can't get blood from a stone, so to speak. Most of these people were dirt poor, after all.

8
The Common Room / Re: Multiple illegitimate children: how unusual?
« on: Thursday 05 August 21 00:03 BST (UK)  »
Maybe my ancestor Emma Auber was a "lady of the night". She had 5 illegitimate children. Unless she was getting financial support from a man. She did give one of her children Gore as a middle name. Again, DNA testing is coming on in leaps and bounds so we may be able to find elusive fathers through autosomal DNA, but I still wonder how much you can actually rely on DNA to smash down those brickwalls?

It would be a mistake to assume that a woman of that era who had multiple illegitimate children was a member of the world's oldest profession. Illegitimacy rates were due to a combination of many factors. Population growth, geographical location, climate, farming practices, religious schisms, and changing cultural and economic conditions would be just a few of those. The vast majority of illegitimate births had nothing to do with prostitution.

9
Scotland / Re: David Jeffrey - Scotland (1880s)
« on: Tuesday 03 August 21 20:23 BST (UK)  »
Part 2: Ann Smith or Reid

Maggie’s mother, Ann Smith or Reid, has an equally chequered history. She was born in Ireland in about 1839 to Margaret Gourlay and her first husband, James Smith. She first appears in Scotland in 1851 in Glassford, Lanarkshire with her mother and her second husband, John Reid, along with three siblings.

Her first child, Eliza Simpson, was born in 1856 in Glassford. She subsequently married the child’s father, Matthew Simpson, in Feb 1857 in East Kilbride. Their second child, Jane Simpson was born in December 1857 in East Kilbride. Matthew Simpson seems to have left the household shortly after - he appears in 1861 in Corstophine, Midlothian, where he appears to afterwards take up with a Mary Moran, with whom he has three further children: James in 1862, and Henry and John (twins) in 1869. He died in 1879 in Colinton, Midlothian.

Ann Smith had five children between 1861 and 1870 - presumably all to different fathers (none of whom were her husband): Mary Ann Smith b. 1861; Margaret Allan Smith, b. 1863, Elizabeth Smith, b. 1865; Rachel Smith, b. 1867; and Agnes Barclay Smith, b. 1870.

She then had a son - registered as David Smith, in 1872 - with David Thomas, a soldier stationed at Hamilton. She married David Thomas in 1880 (when, if we remember, her daughter Maggie Reid married William Scott, also a soldier stationed at Hamilton). He appears in barracks at Hamilton in 1881, and I can’t find the family at all in 1891, but Ann registered David Thomas’ death in 1900 in Perth. She died in 1907 in Perth.

Ruth

Ruth, you are a wonder! I love reading your research finds, I only love it more when they are MY ancestors! Best of the Best health to you and your family!!

Richard (Fogmoose)

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