Robert Allan

[fortiter]

Am trying to establish birth details of Robert Allan, youngest child  of Robert Allan and Anne Mann.  Nothing in OPR. 1861 Census gives year of birth as 1809 at Forres.  Other 2 census give birthplace as Aldearn and Aldairn  (no doubt Auldearn near Nairn) IGI only gives 1809 at Nigg (where he lived and died) I have date and place of birth for the other siblings in the family but not Robert my great great grandfather.  Does anyone have any suggestions as to where else I migh try?

[GR2]

When you say the IGI gives Nigg 1809, have you seen the actual entry in the baptism register? If it isn't there, it means the IGI entry is not based on an actual document, but on a detail (which could be made up) submitted by a "researcher" who just made a guess. What do the 1841 and 1851 censuses say? Where were his brothers and sisters born and where were his parents married? Birthplaces on a census can be wrong, sometimes they are inconsistent from census to census.

Graham.

[fortiter]

Thanks for your comments, Graham.

I am pretty sure the IGI record was submitted by a researcher and I have not sighted a baptism register entry.  Robert's parents were married at Forres in  1791 and  children born/baptised  successsively at Dyke, Houston & Killellan (Renfrew), Rafford, Rafford, Rafford and Rafford.  The 1841 census shows Robert, aged 30 and wife Johanna, aged 25.  The 1851 census shows Robert, aged 42, born, M???, Aldearn.  His father (also Robert) aged 83 is now living with the family and I have not seen any evidence that he was living in Nigg before then. 
Hope these details are of use.

Many thanks again,
Jonathan

[Dave the Walrus]

Hi,

You might want to try this website:

www.angelfire.com/ny4/peterhead/

It has a free comprehensive list of all details of persons with the surname Allan.

Best wishes,

Dave

[Forfarian]

1861 Census gives year of birth as 1809 at Forres. 

The 19th century censuses did not record the year of birth. They recorded the person's age on census day. The 1861 census was taken on 7 April 1861. Therefore anyone who was born between 8 April and 31 December had not had their 1861 birthday by census day, and were a year younger than they would have been if the census had been taken on 31 December.

There are various web sites and indexes (for example Ancestry, FamilySearch) where the supposed age is calculated by substracting the age from the census year. Because the census is taken only a quarter of the way through the year, three out of four birth years 'calculated' by this method will be wrong.

[fortiter]

Many thanks for your help, Forfarian.
I still have not been able to identify the birth, but will persevere,
Jonathan

[fortiter]

Hi Dave.  Thanks for your suggestion.  This was a web site I had not seen before, but unfortunately at first glance there did not seem to be anything relevant to my family.
Best wishes,
Jonathan