Well I made the suggestion!! I thought the exact same thing.
But apparently they are different names!! Adamant that the names are different.
I personally think that the McCarthy is correct. You independently came to the same census records that I did, when I did not say what they were.
You added the danny boyo's prison stuff which gives his Welsh birth and birthdate.
Sinann added James birth and you, baby Ellen( that is one I will run past her.)
Added to that the nephew's record Dennis Morris Collins with uncle's West Green address.
It provides approx time they moved - between 1905 and 1907.
The only bit I don't get is the Douglas /Donlan place of birth in Wales. I have spent half of today working through census records for Collins in Wales in 1901 and 1911 on Ancest.. - disregarding the names and concentrating solely on the place names.
Just searching the 3 separate names Douglas, Doulan, and Donlan in Google for Wales got me no where.
It may be an English name for a Welsh name. It looks like Merthyr T. is where Dennis Collins was born.
I can't show all these results to the granddaughter til end next week. I can't name her as her whole family is still alive from her generation.
But I will get back to you as soon as I get an answer.
I know from experience of my other families that stories that get handed down usually have some truth but often belong to someone other than the person the story is about.
One of my stories had a man born in Kerry who became a priest then ran away and became a ships cabin boy.
The truth was that he lived in Bermuda and was trained to the priesthood but didn't take his final vows. We never discovered how he got to Australia.
Another family had a cabin boy in it!!
