Help deciphering father's occupation

Post by **SarahND** » Sat Sep 27, 2008 10:32 am

Hi Isabel,
I suppose it could be that... a furnisher of house handlooms. Sounds as good as any of the others! I think I'll send a contact form and see if there is any chance of getting a better image.
Thanks for your input!
Sarah

speleobat2 · Post by **speleobat2** » Mon Sep 29, 2008 1:52 am

Sarah,

Do you know anything about John Brown's parents and family previous to his marriage?

I did a search on SP on the 1881 Census using Brown as a surname and House, Ayrshire as an address. There are 88 records with House in the address in Ayrshire for that year all with someone named Brown living there. Ardnith House in New Cumnock comes closest to the mystery word and not very at that! You might want to have a look to see if you recognize any possibly children or grand children or since it's forty years further down the road, great grandchildren's names. Or maybe it would be easier to look for that needle in the haystack after all!

Carol

Post by **SarahND** » Mon Sep 29, 2008 8:24 am

speleobat2 wrote:Do you know anything about John Brown's parents and family previous to his marriage?

Hi Carol,
Thanks for your efforts!
I didn't even know of John's existence until just before I posted this topic

And had only just found out that Euphemia Brown was the mother of John Hair. Euphemia and her husband William Hair followed the Scottish naming pattern exactly for the first two sons and daughters-- so you know that John was the second son.

Two of Euphemia's sons were house factors, as I said, but by then they had moved to Glasgow, so the name of the houses won't help. I know nothing about any other family of John's. The only other child of John Brown and Jane Lennox that I know about is the Thomas born 1809, who is the only one of the family to appear in the OPRs. I have followed his widow and children all the way to Pennsylvania

Don't ask me why

He seems to have died just before the 1841 census, as his wife is already alone with six children, the youngest aged 2. That census doesn't give the information of whether or not she is widowed. They were living in Old Cumnock, as were Euphemia and family.

Available OPR deaths don't look too promising:
Deaths in Auchinleck 1753-88; 1828-33
Deaths in Old Cumnock 1783-92
No deaths survive for Sorn

So, unless the deaths are mentioned in the Kirk Sessions, which do exist, I'm not likely to find out when any of these folk died. I'm wondering whether they were members of the established church, since only Thomas appears in the OPR. Euphemia we know was a child of that couple only because of her death cert and there are 20 years between the two births. There are an appalling number of possible Browns in the area and so far I have struck out trying to find any other siblings.

I did go back and stare at the cert for awhile this morning... and came up with Furoisyue House War- ---nn . The capital letter at the beginning of the second line looks nothing like the other M's on the page. The only letter it looks something like is the W of "Widow", as Helen suggested. Also, I will have to agree with Alan that the only time this writer seems to get anything like those two parallel lines in the word before "dead" is when they are descending from a letter above. I do hope SP sends a clearer cert-- maybe today!

Cheers,
Sarah

speleobat2 · Post by **speleobat2** » Mon Sep 29, 2008 12:10 pm

Sarah,

"I have followed his widow and children all the way to Pennsylvania Don't ask me why"

Probably for the same reason that I spent an entire morning following my husband's step-father's mother's family from Ohio back to New York!

I was hoping that since some of the "houses" in Scotland kept their names for centuries, perhaps the Browns were still living in the same place a few decades later. I also found a John Brown who was an auctioneer, but I couldn't make that fit into the space before House on the death cert. either!

Carol

mallog · Post by **mallog** » Mon Sep 29, 2008 2:09 pm

Small step from furniture salesman to auctioneer though.

hg · Post by hg » Wed Oct 01, 2008 9:09 pm

Haven't you had your new cert yet Sarah?

regards

Helen

Post by **SarahND** » Wed Oct 01, 2008 9:51 pm

Hi Helen,
Nothing yet

Sniff,
Sarah

Post by **SarahND** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 8:38 am

Hi all you patient people,
Still no clearer image, but here is the conclusion of someone who went back and looked at the original:

" Euphemia's father worked in a Furniture House Wareroom and the last word is dead.
Odd that dead is written like that, when all the other entries have deceased rather, but I can't think what other word it is ie Furniture House Wareroom something or other."

In my opinion, "Furniture House Wareroom" is odd since normally the occupation refers to the person, not the place. So I would expect "Furniture House Wareman" (if such a thing exists!) rather than "Wareroom". If it IS Wareroom, then I would think that "dead" is not "dead," but some descriptor for the man who worked there. And in that case one would expect it to be capitalized, and this "dead" is definitely lower case...
And if it is "Wareroom"-- what is that loopy thing that comes in the middle of the word?

As you can tell, I'm still not convinced!

All the best,
Sarah

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 1:30 pm

Hello Sarah,

The loopy thing is a bit of a worry, especially seeing there is a space for it, unless it fits neatly over another letter.

By 1864 I would say that John Brown’s body was certainly well mouldered in his grave. There’s no room for deceased unless he intrudes on the last line which he may like to keep clear. We don’t really know whether he usually abbreviates deceased to dec’d as there is no other example on the page. (I think).

The first letter of the third word looks so feeble compared to all his upper case that it almost looks as though it is a continuation of the second word rather than a separate word?

You can search on FreeCen in 1841 and 1851 for occupations without any other fields and can use wildcards and bits of occupations e.g. furn* or *room or wareh* etc. as long as you don’t get too many results.

I haven’t had a good look at that but maybe it could be useful.

All the best,
Alan

Post by **SarahND** » Sun Oct 05, 2008 3:08 pm

Currie wrote: By 1864 I would say that John Brown’s body was certainly well mouldered in his grave.

Now you've got that song going through my head!

Currie wrote:You can search on FreeCen in 1841 and 1851 for occupations without any other fields and can use wildcards and bits of occupations e.g. furn* or *room or wareh* etc. as long as you don’t get too many results.

I did that on Ancestry for several day's straight and I'm afraid haven't got any further

If anyone else want's to give it a try, please do!

Cheers,
Sarah