David Swan

[Bob Haining]

Hoping some one might be able to help, I've been unable to find the death of a David Swan:

Born June 19, 1849 in Ratho, Midlothian.

Married June 24, 1878 to Helen Fairweather in Bathgate, Linlithgon.

Every census from 1851 to 1911 has him listed as born in Ratho. From 1881 to 1911 census he is listed as an Insurance Agent.

In 1927 his wife's death registration (Helen) she is listed as a widow. She was listed as living in Leith.

There is only one David Swan death in Midlothian listed on Scotlandspeople between 1911 and 1927, but it's not him.

There are 2 trees on Ancestry that has him listed as dying July 12, 1915 in Gallioli, Turkey. But looking at Find A Grave, this David Swan is 19 years old.

Any help would be appreciated.

[StewL]

Hello Bob
There is a David Swan death listed in Leith, Midlothian in 1939, (David Lindsay C Swan).
I did not look at the actual certificate, but their is a possibility that his wife was mistakenly listed as a widow in her DC.
Are there any Lindsay's in his line?

[JustJean]

Hi Bob

It's that ol' tricky spelling of David that is catching you out on this one!

1926 SWAN DAIVD M 77 LEITH SOUTH EDINBURGH CITY/MIDLOTHIAN 685/11 0030

I do hope you notify SP that they have a spellink error there......and don't forget to tell them just how difficult it was to locate and how many credits you may have wasted!

Best wishes
Jean

[AndrewP]

Hi Bob,

The 1915 valuation roll on ScotlandsPeople places him at the same address that the family was in on the 1911 census; also being the same address that Helen was at, at the time of her death.

All the best,

AndrewP

** Jean has solved the issue while I have been looking at this one.

[Bob Haining]

Hi Jean,

I got it, thank you, thank you, thank you. This was starting to "drive me around the bend". I'd used "wild cards" on Swan, never thought of doing that with David. One question, how did you find it?

Stewie,

I did have a look at your suggestion, but as you can see, that wasn't him, but thanks for the help. I should know better than to believe everything that is put onto death certificates, but thought she would know if she was a widow. Thanks for looking for me.

Andrew,

I keep forgetting to check these valuation rolls, thanks.

[LesleyB]

Hi Bob

I should know better than to believe everything that is put onto death certificates, but thought she would know if she was a widow.

Without meaning to sound flippant, the problem with death entries is that the person who has just died is not the one who gives the information. If they did, the entries would be a lot more reliable!! We are dependent on the death informant to give the information, and if this informant is not a close family member or even if they are, they are maybe not aware of details such as precise age, parent names etc. then the info given at the time of death can be quite inaccurate. Bear in mind too that this is a distressing time for close family members and even if they are aware of the correct details they may give incorrect information due to the effects of grief. If the person dies in a hospital or has no close family members to report the death, the information can be sparse (e.g. no parent names) or very inaccurate e.g. someone listed as a widow when they are not. Was the death informant someone you know of?

Best wishes
Lesley

[JustJean]

Hi Bob

Why Bob...if I told you how I found it my super sleuth powers would be diminished!

Seriously...if you must know....it was not as straightforward as I made it appear. I had done the wildcard search on Swan...I had even entered the first name as just DAV* thinking it might have been Dave or Davie or somesuch and I had also done the math to know the projected age and yes I had checked a few images and was getting nowhere fast. Sooo.....I decided that he might have been registered somehow under a different first name altogether. (no I did not consider that David had been misspelled at this point.....but now that you mention it I'm very certain this is not the first example of a misspelled David I have encountered so you would have thought I would have considered that at the time .......) Anyway....I refined the search to be: lSurname: "SW*N*"; Surname Option: Wildcard; Forename: ""; Forename Option: Prefix; Sex: "Any"; Year From: 1911; Year To: 1935; Birth Year: 1849; Birth Year Range: 5; City: EDINBURGH CITY; and the results were 120 records and I sighed but decided to plow through them. You can see that I was allowing for his death age to be out by 5 years and the possibility he had really outlived his wife even though her record told us otherwise. I had looked at how many records would be returned if I did not narrow down to Edinburgh City and quickly aborted that sort of thinking falling back to the one county but all districts The very first pageful is all it took....Daivd was record number 10. I simply knew it had to be your fellow.

So you see Bob....if at first you don't succeed.....try a different approach.....eventually that is what usually works for me!

Best wishes
Jean

[StewL]

Hello Bob and Jean
I must admit that when I do searches I always put in surname variations in the search criteria.
I never thought to do same with given names, after all these years searching you learn something new every day
Congratulations to Jean for helping to solve the riddle. =D>
I must have a re-look at some of my lang deid yins and try a given name variation too.
Now to look and see what ones, if any, I can retry.

[LesleyB]

One I came across quite by accident some years ago when at NRH for the day, but which seems to be quite a common typo is GOERGE....if you try a search on SP for deaths with that first name there are an amazing 157!!

Also 202 marriages and 275 births. I'm pretty sure this is not what is written on the entries but is simply a result of the kind of typing we all produce from time to time! You do wonder if it is all the result of the same person's typing or if this is a common transposition....?

Anyway, GOERGE taught me a lot about trying variations and not making assumptions (like: surely no one could spell George wrongly...) !

Best wishes
Lesley

[Currie]

Also Gorge, Lesley, and, going by the census, the incidence seems to increase as you go back in time. That would suggest it’s the entries rather than the transcription.

Does this WW1 death have any connection?

The Scotsman, 20 July, 1915.
“9th Royal Scots.
Pioneer J. B. Swan, 1/9 Royal Scots, died on 15th July of wounds received in France. He was 21 years of age, and was the youngest son of David and Helen Swan, 21 Sloan Street, Leith.”

That's James Blair Swan, born at Nairn. See CWGC. http://www.cwgc.org/find-war-dead/casua ... ES%20BLAIR

Alan