Can't find her birth, census, anything

[cadmium]

First of all - hello! I'm new. Second of all - I'm hopelessly lost! I've used many credits on SP to no avail searching one particular mystery woman. Here's the info.

Marriage certificate 4 Sept 1919
between Colin Campbell (33) and Meta Y Macfarlane (25).
Colin is listed at the time as a warder for Barnhill Poorhouse in Glasgow (I know he later became a nurse), whereas Meta is working at the H(awkhead) Asylum, Cardonald as a Mental Nurse. Meta is the most difficult to trace.
The marriage certificate states Meta's parents as James Macfarlane, soldier, deceased and Sarah Young.

I can't find any marriage certificate between a James Macfarlane and a Sarah Young. I assume Meta's middle name stands for Young. I also can't find her census records or birth certificates that match the names and rough dates, despite it being somewhat of an unusual name!
Colin and Meta's children were never told of any aunts, uncles, grandparents. Which makes me wonder if the marriage circumstances (see below) is relevant, perhaps she was illegitimate or abandoned? Meta only ever said that she came from Easter Ross, whether this was true I do not know.

A second interesting factor is that the marriage doesn't appear to have been religious, it took place in the Poorhouse with staff witnesses.

Forgive me for not providing more info at the moment, the SP website seems to have problems viewing certificates at the moment.. also sorry if the post is long! I'd be grateful for some insight or ideas.. thanks!

[emanday]

Hi mikokunsaki,

A warm welcome to

The marriage certificate states Meta's parents as James Macfarlane, soldier, deceased and Sarah Young.

It's not beyond the realms of possibility that her parents marriage took place outside Scotland. James might have met and married the daughter (or even widow) of another serving soldier.

A second interesting factor is that the marriage doesn't appear to have been religious, it took place in the Poorhouse with staff witnesses.

You will find that many more Scottish marriages took place in the bride's home or that of a relative or friend than in an actual church, so that is not that unusual. If her own relatives were not about, she may have chosen to marry in his residence which appears to have been as a staff member of the poorhouse.

Under where it says the location, does it mention anything about "According to the ...." or even something about "Sheriff Warrant"

[cadmium]

Ah, thanks to IrfanView I can give more info now!

Thanks for your reply... and you are right, it does mention a Sherrif's warrant. I was mistaken, it was only poorhouse witnesses.

4th Sept 1919 AT 19 Howard St Glasgow
By Declaration in presence of James Allan Craig Asylum attendant and Molly Proctor Asylum Nurse

At the side it says Warrant of sherriff substitute of Lanarkshire, dated Sept (4?) 1919.

[emanday]

Basically, that means that they got married by declaring that they were married in front of those two witnesses! That would then have been "made official" so to speak by Sheriff's Warrant but he didn't marry them.

This might seem strange, but it was a perfectly legal marriage in Scotland. Any of my rellies who married in this way were usually of different religions.

[cadmium]

Ah, thanks for explaining about the marriage.

However, as to her birth or her parents marriage - I've looked on ancestry also, and can't find any child to a James Macfarlane and Sarah Young. Any ideas on what I should do next?

I've tried SP, ancestry with no country specified.. no luck.

[emanday]

I'm afraid I'm having no luck with that either, not even on FindMyPast.

[Russell]

Hi mikokunsaki

Can I add my welcome to TalkingScot.
Your post really caught my eye because I not only trained as a psychiatric nurse in Leverndale Hospital, I also taught nurses there for some years.
It was known as Hawkhead Asylum up until the 1950's when they decided to change the name.
I have been searching furiously and unsuccesfully for my link to the Greater Glasgow Health Board site since the hospital archives should be with their Archivist and they may be able to give you some information on Meta.
There should be information available on her training at least since mental nursing was a Registered profession by that time.
Whether there is information on the untrained attendants in Barnhill is less likely unfortunately.
If Colin trained as a nurse later he could have spent his training time in Gartnaval Hospital which is/was nearest Barnhill but there are several other places around Glasgow all of which offered mental nurse training for males.
If SKS has the missing link for the health board archives I would appreciate it too.
Colin Campbell is not the easiest name to search for. Every Campbell family I come across seems to have a Colin in it.

Russell

[cadmium]

Hi Russell, thanks for the welcome.
That's great news that Meta should be registered. She didn't tell her children very much and never spoke about her work either, so fingers crossed her records will be somewhere.
As for Colin - I'm not sure that he was a mental nurse like Meta, or a conventional one, his death certificate only lists 'male nurse'.

These two intrigue me so much because they told so little. I have more luck with Colin's family and it seems he had brothers and parents alive at the time, which he never told his children about so I wonder if Meta's parents really were deceased, and how they came to nursing.

Miko

PS: The annoying thing about Meta's name is that searching in some search engines only brings up jibberish about meta-tags!

[Russell]

HI again mikokunsaki

Unless Colin waited until the late 1940's to do his training he would almost certainly be a mental nurse. General hospitals did not offer 'MEN' the opportunity to do medical and surgical nursing until 1946 when the first male nurses were admitted to the General Register. Even then many hospitals would not accept men into training and The Southern General Hospital in Glasgow was one of the few.
I did my general nurse training there but not until the early 1960's.

Russell

[cadmium]

Ahh, thanks for the info. Well poor Colin died in 1946 of cancer of the spine so that clears it up, he must have been a mental nurse like Meta..