This may sound like a really "stupid" question, if one doesn't know a whole lot about the family. The names are James, George, Thomas, Mary, Jean, Elizabeth and the last names are common like Gray, Hall, Martin, Brown, Jeffries, how does one go about figuring out when people were either married or died?
Much of my work to date has been based on tidbits given to me by my uncles and aunts, census records or information provided by persons within Talking Scot (thank you very much for your assistance).
However, the people now coming up I know nothing about and even using the 1891 and 1901 census material, how does one know where to go looking for marriage certificates and death certificates as no one in my family has ever heard of most of the siblings.
Always willing to learn.
Allison
Where to start looking for marriage/death certificates?.....
Moderator: Global Moderators
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Allison
- Posts: 41
- Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2005 11:29 pm
- Location: Essex, England
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JustJean
- Posts: 2520
- Joined: Sun Dec 12, 2004 12:52 am
- Location: Maine USA
Hi Allison
No professionals being about at this hour I'm going to take a swing at a reply. Never fear as you'll get lots more good advice on the 'morrow
Never fear as there are no stupid questions here...ever 
When researching deaths or marriages you surely must have a known starting point. A living person with a DOB, parents, siblings, maybe placed on 1 or more census returns. All the info you can gather is critical....place of birth, occupation of father, maiden name of mother, informant or witness names, any and all evidence.
You're not specific enough on a time frame that you're looking at and that makes a huge difference....whether or not you can utilize the IGI, what census records are readily available, are you looking for pre or post 1855 information, even what country you're looking in...ie did they emigrate and when?
Certainly the tidbits you've been working with will help you out as all these names will end up being connected in one family tree. All the surnames you list....how did you know of them?....What do you already know that will help you more than you're aware of?
You've probably seen that a Scottish DC if completely and accurately filled in contains parents names and whether they are deceased as well as occupations....whether married/single/widowed and spouse name(s). MC also contain the same parent data. While it's generally easier to follow the male lines as the surname does not change now with the new Death search facility that allows Maiden name/Married name tracing of females you'll find it much easier to look for the women.
With common surnames unfortunately it is more challenging and you're bound to expend a few credits in error...but careful searching and comparison of files along with utilization of wildcards can usually return amazing results.
Why not give us a specific person that you wish to trace and we can all chip in advice and explain various search techniques and see where you end up???
Best wishes
Jean
No professionals being about at this hour I'm going to take a swing at a reply. Never fear as you'll get lots more good advice on the 'morrow
Never fear as there are no stupid questions here...ever When researching deaths or marriages you surely must have a known starting point. A living person with a DOB, parents, siblings, maybe placed on 1 or more census returns. All the info you can gather is critical....place of birth, occupation of father, maiden name of mother, informant or witness names, any and all evidence.
You're not specific enough on a time frame that you're looking at and that makes a huge difference....whether or not you can utilize the IGI, what census records are readily available, are you looking for pre or post 1855 information, even what country you're looking in...ie did they emigrate and when?
Certainly the tidbits you've been working with will help you out as all these names will end up being connected in one family tree. All the surnames you list....how did you know of them?....What do you already know that will help you more than you're aware of?
You've probably seen that a Scottish DC if completely and accurately filled in contains parents names and whether they are deceased as well as occupations....whether married/single/widowed and spouse name(s). MC also contain the same parent data. While it's generally easier to follow the male lines as the surname does not change now with the new Death search facility that allows Maiden name/Married name tracing of females you'll find it much easier to look for the women.
With common surnames unfortunately it is more challenging and you're bound to expend a few credits in error...but careful searching and comparison of files along with utilization of wildcards can usually return amazing results.
Why not give us a specific person that you wish to trace and we can all chip in advice and explain various search techniques and see where you end up???
Best wishes
Jean
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DavidWW
- Posts: 5057
- Joined: Sat Dec 11, 2004 9:47 pm
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Allison
- Posts: 41
- Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2005 11:29 pm
- Location: Essex, England
Where to start looking
Thank you Jean and Davie for your responses--your suggestions are appreciated.
Right now, I'm looking in the post-1855 era. As seems to be the case with my family, they appear briefly and then disappear! I did find the deaths for Alexander and Susan McKellar in 1907 and 1903 respectively. That is the end of that line as their only child died at 3 years of age. Alexander's brother, Donald, died in 1896 and he was not married nor did he have any children. So my great-great-half-uncles left no descendants. Susan McKellar's parents (Manus and Susan McGonagle (Brown) were deceased when she married Alexander in 1863. I've tried to search the post 1855 records for both but nothing matches and there are no pre-1855 searches for deaths. (Frustrating!!!)
Which then moves us onto Mary and Elizabeth, neither of whom seems to have registered births even though they were born somewhere between 1855 and 1860 (we've gone through this story already)!
But somewhere along the line, I have to find Alex's father, Alex Sr. who may have died at sea. There is a notation in the Greenock Telegraph (thanks to a kind person on this forum) stating that Alexander McKellar died on the Shooting Star headed for New Zealand (I don't have all my files here with me, but I think it was in the 1850's or 1860's). But I also note that there are a couple of Alexander McKellar's who lived to ripe old ages in their 70's and 80's so I guess there is a possibility there as well. Alex Sr., it would seem, was not living with his wife, Jean, starting sometime in the mid-1840's and it would seem that neither re-married although they were separated.
Somewhere along the line, after her second husband's death in the 191**s, Elizabeth emigrated to Ontario and I have her death certificate but the informant didn't even have the proper name of Elizabeth's father or mother. I know that from her second marriage with Daniel McFadyen, Elizabeth had several daughters who all came to Canada and the United States, but I can't track them down after that as I don't know where they settled or whom they married. My father and his brothers only knew one aunt when they were very young and that aunt not well at all--it would appear that my grandfather didn't get on very well with his half-sisters.
I have Mary's marriage certificate (she married James Martin in 1876 in Greenock), her appearance in the 1881 census in Totnes, Devon (where James was born), and her address in 1884 on Inverkip Street, Greenock when her mother, Jean, died. Then Mary, her husband James, and three children seem to disappear off the face of the earth. I can't find them in either the Scottish or English 1891 census or the 1901 census. I've tried to look for marriages and deaths in Renfrew and Devon being the roots of both families but there there are no Mary Martin (Gillespie) which match up in Scotland from 1881 to 1945 or later. James Martin seems to provide a whole slew of deaths over the same time period so I'm not sure how one would narrow it down.
I've tried the Free BMD in England to see if I could narrow down the death of James Martin using Totnes but again there doesn't seem to be anyone whose age fits someone born around 1855.
I've tried marriages for Mary's daughter, Jane(t) McDougall Bridget(t) Gillespie, in Scotland but again no one fits the age range (born 1875). And there are too many "James Martin" and "George Martin" to try and figure out which one might be the right one in either Renfrew or England.
I'm beginning to intensely dislike my ancestors--it is just one brick wall after another!!! And that is only line for my grandfather. I won't get started on the other line or my grandmother's side (which is English and trying to search out records in England is not nearly as easy as in Scotland).
My aunt and uncle want me to put together as much of a family tree as possible for a reunion in two years time, so I'm praying that a whole pile of brick walls will suddenly come tumbling down! [-o<
Am I missing something? Suggestions appreciated.
Allison
Right now, I'm looking in the post-1855 era. As seems to be the case with my family, they appear briefly and then disappear! I did find the deaths for Alexander and Susan McKellar in 1907 and 1903 respectively. That is the end of that line as their only child died at 3 years of age. Alexander's brother, Donald, died in 1896 and he was not married nor did he have any children. So my great-great-half-uncles left no descendants. Susan McKellar's parents (Manus and Susan McGonagle (Brown) were deceased when she married Alexander in 1863. I've tried to search the post 1855 records for both but nothing matches and there are no pre-1855 searches for deaths. (Frustrating!!!)
Which then moves us onto Mary and Elizabeth, neither of whom seems to have registered births even though they were born somewhere between 1855 and 1860 (we've gone through this story already)!
But somewhere along the line, I have to find Alex's father, Alex Sr. who may have died at sea. There is a notation in the Greenock Telegraph (thanks to a kind person on this forum) stating that Alexander McKellar died on the Shooting Star headed for New Zealand (I don't have all my files here with me, but I think it was in the 1850's or 1860's). But I also note that there are a couple of Alexander McKellar's who lived to ripe old ages in their 70's and 80's so I guess there is a possibility there as well. Alex Sr., it would seem, was not living with his wife, Jean, starting sometime in the mid-1840's and it would seem that neither re-married although they were separated.
Somewhere along the line, after her second husband's death in the 191**s, Elizabeth emigrated to Ontario and I have her death certificate but the informant didn't even have the proper name of Elizabeth's father or mother. I know that from her second marriage with Daniel McFadyen, Elizabeth had several daughters who all came to Canada and the United States, but I can't track them down after that as I don't know where they settled or whom they married. My father and his brothers only knew one aunt when they were very young and that aunt not well at all--it would appear that my grandfather didn't get on very well with his half-sisters.
I have Mary's marriage certificate (she married James Martin in 1876 in Greenock), her appearance in the 1881 census in Totnes, Devon (where James was born), and her address in 1884 on Inverkip Street, Greenock when her mother, Jean, died. Then Mary, her husband James, and three children seem to disappear off the face of the earth. I can't find them in either the Scottish or English 1891 census or the 1901 census. I've tried to look for marriages and deaths in Renfrew and Devon being the roots of both families but there there are no Mary Martin (Gillespie) which match up in Scotland from 1881 to 1945 or later. James Martin seems to provide a whole slew of deaths over the same time period so I'm not sure how one would narrow it down.
I've tried the Free BMD in England to see if I could narrow down the death of James Martin using Totnes but again there doesn't seem to be anyone whose age fits someone born around 1855.
I've tried marriages for Mary's daughter, Jane(t) McDougall Bridget(t) Gillespie, in Scotland but again no one fits the age range (born 1875). And there are too many "James Martin" and "George Martin" to try and figure out which one might be the right one in either Renfrew or England.
I'm beginning to intensely dislike my ancestors--it is just one brick wall after another!!! And that is only line for my grandfather. I won't get started on the other line or my grandmother's side (which is English and trying to search out records in England is not nearly as easy as in Scotland).
My aunt and uncle want me to put together as much of a family tree as possible for a reunion in two years time, so I'm praying that a whole pile of brick walls will suddenly come tumbling down! [-o<
Am I missing something? Suggestions appreciated.
Allison
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JustJean
- Posts: 2520
- Joined: Sun Dec 12, 2004 12:52 am
- Location: Maine USA
Hi again Allison!
Well....I have to agree with you that perhaps you have a more difficult family than some!
After reading all that and trying to find a starting point I settled on looking at the marriage of James and Mary. Which led me directly to the England census returns where I found James living at home in 1861 in Totnes. He had an older sister Anna J. and a younger brother George F. W. (whose birth might be indexed as George Frederick William Martin in the Sept quarter of 1859 Totnes Vol 5b page 164). Also interesting to note is James has two middle names as well....F. G. Alas no birth appears likely for him or his sister but maybe the FreeBMD site doesn't have them transcribed yet? Sister Anna was born in St. Mary Church, Devonshire but both James and George are born Totnes. His mom, Mary, is born Bigbury, Devonshire.
In 1871 Mary is widowed with only James F. and George living with her. No mention of Anna so she is either dead, married, or working elsewhere.
You have the 1881 records for James and Mary and her daughter Janet and then James and George and I assume also the record for James mother and brother who are still living together in Totnes as well.
1891 shows James mother, Mary, still living age 62 but she is alone. I haven't been able to narrow up a death for her but it would be a logical thing to do as the informant may have been one of her sons. Or if not it would indicate that they were likely not nearby enough to attend to it or they were dead themselves.
Not much to go on but sometimes when the walls are high enough the only way around is to move sideways and look for a different approach.
As for the daughers of Elizabeth that all emigrated to Canada/ US. Do you have any idea what time frame they would have arrived?...If they traveled as a family or separately?....If they would have married in Scotland or after emigrating?.....First names?
That's my best shot so far.....
Best wishes
Jean
Well....I have to agree with you that perhaps you have a more difficult family than some!
After reading all that and trying to find a starting point I settled on looking at the marriage of James and Mary. Which led me directly to the England census returns where I found James living at home in 1861 in Totnes. He had an older sister Anna J. and a younger brother George F. W. (whose birth might be indexed as George Frederick William Martin in the Sept quarter of 1859 Totnes Vol 5b page 164). Also interesting to note is James has two middle names as well....F. G. Alas no birth appears likely for him or his sister but maybe the FreeBMD site doesn't have them transcribed yet? Sister Anna was born in St. Mary Church, Devonshire but both James and George are born Totnes. His mom, Mary, is born Bigbury, Devonshire.
In 1871 Mary is widowed with only James F. and George living with her. No mention of Anna so she is either dead, married, or working elsewhere.
You have the 1881 records for James and Mary and her daughter Janet and then James and George and I assume also the record for James mother and brother who are still living together in Totnes as well.
1891 shows James mother, Mary, still living age 62 but she is alone. I haven't been able to narrow up a death for her but it would be a logical thing to do as the informant may have been one of her sons. Or if not it would indicate that they were likely not nearby enough to attend to it or they were dead themselves.
Not much to go on but sometimes when the walls are high enough the only way around is to move sideways and look for a different approach.
As for the daughers of Elizabeth that all emigrated to Canada/ US. Do you have any idea what time frame they would have arrived?...If they traveled as a family or separately?....If they would have married in Scotland or after emigrating?.....First names?
That's my best shot so far.....
Best wishes
Jean
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Allison
- Posts: 41
- Joined: Wed Apr 06, 2005 11:29 pm
- Location: Essex, England
Thank you Jean for your response!
You and I must be thinking along the same lines as I checked out the 1861, 1871, 1881, and 1891 census for James' mother, Mary, with the same results as you. Mary Gillespie's husband, James Jr. was christened James Frank Gregory (same as his father). What is interesting is that there is no death for James* Martin showing up yet in the Free BMD between 1861 and 1871 in the town of Totnes. However, I'll keep looking on that one.
With respect to Elizabeth's daughters born to herself and Daniel McFadyen, from what I understand, most of them came over alone or in pairs prior to their mother emigrating (she apparently came over after Daniel died--sometime in the 191?'s or 1920's--that shouldn't be too hard to find). The daughters also married over in Canada and the US according to what I have been able to glean from my father and uncle but they don't know the spouses' names--too young.
However, one day and one step at a time. Hopefully with your suggestions and some other divinely inspired thoughts, something will come up. As things come up, I'll let the list know. This forum has been great in giving suggestions, thoughts, ideas, and leads and I have moved forward more in the past few months than in the past 15-20 years.
But I'm always willing to hear more suggestions and willing to learn!
Allison
You and I must be thinking along the same lines as I checked out the 1861, 1871, 1881, and 1891 census for James' mother, Mary, with the same results as you. Mary Gillespie's husband, James Jr. was christened James Frank Gregory (same as his father). What is interesting is that there is no death for James* Martin showing up yet in the Free BMD between 1861 and 1871 in the town of Totnes. However, I'll keep looking on that one.
With respect to Elizabeth's daughters born to herself and Daniel McFadyen, from what I understand, most of them came over alone or in pairs prior to their mother emigrating (she apparently came over after Daniel died--sometime in the 191?'s or 1920's--that shouldn't be too hard to find). The daughters also married over in Canada and the US according to what I have been able to glean from my father and uncle but they don't know the spouses' names--too young.
However, one day and one step at a time. Hopefully with your suggestions and some other divinely inspired thoughts, something will come up. As things come up, I'll let the list know. This forum has been great in giving suggestions, thoughts, ideas, and leads and I have moved forward more in the past few months than in the past 15-20 years.
But I'm always willing to hear more suggestions and willing to learn!
Allison
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janette5
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Wed Jan 25, 2006 9:14 pm
Daniel McFadyen
Hi Allison
Do you have any parents for Daniel. Recently found a daniel McFadden/McFadyen, whose first wife died abt 1913. He was aged abt 33 at the time.
His parents were John McFadyen and Catherine Trainor.
Thanks
Janette
Do you have any parents for Daniel. Recently found a daniel McFadden/McFadyen, whose first wife died abt 1913. He was aged abt 33 at the time.
His parents were John McFadyen and Catherine Trainor.
Thanks
Janette
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grannysrock
- Posts: 472
- Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2005 9:21 am
- Location: Belgium
james martin
Hi Allison
There may be more in the decade, I stopped after the first hit.
Also there is a James Frank Gregory Martin born Totnes 2nd Quarter 1856 in Totnes ref 5b 166 I think.
As I said the above is free on Ancestry just now ( I think you have to be registered but you son't have to have a subscription) - so you might like to have a look yourself - if not possible, I can look later - I have to temporarily hand the reins of the PC over to the "virtual footballer" in the family...
Best of luck
Sally
I thought I'd try out www.ancestry.co.uk 's "BETA" search of the England and Wales BMD images - ( I have no English ancestors and few English rellies - but it's free so I'm desperate to take advantage .... ) there is a James Martin died Quarterr 2 1861 Totnes I think the ref is 5B 127 , but its a bit faded....there is no death for James* Martin showing up yet in the Free BMD between 1861 and 1871 in the town of Totnes
There may be more in the decade, I stopped after the first hit.
Also there is a James Frank Gregory Martin born Totnes 2nd Quarter 1856 in Totnes ref 5b 166 I think.
As I said the above is free on Ancestry just now ( I think you have to be registered but you son't have to have a subscription) - so you might like to have a look yourself - if not possible, I can look later - I have to temporarily hand the reins of the PC over to the "virtual footballer" in the family...
Best of luck
Sally
Newhaven-DRYBURGH,NICOLL,HUNTER(+Alloa) ; Lesmahagow-MITCHELL,LAMB, BARR, BROWN,CALLAN; Comrie-MCDOUGALL, MCEWEN, MCLAREN, BRYSON; BEW - PRINGLE, FISHER,SPENCE;Edzell-MIDDLETON,DORWARD;
Edin.-JOHNSTON, MONTGOMERY;Fife-SIME, FORRESTER, WANLESS
Edin.-JOHNSTON, MONTGOMERY;Fife-SIME, FORRESTER, WANLESS
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CatrionaL
- Posts: 1519
- Joined: Fri Dec 10, 2004 11:11 pm
- Location: Scottish Borders
Re: Daniel McFadyen
Janette,janette5 wrote:Hi Allison
Do you have any parents for Daniel. Recently found a daniel McFadden/McFadyen, whose first wife died abt 1913. He was aged abt 33 at the time.
His parents were John McFadyen and Catherine Trainor.
Thanks
Janette
I noticed you joined Talking Scot today. May I take the opportunity to welcome you and wish you succesful searching.
Catriona
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misskm21
- Posts: 1
- Joined: Wed Oct 28, 2015 7:44 am
Re: Where to start looking for marriage/death certificates?.
Hello, this is post is a little late considering the date you first posted but I may have some answers for you. James Frank Gregory Martin born 10.4.1856 in Totnes Devon is my 2nd great uncle. His brother George Frederic William Martin is my 3rd great grandfather. I have little details about him just that he was born about 1859 in Totnes Devon according to newspaper articles. He emigrated to South Australia sometime before 1890 as he married married in that year to a Florence Ayliffe. They had 7 children and he lived to be 69. He was buried in Hamley Bridge Cemetery alongside his wife. I grew up in this town and can give you more details if you want.
Hope this is of interest - Karen Martin
Hope this is of interest - Karen Martin