Donald Crisp, actor. Scots or English?

[maddymoss]

During a lighthearted conversation about old films the name of Donald Crisp (How Green was my Valley, Lassie, etc.) came up. All thought of him as Scots but were somewhat surprised some sites on the internet had him as being born in Bow, London on 27 Jul 1882, while others in Aberfeldy two years earlier in 1880. Even online encyclopaedias Wikipedia and Answers.com disagreed. A brief look on Scotlandspeople gave no clues.

It's of no great importance, just curious.

Jim

[LesleyB]

hi Jim
Working from Wikipedia (having checked there are no Crisps on SP for the period)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Crisp

Donald Crisp was born George William Crisp in London, at the family home in Bow (historically known as Stratford) on July 27, 1882.

- then going to free BMD, I think this might be your man:

Births Sep Quarter 1882
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Crisp George Morpeth 10b 354
Crisp George Kettering 3b 191
Crisp George Daniel Thetford 4b 384
Crisp George William Barnsley 9c 161
Crisp George William Poplar 1c 594
Crisp George William G Berwick 10b 408

- then checking Poplar Registration District: (from Genuki) http://www.fhsc.org.uk/genuki/reg/districts/poplar.html

• Registration County : London (1837-1965); Greater London (1965).
  Created : 1.7.1837.
  Abolished : 1.1.1966 (succeeded by Poplar & Bethmal Green district).
  Sub-districts : Bow; Bow & Bromley; Bromley; Poplar.
  GRO volumes : II (1837-51); 1c (1852-1946); 5D (1946-65).

Seems to all link up. But the only way to know for sure would maybe be to order his birth cert, then find his death and compare them!! Or try the 1891 census, maybe!
Grave seems to state 1882 as year of birth too.
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cg ... id=8529&pt

Best wishes
Lesley

[paddyscar]

Hi Jim:

Looks like LesleyB and I have had some fun with this one!

Electric Scotland states that he is a Scot born 1880 July 27. England is named on Wikpedia and the International Movie Data Base http://us.imdb.com. IMDB also gives a biography for him.

Born to: James and Elizabeth Crisp
Given name: George William Crisp
Where: Family home in Bow, London
Date of Birth: not given only that mother registered him 4th Sep 1882.
Siblings: Elizabeth, Ann, Alice (aka Loiusa), Eliza, James, John and Mark.

This bio says that he applied for US Social Security card 16th February 1937 giving N Vista Street Hollywood California as his address and Warner Brothers Pictures, Burbank, California as employer.

In the US Social Security death index on Ancestry.com a likely entry is:

Name: DONALD CRISP
Birth: 27 Jul 1882
Death: May 1974 91102
Last Residence: (Pasadena, Los Angeles, CA)
Last Benefit Issued: (none specified)
SSN: 565-14-5185
Issued: California

As I've no membership, can't verify that link any further.

The Globe & Mail newspaper (Toronto, Canada) has a death announcement in the Tuesday, May 28, 1974 issue that said he died on Saturday, which would have been May 25.

It says he died in suburban Los Angeles hospital of unspecified causes, but his health had been failing after several strokes in recent times.
It says that he was Scottish born.

There is also a record on the Ellis Island site for George William Crisp age 39, a producer who claimed London as home and British as his Nationality, but the age doesn't match.

So, yer still nae firther aheid!?

Frances

[Tom-W]

There was a bit of a fuss about this in the papers a few years back but this is the only article I could find on the web.

http://www.netribution.co.uk/news/north ... story.html

Tom

[maddymoss]

Ah well, it looks as if Donald was indeed a Londoner. It certainly makes a wee change for an Englishman to adopt a Scots accent rather than the other way around. I think for most people his persona will always be a Scotsman.
David Niven, a Londoner, also liked to portray himself as a Scot born in Kirriemuir.

Jim