Missing father - Robert Glass

[maple23]

I have found the marriage certificate of my g/gf - William Glass married Mary Shiels Moffat on 2/12/1892 in East Lothian. On the certificate it states his father as Robert Glass (deceased), mother Isabella Kerr, previously Glass, maiden Clark. I cannot find anything to suggest that Isabella married Robert and had a son called William. I have found a birth certificate of a William Glass born illegitimately in 1866 to an Isabella Glass but then nothing more. Any ideas where I could be going wrong here?

Thanks

[emanday]

Hi maple23,

The 1866 BC you found for William - Did it mention that Isabella's husband Robert Glass was either dead or otherwise gone? Was she even shown as married at all?

The reason I ask is that, if William was illegitimate and Robert was deceased/gone, he would actually have been registered as William Clark, that being his mother's maiden name. That leads me to wonder if the DC you found is your William at all.

Have you looked for William and Mary on the 1901 census? Hopefully that will give his place of birth and make finding his BC a wee bit easier to find.

Assuming the BC you found isn't him at all...

What age is given for him on his MC? Between that age and the one shown on the 1901 census you should be able to get a fair idea of when he was born. If you are lucky and his birth was in the right period, it may give you his parents date and place of marriage.

Sorry, it's late and I'm typing as I think, so if you want me to clarify anything I have just garbled please feel free to ask

[SarahND]

Hello,
I see while I was typing my reply, a sleepy Mary managed to post first Mary! It's past your bedtime!!! Okay, I'm on an earlier time zone, so will ask some of the same questions as Mary and then make some of the same comments Maybe the combination of the two will make more sense This is what I wrote:

I wouldn't say you were "going wrong," but you might be led astray! By that I mean maybe all the information on the marriage cert wasn't strictly correct. It wouldn't be the first time! If you give us some more information, maybe we can figure this out.

Where was William born? I've been trying to find him in 1871, but there are too many William Glasses. Only one, however, has an Isabella in the household also. This one is probably not the right one, or else the relationships are not noted correctly. If Isabella were the daughter-in-law instead of the daughter... Or maybe William is Isabella's son, and the Robert responsible is not there. She just happens to also have a brother Robert. The children are listed in descending order of age, then the grandchildren in the same way. But nothing indicates whose children the 3 grandchildren are...

1871
Blackburn, Cockburnspath, Berwickshire
Richard Glass, 55, head, born Spott, Haddingtonshire, Ag Lab
Agnes Glass, 51, wife, born Buncle, Berwickshire
Isabella Glass, 30, daughter, born Coldingham, Berwickshire, Out Door Servt
Robert Glass, 21, son, born Coldingham, Berwickshire, Ag Lab
Alexander Glass, 19, son, born Oldhamstocks, Haddington, Ag Lab
William Glass, 16, son, born CO Path, Berwickshire, Ag Lab
Richard Glass, 8, son, born CO Path, Berwickshire, Scholar
Catherine Glass, 9, granddaughter, born CO Path, Bersickshire, Scholar
William Glass, 4, grandson, born Oldhamstocks, Haddington
Robert Glass, 1, grandson, born CO Path, Berwickshire

If you could give us the location of William's birth, his father's occupation (if it is given on the marriage cert), the location of the marriage and William's occupation... then we will try to work backwards and figure out what was going on. It may well be that Isabella's maiden surname was Glass, since (at least in my experience) if a child was illegitimate and the father not mentioned, then that child was given the surname of the mother. I hope we can figure this out for you

All the best,
Sarah

[eilthireach]

One of my cousins (3rd cousins) married into these Glasses, so I recognised the names. I know that you will find it very useful to look at the website of Roger and Lisa Moffat ... http://roger.lisaandroger.com and do a search for William Glass ...

[emanday]

Hi eilthireach,

Wow! That link looks brilliant for maple23. Great site!

[emanday]

Maybe the combination of the two will make more sense

You're kidding I've just re-read my post and I'm not sure I understand it now

Note to self: Go back to typing posts in Notebook first and read them through BEFORE posting! (especially in the wee sma hours!)

[SarahND]

Hi maple23,
I have seen the site that eilthireach mentioned before, as the author is a frequent contributor to the Reunion family tree software users forum. I see he has integrated many of the cool features of the software into his website-- wow! You can calculate the relationship between any two people, find anyone associated with a given place, etc. Nice work, Roger!

It looks as though he did not find William's birth, however, so you have something to offer him also. I wonder where the "Clark" surname comes into the mix? Could that have been his father's surname? Food for thought...
All the best,
Sarah

[DavidWW]

What a fascinating little puzzle .................

Follow me, but you'll need to concentrate

Firstly, I wanty to find out something more about William.

I want to find his death register entry, but to do that I'll look first for that for his wife, since that's easier with the crosscheck surname search, and it also narrows down the range of years to search.

Mary died aged 77, in 1951, the widow of William GLASS, Ploughman.

That leads us quickly to William's death, aged 69, in 1935, both deaths in East Lothian parishes. There's no father's name, just the mother's name as Isabella GLASS.

Now let's find the family in the 1901 census, there being an obvious matching one in Gladsmuir in East Lothian, - validate that it is the correct family by checking the birth register entry for one of the kids, showing wife Mary's maiden name correctly as MOFFAT.

William's place of birth is shown as the parish of Cockburnspath in the county of Berwick.

From the various ages reports it looks very likely that William was born 1865 to 1867, so go looking. There's nothing in Cockburnspath, but the neighbouring parish just over the county line in East Lothian is Oldhamstock, where there is the birth of Willim, no father's name, mother Isabella GLASS.

There's also an RCE referring to a paternity action, - what's the betting that the father was a Mr CLARK

Now that we're reasonably sure that Isabella's maiden name was GLASS let's find her marriage to Mr KERR, which is easily located in yet another East Lothian parish, showing her as a 36 year old spinster, parents Richard and Agnes GLASS MS MOFFAT (that surname again!)

www.familysearch.org provides ............

Father: Richard Glass, Mother: Agnes Moffat

ISABELLA GLASS - International Genealogical Index
Gender: Female Christening: 15 JUL 1841 Coldingham, Berwick, Scotland

PEDDIE_ GLASS - International Genealogical Index
Gender: Female Birth: 31 DEC 1842 Chirnside, Berwick, Scotland

RICHARD GLASS - International Genealogical Index
Gender: Male Birth: 04 FEB 1859 Cockburnspath, Berwick, Scotland

ELIZA GLASS - International Genealogical Index
Gender: Female Birth: 12 APR 1860 Cockburnspath, Berwick, Scotland

RICHARD GLASS - International Genealogical Index
Gender: Male Birth: 10 OCT 1862 Cockburnspath, Berwick, Scotland

...which all fits together with the 1871 census entry from SarahND ........

Blackburn, Cockburnspath, Berwickshire
Richard Glass, 55, head, born Spott, Haddingtonshire, Ag Lab
Agnes Glass, 51, wife, born Buncle, Berwickshire
Isabella Glass, 30, daughter, born Coldingham, Berwickshire, Out Door Servt
Robert Glass, 21, son, born Coldingham, Berwickshire, Ag Lab
Alexander Glass, 19, son, born Oldhamstocks, Haddington, Ag Lab
William Glass, 16, son, born CO Path, Berwickshire, Ag Lab
Richard Glass, 8, son, born CO Path, Berwickshire, Scholar
Catherine Glass, 9, granddaughter, born CO Path, Bersickshire, Scholar
William Glass, 4, grandson, born Oldhamstocks, Haddington
Robert Glass, 1, grandson, born CO Path, Berwickshire

Note wee William's age and place of birth.

And this all fits together very nicely with the 1881 census entry from the website at ... http://roger.lisaandroger.com ..............

Dwelling: CottageCensus Place: Dirleton, Haddington
GRO Ref Volume 705 EnumDist 2 Page 6
Thomas KERR M 67 M Coldingham, Berwick, Scotland Head Occ: Agricultural Labourer
Isabella KERR M 37 F Coldingham, Berwick, Scotland Wife
William GLASS (KERR) 15 M Old Hamstocks, Haddington
Step Son Occ: Agricultural Labourer
Robert GLASS (KERR) 13 M Cockburns Path, Haddington
Rel: Step Son Occ: Scholar
Isabella GLASS (KERR) 8 F Cockburns Path, Haddington
Step Daur Occ: Scholar
George KERR 4 M Cockburns Path, Haddington, Scotland Rel: Son

I should really check that this is "our" Isabella by looking at the birth register entry for wee George, but the three stepkids "give the game away".

BTW, as relationship is to the Head of the Household Thomas, the stepkids must belong to Isabella. Again note William's place of birth.

Sooo...... likely scenario, - Isabella had three kids "out of wedlock" - had there been an irregular marriage it's likely altho' not 100% certain that the father and mother would have been shown on the birth register entries.

Finally, let's have a look for the birth register entries for wee Robert and Isabella; and both are where they should be, both illegitimate, no father's name, no RCE, except that wee Isabella's age in 1881 is a wee bit out.

It could well be that the first place that William recalls is Cockburnspath where his two younger siblings were born, hence his 1901 census entry ..........

David

[SarahND]

Nice work, David! I'm curious to find out what that RCE says...
Another side note that puzzled me last night: In the 1861 census, Isabella's sister Peddie's birthplace is, according to ancestry OCR, Chernade From Birth, Berwicksh

I was wondering what it meant to be Chernade From Birth Some sort of hereditary condition? Then the birth record you give above shows that she was born in Chirnside. So... she was Chirnside from birth Whatever
Regards,
Sarah

[emanday]

Ma heid hurts David, but I'm trying to concentrate

So you're saying that when William Glass married Mary Shiels Moffat and gave his mother's maiden name as Clark, he made a mistake?