names

[lynne smith]

For the life of me, I cannot understand why children are given the exact forenames as their parents, it makes it inconvenient doing research, the forenames John, James, Alfred and John weave all through my husband's family. Why do people reverse their given names, their names might be Jane Mary, but they call themselves Mary Jane, it makes it confusing when researching them. Why do people call themselves forenames that don't even sound like their legal names, for instance my Sainted Mother was called Nance and her name was Annie. My not so Sainted Father was called George, and his name was Arnold. My sister's name is Clara and she is called Clare', one of my sister in laws is called Trude', yup you guessed it, her legal forename is Gertrude. It is all so confusing, but then, why am I called Lynne? - that is my second forename.

I feel so much better now, getting that all off my chest, what did I say my name was? - oh yes,

Lynne

[AndrewP]

(Many moons ago) in my primary school class, two of the girls were known by their middle names. Whenever there was a new teacher, they would call the register and use the first names, as these were the names witten there. There was much sniggering when these two had their names called by their unused first names.

All the best,

AndrewP

[carlineric]

I have a similar situation as Andrew's in my mother's family but even worse. Two of her cousins are called John Boyd Calder and John Alexander Calder one uses Boyd and the other Alec. Boyd was my maths teacher at school and it was odd hearing him refered to as Mr J B Calder over the Tannoy. The repeating of names makes this family fairly easy to research for as well as John and James I have Michael and Ebenezer. The line comes down John, Michael, John Michael ... As far as I have found out the use of Michael Calder is unique to the family from the 1780s until the 1930s.

Eric

[Hibee]

It does provide a valuable clue that you may have gone wrong on occasions. I had generations of Andrew, John, Hugh, then up pops an Arthur in the 17th century.

Turned out to be very wrong, after a great deal of study.

Hibee

[joette]

Gilbert Greer in each generation from around 1800 to the mid 1900's has steered me to the myriad off-spring of the various branches of the original Gilbert.
William Trail & William Fraser McKimmie are recurring names through that line.
My Maternal Grandpa was the youngest in his large family so there were many first born sons named "John Waddell" in honour of their Father's Father.When my my Grandparents first born arrived they waited to name him.MY Great-Grandfather rather uncharacterisely after two weeks told my Grandpa.
"Call him wee sh..... if you like just give the wean a name"
They settled on Thomas in honour of my grandpa's elder brother killed in action WW1 when my Grandpa was a boy.He had no children so the name has lived on down to my nephew with the affixed surname of our Father.So that's five generations of Thomas Waddell my Great-Uncle being called for his paternal Uncle.Who was named Thomas for his maternal grandfather Thomas Graham.So the name means a lot.
Jeannette AKA as Joette,Jinty.

[paddyscar]

Hi Lynne:

That very situation has dogged me all my married life. At my father-in-law's insistence, my husband was named after an uncle Joseph my mother-in-law didn't like. She refused to call him Joseph so they called him Paddy for his second name of Patrick.

When he worked for the postal service, he was required to use the name on his birth certificate, so everything that originates from there is Joseph Patrick, but everything else is Patrick Joseph.

A few years ago the government issued new health cards requiring the name on his birth certificate. This has caused some confusion in doctor's offices, clinics, labs and hospitals when they call out for the next patient named 'Joseph'. Just last month, when I called a doctor's office for some results, I had the assistant on a wild goose chase looking for Patrick. She finally found him by his birth date

Frances

[lynne smith]

Just to add to the sillyness of it all, I read recently that Charles and Camilla call each other by forenames that don't even resemble each others forenames.

Lynne



Ellis/Morgan/Smith/Brewer

[speleobat2]

Hi Lynne,

I've been wrestling with the same problem for a few years now with my Cadenhead relatives. My great grandmother Mary Cadenhead Munro had an older brother named James Williamson Cadenhead. He had an illegitimate son named James Cadenhead. He also had a daughter who went on to have an illegitimate son--named James Cadenhead. Then James Williamson's brother George named one of his sons--James Williamson Cadenhead!

However, there is an up side to the naming as many times people used the mother's or grandmother's maiden names as middle names for their children thus preserving them as clues for us! I've been looking for the James Cadenhead, illegitimate son of the first James Williamson Cadenhead since 2007. Just yesterday I found him on the 1881 census married to a Margaret Harper. His mother's name was Jane Petrie. When I started searching for the two children listed on the 1881 census to see if I could find them on the 1891 census since their parents seemed have disappeared up popped little Ann Petrie Harper Cadenhead--on the Australia Births Index!!! She had to be related with that name. With a little help from Alan (Currie) since my dial-up was not working well with the Queensland BMD site, we were able to confirm that James Cadenhead and Margaret Harper had moved to Australia in March of 1882. What I also found was a possible illegitimate son of James' named Alfred who was born in 1876, four years before James and Margaret were married and who made the trip to Australia and then vanished completely. No birth, no marriage, no death. If only he had been given three middle names I might have a chance of finding him too!

Carol

[margarita]

My mother in law was always known as Babs. Anyone serching for her under the name Barbara would be on a very long wild goose chase, as her real name was Edith Lydia. She was given the name Babs as she was the youngest of the four daughter and therefore "Baby" or Babs.

I'm glad I knew that before I started researching her.

Regards,

maggie

[JanPage]

CADENHEAD ancestry: I am Great great grand daughter of James Williamson Cadenhead. Ann Petrie Harper Cadenhead was older sister of my grand mother Elizabeth Grey Cadenhead (I believe her mother Margaret Cadenhead née Harper remarried a man Henry Baxter but I do not know under what circumstances she remarried). The family resided in Ipswich and then in Maryborough Qld.

I would like to hear from anyone with family connection with Cadenhead or Baxter. I believe the Baxter side of the family might have had a second hand dealing business and I'm not sure if that would have been in Maryborough or Ipswich.

Thanks for your interest. Janette Page.

janpage AT iinet DOT net DOT au.


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