WHO LIVED THERE THEN?

[wini]

I have an address in Skye I used to visit as a small child. WW2 or there abouts.
They were relatives of my Mother, who although she was born in Glasgow her Maternal side of the family came from Skye.
If I could find out their name it might help me get a bit further.
Where should I start looking?

wini

[LesleyB]

Hi Wini
I wonder if you could tap into some local knowledge - the local PO maybe? (there are several POs on Skye, see those found below, so it would depend which area) With any luck, there might still be folk around who remember.

Breakish Post Office
Telephone: 01471 822665
Address: Breakish, Isle of Skye, IV42 8PY

Broadford Post Office
Telephone: 01471 822201
Address: Broadford Delivery Office, Broadford, Isle of Skye, IV49 9AB

Isle Ornsay Sub Post Office
Telephone: 01471 833230
Address: Isle Ornsay, Isle of Skye, IV43 8QU

Portree Post Office
Telephone: 01478 612533
Address: 4 Wentworth St, Portree, IV51 9EJ

Bernisdale
Telephone: 01470 582419
Address: 2, Suladale, Portree, IV51 9PA

Edinbane Post Office
Telephone: 01470 582261
Address: Edinbane, Portree, IV51 9PW

..and there are quite a few more, too many to list, on http://www.near.co.uk/


Best wishes
Lesley

[wini]

Good idea Lesley.
I'll try that

wini

[David Flint]

Hi Wini,
If you haven't done so don't forget to write to the address you already have in case they know something. When I wanted to trace relatives in Canada I wrote to an address where my grandmother stayed in 1938. The present owner's paper-girl remembered her grandmother saying that she used to live in that house and the letter was passed on to her - she was only a little girl when my grandmother stayed with her parents. She provided me with a full family tree of the Canadian relatives.
David Flint

[wini]

Thank you David,
That is an excellent idea.
I will do that NOW.

wini

[Malcolm]

Hello Wini
I was about to suggest that you write to the address you have, but I see that David got to you first. If you do decide to write, I suggest you include a stamped addressed envelope and that you write your own return address on the back of the outward envelope as well. Sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn’t.
Lesley’s suggestion is good but if you were to make contact with a local post or sorting office you may find the staff unwilling to reveal the information you want. I’m not an expert at this work but it’s something I have tried myself only to be confronted with a wall of bureaucracy. It’s got something to do with privacy or data protection acts. However, it’s worth a try.
There is something else that you might like to try. If you go to www.b4usearch.com you will come across a free search system using electoral roll information. Normally this would require you to enter a surname together with a place name. From what I read in your original post, you only have a place. To get round this you could enter a name likely to be fairly common on the Isle of Skye. Not so common as to make your search too big but big enough to cover a wide range of addresses. If you enter Macleod for example you will find upwards of three hundred names. Now all you have to do is click on “view” against each name until you find a Macleod living on your road. This might take a few minutes or up to half an hour and a satisfactory conclusion is not certain, but it’s worth a try.
You could try other names. When you do locate a named person on the road in the town or village known to you, click on “search neighbours” This will reveal all the residents living local to your chosen Macleod together with house numbers, post codes, telephone numbers and names of children, if any. It’s surprising what one can discover about one’s neighbours in this way. I learnt that one of mine was once something in the theatre which explains how my daughter acquired an item of clothing once belonging to Judi Dench.
All of this might seem a bit long winded but I think it’s better writing to someone by name if you can rather than to “the occupant”.
Best Wishes
Malcolm

[LesleyB]

Hi Wini
Another thought - if they owned the property you should be able to find out who owned the property at a given date from Registers of Scotland http://www.ros.gov.uk/ for a small fee. This would also give you some indication of when they purchased it and when they sold it. Will not work if they rented the house, or were sharing the house with the owner, of course...

Best wishes
Lesley

[wini]

Thanks Lesley & Malcolm,
I will try both these sites, unfortunately Malcolm I sent off a letter To the Occupants before I read your posting. I did however enclose a stamped envelope and put my name & address on the back.
It's amazing the information you people come up with

Thqnks again
wini

[joette]

I thought I would try out Malcolms link for myself & thought I will try a name location I know to see what happens so typed in Scott/Dalmuir & came up with a link for deaths reg in Kitchener Ontario 1999-2001!
Somebody on it was born in Dalmuir & I suppose that's how that happened but as I am computer dumb I also was astounded that so much recent personal info should be out there!

[LesleyB]

Hi
Yes, I had a play about with it too - scary stuff!

best wishes
Lesley