Ayrshire Poor Relief; Wm and Hugh McGrace.....

[mcgrice]

I have found two poss ancestors in an Ayrshire Poor Relief database; few details, only b Ire.
Does anyone know where I might find anything further??

[DavidWW]

I have found two poss ancestors in an Ayrshire Poor Relief database; few details, only b Ire.
Does anyone know where I might find anything further??

It all depends what's in the database

If it's only a list of those resident in the poorhouse involved at a certain date, then not much, but if you are fortunate to have an ancestor for whom the original poor relief inspector's report survives, then you may well find that there is a mini life history giving the applicant's place of birth (down to the level of the Irish townland, which may well not be recorded in any other Scottish source), the names of their parents, the names of their spouse and children, sometimes also with the names of children's spouses and their kids in turn, employment details, etc., etc ........ what more could you want

A good number of these inspectors' reports survive for North Ayrshire, particularly the Ardrossan/Saltcoats/Kilwinning and Kilmarnock records.

I heard a few years ago that some records had "surfaced" relating to the Mauchline/Catrine area but haven't heard anything more since.......

Each parish, at least in the early decades of government sponsored poor relief in 1845 and later, had it's own poor relief organisation and inspector.

However, most parishes outside the cities didn't have their own poorhouse. Instead, they got together with neighbouring parishes and formed a "combination", - in Ayshire, the Cunninghame Combination with the poorhouse in Irvine, the Kyle Combination in Ayr, and the Maybole combination. (Every possible thanks to the local FHS volunteers who have invested considerable time and effort in this indexing effort, as well as for the cooperation of the local archives involved )

In any case, unlike in England, the majority of Scots receiving poor relief were not (required to be) resident in the poorhouse - termed "in-relief" in Scotland, - but instead stayed at home, and received "out-relief", either in the form of cash or food.

David

[Caroline]

I have found two poss ancestors in an Ayrshire Poor Relief database; few details, only b Ire.
Does anyone know where I might find anything further??

If you go to http://www.ayrshirearchives.org.uk you will find details of the poor relief records in Ayrshire that they have and a contact e-mail address.

Hopefully they'll have details of your relatives applications.

Caroline
JJ