ScotlandsPeople upgrade - new data sets

[AndrewP]

As well as the functional and cosmetic updates to ScotlandsPeople unveiled today, there are some new data sets from the Catholic Parish Records available to search:

• Banns & Marriages
• Deaths & Burials
• Others:
  • Communicants
  • Confessions
  • Confirmation
  • Seat Rents
  • Sick calls
  • Status Animarum

Full details of these, such as available dates and parishes, can be found on the ScotlandsPeople website.

All the best,

AndrewP

[paddyscar]

I saw that Andrew and I'm going to get my teeth into them very soon. What a boon!

I like the new look and the additional features; the only negative so far is that some of the lettering needs more contrast for those of us over a certain age:)

Frances

[joette]

Off to flex the plastic hope it will take the strain. [-o<

[ninatoo]

Well, the Catholic Baptisms have been there a while, but I was prompted to search again and found evidence of the baptism of my Catharine McCormack, with a birth date listed as February 13 1860 in Glasgow. But a little problem has emerged...I have never found her birth registration, jut one for a brother James, born on the above date! He never appears again, not in deaths, censuses etc.

There are a few possible reasons for this:

They were twins, and the parents accidentally only registered James but did not baptise him.....

A child of questionable gender was born??? Probably not likely since Catherine went on to become a mother....and I've heard individuals with this problem are infertile,

and the most likely:

They accidentally registered Catherine under James - a possibility since there are clerical errors on the birth registration, where the registrar entered father's occupation in the space where the child's name was, and then crossed it out.

So I am banking on the premise that a James was never born and Catherine was registered incorrectly under her father's name by her very young and illiterate mother....what do people think?

Nina

[paddyscar]

Hi Nina:

As I started reading your post, my mind leapt to the same conclusion - that it was a clerical error and likely not recognized as such by the person registering the birth because they likely couldn't read.

Sounds like the clerk was sliightly unfamiliar with the form as there was confusion with the form.

Frances

[ninatoo]

Thanks Frances...

As soon as I saw the birth date was the same I went back and looked at the registration, and I am certain it was a clerical error...or the mother misunderstood the questioning of the clerk. I did go and check to see if the birth registration on the page before James' had a twin Catherine, but no such luck.

It's a bit annoying though...the amount of money I've spent over time looking for Catherine's birth and James' death!!!! Only to realise that there never was a James after all!

Well, at least I was able to work out what happened in the end...