Thursday 30 August 2012

LornaGenie

Those that had access to my prior LornaGenie website may be pleased/indifferent to know that it is returning, piece by piece.
There will continue to be open and restricted pages - the distinction primarily being because the content behind a logon is purely notes, rather than fully researched webpages,  on assorted topics either of interest to me, or the subject of a presentation, or a WEA course.
The notes on the latter two are intended to supplement what was presented, and to prevent a paper war.
I'm taking the opportunity to rationalise some of my other bits and bobs on the web, so the main LornaGenie site will include/already includes some of the non family related parts of my Research website

Wednesday 29 August 2012

What about Jasper?

The Morebattle RICHARDSONs continue to spread their tentacles.
Something drew me to a RICHARDSON/CAIRNS headstone at Denholm and I decided to investigate a little further.
Sure enough, John RICHARDSON led me back to Morebattle, albeit via Selkirk (his birthplace) and Ancrum (father Jasper's), Jasper's parents being John RICHARDSON and Janet INGLES or INGRAM, depending on which records you believe, or whether or not John remarried to a Janet of the same age and birthplace but a different surname.
John being shown as born Morebattle or Eckford, again depending on which records you believe, the son of Jasper RICHARDSON & Mary HOPE.
The family of Thomas and Cecilia (YOUNG) RICHARDSON will be added to my RICHARDSON page. They do appear to have more connections to Southdean than to Morebattle, but inter-relate to several other families, so my research may as well show up somewhere!

Saturday 25 August 2012

Face recognition

Had to chuckle over the recent publicity about Facebook using face recognition to identify people.
Miaow?
My avatar on most public systems is one or other of my current or prior cats, or a mosaic of one of them that graces my backyard.



Thursday 23 August 2012

And Henry too?

The growing RICHARDSON page has been updated to include the family of Henry and Ann (PRESTON) RICHARDSON, where Henry appears to track back to James RICHARDSON & Isabel PRINGLE of Over Roxburgh.
Henry and Ann were also eschewing the established curch for the Morebattle Gateshaw sessions around the same time as James and Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON, and had emigrated to Quebec by 1832, as had James and Christian (OUTERSON) RICHARDSON, which James may, or may not, be one and the same.

Usual plea - any direct male RICHARDSON of Henry and Ann out there interested enough in their family history who would be willing to join the RICHARDSON DNA project to see if there's a match to John and Ralph?

Also added to the page is a timeline of relevant events to the above RICHARDSON families against the lifespans of some of the main characters. Suggestions of significant events to be added welcome.

With all this RICHARDSON activity, especially the repeating use of Andrew as a family name, and the extension from Morebattle to Roxburgh, the family of Andrew and Mary (WATSON) RICHARDSON also came back into view. They've been lurking in my database LornaPotential for many years as this tree inter-connects many times over with assorted lines in mine. So a brief descendant list for them as been added as well - the connection to the above being Roxburgh rather than Morebattle however, with Crailing thrown in.

Sunday 19 August 2012

Cracked it!

Patience, perseverance, and not believing what we've been told - or at least interpreting it less literally, given that the Sth side of the St Lawrence river would have been/is rather close to St Lawrence County in New York State.
Adam Brown RICHARDSON's census data all indicated he was born in New York around 1835.
The recent flurry of activity trying to connect him to the Bermuda RICHARDSON family that turned out to be that of James and Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON was inconclusive, but there is a growing body of circumstantial evidence of a connection - my theory being that James remarried, to Christian OUTERSON.
Who has finally been found to be Adam's mother.
A very big thank you to those behind the indexes on the Huntingdon County and the Seigniories of Chateauguay and Beauharnois website.
I was actually looking for anything that provided evidence for the age of James, Christian's husband, that may add even more fuel to my theory of this being his second marriage, and had turned my attention to Quebec, given that their son Robert's bio stated that he had emigrated at age 6 to Quebec, and taken part in the Patriot War of Canada at aged 16-17.
Still pinning my hopes on a heads of household census of 1841 for Chateauguay, but as there's also a James shown as being buried in 1840, I'm not holding my breath.
 

Wednesday 15 August 2012

WorldConnect updated

A fresh copy of the WorldConnect database LornaHenderson, the online tree of BDM data on the rellies no longer with us, and their connections,  has been uploaded.
Last updated in April, so a few months of updates.
Although not proven to be a connection, some of the Morebattle RICHARDSON research from the last few days has also been included in the hope of flushing some descendants out of the woodwork.

While onto updates, database LornaPotential has also had a rather overdue review.
Several people have been shifted into the above Lorna Henderson database as they are now either know to be relations, or connect to people who are, others have been dropped off. There's more that can be reviewed given the timespan since last review (last updated March 2010!), and the fact that 50 of them are "orphans", ie not connected to anyone else in the database, but pegged as of potential interest, mostly as possible sightings of one or other of the rellies.

I'm almost convinced

But have I convinced anyone else?
Some additional circumstantial evidence for the theory of the the two James families, that of James and Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON, and that of James & Christian (OUTERSON) RICHARDSON being one and the same James:
-  George (mother MABON) also emigrated to the States and is to be found in Omro, Winnebago, Wisconsin in 1860 three census pages before his presumed step-brother Robert who has his mother Christian (OUTERSON) living with him.
- George 's wife is Margaret MELDRUM
- David, George's assumed step brother names his daughter Ella Meldrum RICHARDSON
- a snippet view of "New Brunswick Lineages" on google books brought to my attention by John shows James as 1770 (Edinburgh) -1850 (Lower Canada) - which age makes it highly likely that he remarried (Christian was born around 1796)
So, just maybe John's Adam, born 1835 New York, belongs to James and Christian? This is only 3 years after their last known Scottish son was born.
All pure speculation of course, but even though there isn't, yet, a proven dna signature for James' line(s), we do still have a Bermuda, and a New York connection.

Love to hear from any direct male line RICHARDSON descendants of the above families who might like to explore this further.

Sunday 12 August 2012

Speculation rife

Couldn't quite give up on the RICHARDSONs.
Went back to my 2008 notes from the Morebattle Gateshaw session records to see if there might be a re-marriage of the widowed James, whose wife Margaret MABON had died in childbirth in 1812.
Although 8 years seems a little too long to wait to get a mother to his bairns, the family of James and Christian (OUTERSON) RICHARDSON came back into view. There's nothing on the 1820 Eckford marriage entry that indicates James was a widower, just that he was from Morebattle.
I'd never managed to find traces of them in Scottish censuses.
Spurred on by reminding myself that they had a son named Archibald Moffat RICHARDSON (Morebattle, 1832), I widened the net to the States.
An Archibald Moffat name is just too much of a coincidence given the Bermuda James' wife Mary MOFFATT, and her father Archibald MOFFATT.

Son Robert pops up in Winnebago Co., Wisconsin by 1850, stating he was born in Canada! Later censuses correct that back to Scotland, with 1900 adding an emigration date of 1841, and the 1860 having (mother assumed) Christy RICHARDSON, aged 64, born Scotland with the family.
His two subsequent remarriage indexes, between them, show his parents as James RICHARDSON and Christiana "OTTASUS" !
The mistranscriptions of OUTERSON abound, but that one takes the cake.

With the hint of Canada being somehow significant the net got wider.
Up popped son Andrew, with (assumed mother) Christian in the Quebec household in 1881.
Andrew thought he had emigrated in 1837.
One family tree has decided that Christian was born in Yorkshire (census records both indicated Scotland) - but as the Bermuda James married and had one child in Leeds, this may have been a bit of lingering family misinformation?

Another tree claims David for the James/Christian family but I haven't yet verified that one, other than yes, he's the right age, and of more than passing interest, is to be found in Oneida county, New York in one census - where Thomas of Bermuda settled. Well, the same county anyway, Thomas was at Trenton, David at Deerfield - which appear to be about 12 miles apart.

Just maybe, one day we'll find that John's Adam, born 1835 in New York, does belong to James of Morebattle after all, but the father not the son?  He's only 3 years after Archibald Moffat RICHARDSON was born in Morebattle to Christian.


Saturday 11 August 2012

The difference an s makes

Back to the drawing board.
Having gone from the Bermuda Triangle to the Pirates of the Caribbean*, John has reviewed the information that led us to examine the family of James & Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON of Morebattle, descendants in Bermuda, Canada and the States - at least.

His relationship has been relegated to one by marriage as it was the granddaughter of James RICHARDSON, tailor in Bermuda, that was the connection, not her husband William Meade RICHARDSON, sometime photographer of Bermuda, later of Wisconsin (Mrs W M RICHARDSON, not Mr W M RICHARDSON).

However, Ralph's and my interest remain because of the Morebattle Gateshaw session connection.

The newly uploaded Richardson page on my family tree pages has been updated to reflect this change.

* The Pirates reference being that James' daughter Catherine Haddon Moffatt RICHARDSON married Hezekiah FRITH, grandson of the pirate.

Friday 10 August 2012

RICHARDSONs

Spurred on by the recent RICHARDSON finding, the RICHARDSONs have been promoted to having a page of their own on my main webpages
It includes the chart of William RICHARDSON of Pringlestead's descendants that was already present, but William is now joined by charts of the families of James and Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON and William, the dancing master, or at least some of them.
Not all of the descendants found in the records have been entered.
Reviewing my notes from the Morebattle Gateshaw Session records I can spot several other RICHARDSON families that I noted in passing.  These will now get a closer scrutiny!

Tuesday 7 August 2012

Bermuda!

Some time ago we found a dna match between Ralph and John RICHARDSON.
John's family knowledge started in New York with the birth of an Adam in 1835, but without any knowledge of his parents.
John has been back in touch, having found a snippet that indicates Adam father was a James, tailor, who emigrated to Bermuda with a brother (also a tailor, unnamed, but probably Thomas as his Oneida death is reported in a Bermuda paper and states the relationship to James ).

So, the prior suggestion that his family might be Adam and Margaret (BROWN) RICHARDSON has taken a new turn of events.

James' 1879 obit. brings in a brother John of North Georgetown, and a sister Mrs Samuel MOFFAT of Beechridge, (Beauharnais, Quebec), which most definitely leads to the family of James RICHARDSON & Margaret MABON of Morebattle.
When reading the Gateshaw Session records I had noted this family as being of potential interest, so it just goes to show that all little snippets squirrelled away usually come in handy sooner or later!

John is now on a hunt to definitively link his Adam to James, but there is indeed circumstantial evidence in that he did know that Adam's three sons had a photography studio in Bermuda before returning to their birthplace of Wisconsin.
And I've found that Thomas, a tailor, died 1880 in Oneida, NY, had a son William Thomas, or Thomas William, born Bermuda around 1850, who was a photographer.

Investigations proceed. 

Friday 3 August 2012

The value of contacts

Love it when people get in touch.
Makes me review areas of the database that haven't been touched for quite some time.

The HENDERSON descendant chart has been updated to include a few more of the descendants of Margaret McGREGOR nee HENDERSON, the HEIGHTs of Nova Scotia and Connecticut ++.
Thank you Roger for contacting me because of a 2007 post to see if I was still interested in his grandparents - Alden Elkiney HEIGHT and Christine Addison McGREGOR.
Most definitely still interested, look forward to some updates.

As the Recent Changes index shows the family of David & Jane (HERD) FAIRBAIRN has also been updated as a result of the earlier mentioned contact.  David's page has been tweaked to include his naturalization, and land holdings in Wisconsin from the now more readily available information, and Robert Herd FAIRBAIRN's  family has been expanded thanks to Veronica.