How many to go: Helen SINTON mtDNA update

Further research into descendants of Helen WIGHT nee SINTON, and a resulting update to WikiTree for her daughters' families in particular has extended the chart of those carrying Helen's mitochondrial DNA.
Unfortunately, it looks to be a rather short list of living candidates, and with at least one branch apparently in Sth Africa and another in Portugal, information is a little harder to come by. 

Would love to hear from:

• any descendants of Jane Wight BECKINGHAM nee McGREGOR, although indications are there's only one daughter, unmarried at age 30 when travelling to/from the UK in 1960.
• any descendants of Margaret Scott NORTH nee CROWDEN, born Edinburgh, but apparently marrying and living in Lisbon, Portugal in the 1950s
• any descendants of Isabella Wight SCOTT nee BELL, who married George Gideon SCOTT in 1936 at Innerleithen. 
• any living family for Helen Euphemia Leckie BROWN nee SOUTAR? 

The search might have to go back another generation and down the mtDNA candidates from Jane WIGHT, which might actually be easier.
Surely at least one of the Jane SINTON/James TELFER/TELFORD branch will have a living mtDNA descendant in Australia?

Love to hear from you if you can help in this quest.

Traps for not so young players

Still digging around in the family of Donald Cowper HENDERSON & Margaret BROWN.
Back in 2006 I'd found an ancestral file entry for the family showing they had a son James born about 1882 in Scotland, married to Della HAUCK - which family I'd never been able to validate, coming or going to/from Scotland to California, marrying, dying, nothing.
But I did have a brother in the family named Hinckley who married a Della someone.
For the latter I had at least found some evidence in records, including the "perfect" speicimen his father, the registrar, thought he was in his WWI draft registration below.

Think I've cracked that one.
James supposedly born 1882 Scotland turns out to be James Cowper HENDERSON, born Hinckley Stn, San Bernadino County, California in 1896, on exactly the same day as the above Hinckley always uses, with the same parents.
Haven't yet figured out who his supposed child is and reconciled the conflicting marriage information between census and military records.


The Californian branch adds in a few new names: KLEINSCHMIDT, McDONALD, BOGGS, FAYLE, EARLE, SMITH, GOLDING, TRAPNELL to add to those already there - ALLAN, HAWLEY, MILLER, CRAWFORD.

The descendant chart on the HENDERSON page  has been updated to reflect current status.

SINTON twigs

Email from Dave greeted me this morning, researching Archibald Douglas TURNBULL (Jnr).
Did I know his wife's name? All he had was BROWN and couldn't find a marriage in England.
He was one step ahead of me, I didn't even have Archibald married.
I ended the day a few steps ahead - they married in Edinburgh, presumably because Mary Grace BROWN was working at Fleur, Coldingham at the time, even though she was Northumberland born and bred.
No idea if Mary is any connection to her husband's grandmother Jessie Douglas Carmichael BROWN, with or without an E, daughter of David BROWN(E) watchmaker born Edinburgh.

The SINTON descendant chart these TURNBULLs belong to has been updated with the above and one or two other connected dates, including that for the above Archibald's grandfather's 1934 death as there was a probate indexed in 1934 for Thomas Wilson TURNBULL of the right place, wife and children.
Some trees seem to claim this Thomas Wilson T. as the father of an Archibald Lancelot TURNBULL and have him dying in 1913 in Linlithgow, which date and/or place cannot be verified.

Fewer orphans

I'm in the process of checking another update to my WorldConnect database LornaHenderson.

Part of that check is to see if I can connect a few of the "orphaned" people in my database that are known to be related, but I've no idea how.  They've usually been found because there were "grandchild of xxx" in a census, or informant for a BDM etc.

This time round I've placed:
- Thomas BROWN, informant for the death of his brother-in-law Alexander LIDDLE in 1926 (he was married to Agnes WIGHTMAN, sister of Alexander's wife Jessie).
- Maggie P  and John P AINSLIE, who probably show up as HALL at the moment, given as part of this check I realised I'd recorded them inaccurately from the 1891 census. According to the 1901 census they belong to Euphemia AINSLIE or HALL, as they appear on that census as step children to Euphemia's husband Peter RIDDELL
But I gave up, again, on identifying which METHERELL married a T C JENKINS some time before 1923 and was living in Philadelphia - at least according to the emigration records for her brother Marshall METHERELL.
Several of his sisters are now more fully identified, with husbands and children as a result, so some progress, with names such as DONEY,  HAM and ROGERS, being added to the tree.

At this rate of progress, could be a while before the updates arrive.

25th: How many POVOAS wives? An explosive mix

Cousin Harry shared a certificate with me as he thought I'd be interested in the FAIRBAIRN on it (as well as one of our mutual WIGHTs).
After processing it I checked the third birth on the page and realised that is was for another of our WIGHT relations, the birth of Elizabeth Jane WHITSON, dtr of Elizabeth WIGHT.
I already knew that her mother had died in childbirth with Elizabeth, and that she was brought up by her aunt, Margaret SOUTAR nee WIGHT, and went by the surname SOUTAR as a result.
However, I'd never figured out what happened to her after her marriage to David McLaren PAUL, so thought it time to have another look around.
I still cannot, as yet, find Elizabeth's death, but have now found David's, which was a bit of a surprise.
The informant for his death (in Glasgow) being his "sister-in-law" Helen E L BROWN of Edinburgh. This was the same Helen who was witness to David's marriage to Elizaabeth WHITSON or SOUTAR, her sister by adoption. Which all seemed fit and proper, and understandable enough.
Then I further investigated the scribble for David's wives and realised that the second, which I'd skipped over on first reading, was an Ivy Elsie POVOAS or SOUTAR.
Way too much of a coincidence that Ivy Elsie was a POVOAS, as Helen E L BROWN nee SOUTARs brother Charles William SOUTAR had married a Helen POVOAS, or so his death notice in the Scotsman had told me.
I'd never found hide nor hair of the existence of a Helen POVOAS, anywhere, although there was at least one family of them in Hackney, but no Helen.
Spurred on by this, and the more general availability of records on the internet these days, I have now found Charles' marriage to Ivy Elsie POVOAS (Manchester, 1927).
So Helen BROWN nee SOUTAR was sister-in-law twice over.
Interested to note that David McLaren PAUL's occupation of technical chemist (as per his 1916 marriage cert.) was translated somewhat more fully in the now available 1911 census.
It gives him as a technical chemist, but adds he was a worker for "explosives manufact."

New York RICHARDSONs?

Ralph's dna results arrived at last, and show a 34/37 match with a descendant of an Adam RICHARDSON, born 1835 New York of Scottish parents (ie rather distant, but definitely worth investigating).
Hardly a conclusive match, and certainly no immediate candidates spring to mind, but given Adam had a middle name of BROWN, just possibly he's a descendant of this family in my LornaPotential database: Adam and Margaret (BROWN) RICHARDSON, married 1788 Hawick, ROX.
I had researched them for possible connections to "our" RICHARDSONs because both families were from the Borders, and had ended up in Edinburgh, one in Lauriston Gardens, the other in Lauriston Terrace (I've not found out how close these streets are).
If there are any male RICHARDSON descendants of Adam and Margaret out there willing to test this theory out further, we'd love to hear from you.

Also decided to help out by joining the indexing project at FamilySearch.
Least I can do for all the help they've given the genealogical community over the years with their filming of original records.
I'd been holding off in that I thought I might not be able to commit enough time to make it worthwhile, but a "batch" is a very manageable size, easily done in a few minutes (or at least it was for the two initial batches of Cheshire records I've contributed so far).

Jan 28, 2008: DNA success story

The RUINCIMAN Surname DNA project now shows that the respective descendants of the Michigan and Wanton Walls RUNCIMAN families are a very good match, at 37 out of 37 markers. Now I'm trying to work out whether or not it is worth upgrading the tests to get a better idea of how closely related, or just to fit William in where he probably belongs anyway. I reckon his grandfather is probably a son of John and Betsy(FAMILTON) RUNCIMAN, so along with this assumption, and that the Michigan James and William are cousins, not brothers, that's where I've placed them in the RUNCIMAN family tree. If anyone has a convincing argument of where better to place them, speak up.

Still looking for a willing descendant of James & Isabella (CARTER) RUNCIMAN to join the project - which is growing. There's been some interest from a descendant of William of Crail whose descendants seemed determined to set foot in a fair few countries and Counties: Fife, Dunbar, Ireland, Canada, NZ, Australia... and hopefully Don will eventually get some evidence of a connection between his James and Janet (HOG) RUNCIMAN of Selkirk then Canada, and the James & Agnes (HERIOT) RUNCIMAN of Ayton/Dunbar whose descendants went to Selkirk, Ohio, and NZ.

Aug 17, 2007: SCOTT, LAIRD, FAIRBAIRN, BROWN, JARDINE

A search of The Times archives on the Rev Adam SCOTT brought up the marriage of dtr Marion in 1924 to a David Anderson LAIRD, son of yet another Minister (did my extended family tree attend to the spiritual welfare of the entire British Isles from the tip to the toe?).
In checking back on the FAIRBAIRN & JARDINE families of Hawick, I realised I hadn't followed some of them thru later census records. Most of the family of George BROWN and Agnes FAIRBAIRN, previously in Jedburgh, have now been traced forward 20 yrs to Hawick, and one son's marriage found (Archibald BROWN to Lizzie SMITH or MILLER). A witness to this 1890 marriage was one Martin JARDINE, not that I've placed the latter in the tree as yet. Possibly he's related to the James JARDINE who married Mary FAIRBAIRN, aunt of Archibald, possibly not, but there is a Hawick connection.