Genealogy Chat

Does anyone have any advice on how to handle double-barrelled names? I have some ancestors that my family has told me had the surname MacPherson-Fraser and some that were Bloomfield-Richardson. However, on IGI I've found some entries that show eg Winfred MacPherson <Fraser> as if the MacPherson is a middle name and not surname. And also on IGI my Bloomfield-Richardson shows as just Bloomfield, with another source showing her as Isabel B. Richardson! Has anyone else come across anything similar and have any advice on what is correct? Unfortunately all this part of the family was based in India, so it's pretty difficult tracking down any information! thx Julie

iT DEPENDS why they are double barrelled it was quite common for the mother's maiden name to be used as the first son's middle name and in some instances this was hypenhated. on the other hand sometimes if the child was born out of wedlock the father's name may be added as a middle name for the child. I have a case like that The mother was E Clark and the Child was Mary Weaver and surname Clark . her mother eventually married the Weaver and the two names were joined. I would suggest you try all combinations. Sometimes the surname was simply a "known as" say on a second marriage the children may use the stepfather's surname.Although this would not be on their birth certificates at all. Census details tend to show the names people were known by not necessarily what was on their birth certifictes. KIM

The opposite can happen too! It took me ages to find my grandfather's marriage certificate in GRO because the registrar had split his surname and logged it under the 2nd half of the name. eg BLOOMFIELD would have been split and recorded under FIELD. Maybe others who have 'splitable' names may consider this possibility when searching.

I have people on my Grandmothers side of the family with the surname of Bates, some off them were also harris-bates or bates-harris. It does get very confusing it times. Darren(Nuneaton)