I was recently pondering the importance that we attach to names when there was, yet again, intense media scrutiny over the names chosen for the latest royal baby. She ended up being Charlotte Elizabeth Diana, an obvious nod to her great-grandmother the Queen, her grandmother Diana, and a feminine form of her grandfather’s name Charles. She joined her brother George Alexander Louis, the latter name probably recognising Lord Louis Mountbatten. I was wondering, however, whether these children would be like millions of others in being called by a pet name or nickname – one which closely links them with other members of the family, and is not generally known outside the family.                                       

There are some well-known and traditional naming patterns, which may help us to sort out relationships and genealogies. In Scotland, for example, children’s names were traditionally chosen as follows:                                                                                                              

Male	Named after
First-born Son	Father’s father
Second-born Son	Mother’s father
Third-born Son	Father
Female	Named after
First-born Daughter	Father’s Mother
Second-born Daughter	Mother’s Mother
Third-born Daughter	Mother

 

As suggested earlier, ways in which families distinguish among different family members with the same given name is to use a middle name, and/or adopt a pet name or nickname. These names are usually not recorded officially, but can be found in family letters, diaries, captions to photos, etc. 

They can also trip up the unwary when searching official civil registration, census, electoral records.

Australians excel at lengthening short names and abbreviating long ones, but perusing UK census returns shows that this practice was alive and well in 19th century England.  Some 19th century names were once used for males, e.g. Marion, Evelyn and Hilary, but are now female names – you need to look carefully to see if a gender has been attributed to the individual. Other names appear to us to be abbreviations of longer names but actually can be names in their own right. My paternal grandmother was Lizzie; maybe a pragmatic coalminer father said (imagine the appropriate dialect) “If she’s going to be called Lizzie, then she’ll be registered as that!” Is an Eleanor in your family tree the same person as Nellie or Ellen – is this just one person, two or three? Would you work out that Ninni/Neeni was actually Jane?

Have you ever agonised over not finding a particular person in official records, when you know they should be there? It could be because they are listed under a pet name, a second or third name, or even a made-up name. Using my father as an example, his birth record appears on the UK civil registration indexes as Charles J. While it is easy for me to confirm that this is indeed my father’s birth registration, despite an incorrect spelling for his mother’s surname, I can’t be so sure when I’m researching 19th century records, especially with common first names and surnames. I was chatting to a regular GSQ member recently; her mother’s brother is Wilf, but he was always called Mick. Why? He loved Mickey Mouse. Another of her relatives was named Terrance Anthony at the behest of a grandmother – the mother disliked both names and called the child Scott.

The choice of a child’s name may reflect the personal views/opinions of parents or grandparents. One person in my family tree is Feargus O’Connor Hall. Son of Joseph Hall and Hannah Radford, and named after the Irish Chartist and radical, Feargus O’Connor, my ancestor was born into a non-conformist family in Nottinghamshire in 1845.  This period was at the height of O’Connor’s involvement in the chartist movement and probably reveals a great deal about Joseph Hall’s political views. The distinctive name did make it easy for me to track him through the various censuses, though, unlike some of his more traditionally named siblings.

A modern trend is to create unique names for children. Innovative spellings of names can challenge the traditionalist, and it’s often necessary to say names out loud to understand what the name is. In contrast, names can be pronounced how they are spelt rather than how they are normally pronounced. A regular minefield.

How often in our genealogical research have we longed for a Theophilus or a Hephzibah, or a Feargus O’Connor, instead of a John and Mary? It makes it so much easier to claim them as our own.  I’m not sure, however, that many of us would aspire to having 26 first names: filling in forms would be a nightmare. Adolph Blaine Charles David Earl Frederick Gerald Hubert Irvin John Kenneth Lloyd Martin Nero Oliver Paul Quincy Randolph Sherman Thomas Uncas Victor William Xerxes Yancy Zeus has a 666-letter surname and is known as Hubert B. Wolfe, 666, Sr. Just as well really.

Have you come across any distinctive/unusual nicknames/pet names in your family? How have these helped or hindered your research?

Until next time.

Pauline