Bill As I understand Scottish law, a woman does not /did not loose her maiden name when she married. Over time the custom of usage of the maiden name by the wife has dropped off, but in 1871 your particular enumerator was doing the entries correctly as per law not as per hobby. Someone with a better knowledge may straighten this out if I'm not quite right. regards Peter >I have a general genealogy question relating to the 1871 census for Isle of >Arran, Kilbride, Bute. > >While reviewing a microfilm of this census the other day I noticed the odd >widow whose children had a different last name. In discussion we initially >assumed the widow had simply re-married and maybe lost a second husband. > >However when I found the following entries I became quite puzzled. > >First entry is: >West Clauchland #5 > Ann STEWART, a widow, whose children go by SHAW. > >Next entry is: >West Clauchland #6 >Margaret STEWART, a widow whose children go by HAMILTON > >Next entry: >West Clauchland # 7 >Alexander STEWART married to Marg't ROBERTSON > >Now on the information I've been able to gather thus far I think the second >(#6) entry is the one I'm interested in as I believe Margaret HAMILTON's >maiden surname was STEWART. I'm just a little perplexed to see it on the >census that way. > >Would anyone have a suggestion about the following: > >Could this have been a particularly fastidious census taker who had >genealogy as a hobby or was there a trend toward calling widows and/or wives >by their maiden surname? As I mentioned there were other instances but this >one was of particular interest and has 3 examples on the same page. > >Any help or clarification greatly appreciated. > >Brian Dunn >Kamloops BC, Canada