Maurine, If the family lived at Huntershall, they would almost certainly be coalminers. Huntershall was built in the 1760s? to house colliers working at nearby Niddry colliery (I assume the village got it's name from Peter Hunter, owner of the colliery). As someone already explained, Margaret Kerr is probably not the death you are after as it was the usual custom for women to continue to be called by their maiden name. For Liberton there is only the Mortcloth register for the earlier years. Also some collier's societies in Liberton and Newton had their own mortcloths so members didn't need to use the parish mortcloths. Before 1855 the register could contain any type of details, if you're lucky you might get details such as age, cause of death or burial place. It's not until 1855 following the 1855 Burials Act, that all parishes were obliged by law to keep an indexed register noting whereabouts people were buried in the churchyards; I don't think it specified what other details, if any, also had to be included. Albert In a message dated 23/09/2009 17:31:59 GMT Daylight Time, nuttall@surewest.net writes: Thank you, Bob, for your input about the KERR family. Yes, that's the family on FamilySearch and yes, I found 6 children, the last being twins, David & Christian. I've been paying to view the images on ScotlandsPeople. That way, I get the village place name and the names of the witnesses. Another member on the list suggested that the "Marget Kerr" death record may not be the Margaret Anderson who married Walter Kerr -- that married women used their maiden names, even on death records and monument inscriptions. I have a feeling that my KERRs, while not paupers, were not well off. I do not yet know Walter Kerr's occupation, but his son, George, my ancestor, was a coalier and was actually listed as a pauper/coalminer on the 1851 census. I don't expect to find that they would have been memorialized with a monument, but would they still be on a cemetery register? Maurine > Message: 4 > Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2009 10:01:17 -0700 > From: "Nuttall Family" <nuttall@surewest.net> > Subject: [MIDLOTHIAN] Verifying deaths/burials > To: <MIDLOTHIAN@rootsweb.com> > Message-ID: <B468A811F0324CCD9EBC8DD8598252EF@Maurine> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" > > Hello, > > I'm fairly new to Scottish research and am in the middle of a research > project about my Scottish "roots." I would appreciate any guidance as to > how to verify that a death record pre-1855 is the correct one for my > ancestor. The death record is so brief (just the name). . .is there some > other record to back it up? > > For example, my ancestor, Walter Kerr married (2) Margaret Anderson, about > 1787. They had six children, the sixth being born in 1798. Margaret was > born about 1766. They lived in Liberton at Hunters-hall. The only > death/burial record I could find on ScotlandsPeople that is a possibility > for Margaret is Marget Kerr, July 11, 1803 at Liberton, the mortcloth 2 L > V, 2 sh 6 pence. Would there be an entry in the cemetery register, or is > this the only record? > > Thanks, in advance, for any advice. > > Maurine Nuttall > nuttall@surewest.net > Granite Bay, CA, USA >