Hi John Stevenson. Hi , excellent explanation, best I have seen yet. In my case there is no baptism record of my gg grandfather b abt 1803. Neither was there of his father b. abt 1759, nor of his three sons b abt 1837(my g grandfather) , 1839 and 1847 and yet three girls born before them all had their baptisms recorded. By the way my g grandfather, gg grandfather and ggg grandfather were all named Robert. Perhaps there was a special tax on individuals named Robert(?) - no just Alberta Canada humour. However was there a larger tax on males than females? Thank you Frank -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of John Stevenson Sent: Sunday, February 10, 2008 4:10 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [MIDLOTHIAN] SCOTLANDSPEOPLE / ORIGINS (SCOTS) Snip > I am not sure either why their births are not available apart from the > reasons given by other listers. > Do you have John H W Payne birth?? Good morning Julie, I have worked , for eleven years ,as a "Volunteer Helper" at Scottish Genealogy Library and Family History Centre, Edinburgh and this is the question that causes more problems , than any other, for the Family Historian who visits us. As you know the one word that does not appear in the FH's vocabulary is "ASSUME" but so many people I meet slot in a name/date , possibly through frustration, without substantiating the information . That is a recipe for disastor !! This is where boards like this come into their own - sharing information can be so productive !! The fact is that it is not in Scotland's People's interests to "advertise" there are a large number of births and marriages which were never registered. ( wink) I.E. When the tax on registrations was introduced in 1783 the number of B,D & M registrayions fell dramativally . In one Highland parish it fell to around 20%.. The Act was repealed in 1794 but it was up to ten years in some parishes before things got back to "normal" If you check Births in Parish of Braemar for 1803 you will find pages of entries by the local JP asking the Session to enter details of births which took place between 1784 and 1793 and had never been formally registered Please accept there is nothing sinister about B M & D's not being registerd in OPR's - doesn't help the FH but there are other roads to try !! Regards John John D. Stevenson Edinburgh Scotland ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message