> I have a question now and hoping that SKS might be able to help answer it. > On the site when I looked up James Fraser's father he was listed as " > James > Fraser Hardmuir". Janet Ritchie was named as "Janet Ritchie > Whiteharriedwood". Also Janet's father was named as " William Ritchie > Hardwood". What I don't understand is are the last names their surnames > or > do they stand for something else entirely? Hardmuir, Whiteharriewood & > Hardwood.... They will be the place where the family lived, as it was shown in whatever record the index entry was taken from. Anne

Hi Anne Here's a guess for you to consider. You don't mention Janet's mother so this is a shot in the dark: . Could William Ritchie Hardwood have married a [?Janet] White? They had a daughter who they named Janet [after her mother and/or maternal g-mother], add Ritchie for Janet's father's middle name [?family tradition or the paternal g-mother's family name], add White for Janet's mother's maiden name [common practice], add Hardwood for the family name. This gives Janet Ritchie White Hardwood This is a long name by old standards and could easily transmogrify into the Janet Ritchie Whiteharriedwood you mention. Especially so if the clerk recording it couldn't be sure what the informant was saying - a fairly common occurrence judging by some Census entries. [You don't give a date for this entry] The 1841 Census of Aberdeenshire has a record a forename: "Oordad". You can imagine the conversation: "Is anyone else in the house?" "Aye, Oor Dad" "Who's that" "Oor Dad!" [Enumerator mutters "och, the hell with it" and fills the return in anyway!] Best wishes Ray www.whatsinaname.net ----- Original Message ----- From: Anne Burgess To: MORAY-L@rootsweb.com Sent: Saturday, February 26, 2005 9:30 AM Subject: Re: [MORAY] Re: LIBINDX onLine at Long Last!!! > I have a question now and hoping that SKS might be able to help answer it. > On the site when I looked up James Fraser's father he was listed as " > James > Fraser Hardmuir". Janet Ritchie was named as "Janet Ritchie > Whiteharriedwood". Also Janet's father was named as " William Ritchie > Hardwood". What I don't understand is are the last names their surnames > or > do they stand for something else entirely? Hardmuir, Whiteharriewood & > Hardwood.... They will be the place where the family lived, as it was shown in whatever record the index entry was taken from. Anne ==== MORAY Mailing List ==== MORAY OPR's. The OPR's for the Moray area are now starting to be transcribed and volunteers are needed. Would anyone interested in transcribing the OPR's for our area please contact me via my usual email address or visit the Moray Rootsweb pages and contact me via the mailing list Admin. ============================== Find your ancestors in the Birth, Marriage and Death Records. New content added every business day. Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13964/rd.ashx