There has long been a history of second Christian names being derived from famous people, even first names. Just look up how many Horatios were named after Nelson, and Ewart after Gladstone. And as someone has said, the Russell could be after the Whig politician Lord Russell. Interesting that he was instrumental in starting off the reform act which took 3 times to get through Parliament and The Lords - who needless to say opposed it. In Nottinghamshire we had one of the most vociferous opponents to it, namely The Duke of Newcastle. It was he who set up Gladstone as a prospective, and successful candidate for Newark in 1832. In those days voting was not secret, and any tenants of the Duke who hadn't voted for Gladstone were thrown out of their houses. In those days Gladstone was a High Tory, softening his politics in later life. The Duke of Newcastle of course suffered from his opposition the initial Reform Act, because in 1832 a mob burnt down his Ducal Palace which stood on the Nottingham Castle Rock. Brian Binns -----Original Message----- From: nottsgen-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:nottsgen-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Ruth Burkholder Sent: 14 January 2014 11:13 To: nottsgen@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [NTT] Unusual Middle Names The last responder wrote in the NOTTSGEN Digest, Vol 7, Issue 12 Message 2: "The middle name doesn't have to be significant. ..... . None of these explain Benjamin Disraeli Micklethwaite and his brother Stafford Northcote Micklethwaite :-)" It was certainly not uncommon to name a child after a political figure that was admired by the parents ... On this side of the ocean, there are many "George Washington [surname]" or "Benjamin Franklin [surname]" boys in US families ... so my guess is that this family was staunchly Conservative in politics, and were 'honouring' the children by giving them names of men that they admired. I would also guess that the boys were born in the late 1800s. Ruth from Canada Notts Surname List http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~hughw/notts.html ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to NOTTSGEN-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message