BlankHi all The perennial question about research into Roman Catholic ancestors has risen again. The Scottish Catholic Archives, an agency of The Bishop's Conference of Scotland, has just ( 24th Nov) revamped its web-site However, as before, it states "The Scottish Catholic Archives holds parish registers for nearly all Scottish parishes founded before 1855. These registers are currently un-indexed. Researchers are welcome to visit the Archive and conduct their own research. Limited searches can be made of the registers held at Columba House, but requests must be very specific. There is a fee for searches conducted by staff." http://www.scottishcatholicarchives.org.uk/Genealogy/tabid/70/Default.aspx Rosemary Meechan's posting to this List in 2005 is worth a look at http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/sct-argyll/2005-09/1125655122 as is the following article by her which, hopefully, has reproduced well here. Regards Les ========================== Lochaber and North Argyll Family History Group - http://tinyurl.com/y6te7n e-mail - landnafhg@fsmail.net ========================== "ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH RECORDS Only the Church of Scotland was bound by LAW to keep records but most denominations did keep records - of sorts. The difficulty comes in tracking them down and finding out whether your particular ancestors were baptised, married or buried by clerics who could be bothered to keep even half-decent records. In the case of Catholics in the nineteenth century, marriage was particularly important because both parties had to be (a) baptised as a Christian (denomination wasn't important) and (b) Catholic. If one party didn't happen to be Catholic, a different kind of ceremony was carried out. This went on into the 1960s when common sense and good manners started to prevail. Therefore, Catholic priest must have had to make enquiries about the baptismal status, place of baptism and religious denomination of the couple about to be married. It would have been good for us if they had all bothered to write it down... I have one 19th century family record from Stirlingshire in which the occupation of the groom's father is given as "Prodestant" (yes, whoever wrote it down was a non-spelling bigot....) Matters are confused slightly by the fact that the Roman Catholic Church - until well into the second half of the nineteenth century - encouraged Catholics to marry in the Church of Scotland in the absence of a Catholic priest. These marriages were perfectly "legal" in the eyes of the Catholic Church and were NOT required to be re-done when and if a priest became available. This is probably because the available Catholic clergy in the first half of the nineteenth century were hard-headed and hard-pressed Scots who respected the Church of Scotland. It is only when Irish priests started coming into Scotland in the latter part of the nineteenth century that things started to get more complicated. If you study the 18th century records of Catholics in the Braes of Scalan (and particularly the young Catholic seminary which grew and flourished there) you will see that they relied on the goodwill and protection of their Protestant neighbours to warn them of attacks by government forces. They are very specific about the debt they owe to their neighbours. So, what can we learn from this? (1) Your Catholic or non-conformist ancestors may well have been married in the Church of Scotland - so search the pre-1855 records diligently. (2) Other denominations DID keep records before 1855. Google very carefully for them. Here are some Catholic examples which my researcher found for me: "Linlithgow Mission Register of Baptisms and Marriages October 30th 1854 Anthony Christy and Catherine O' Brian both of Linlithgow after due proclamation of Banns were married by me at Linlithgow on the 30th day of October one thousand eight hundred and fifty four years. Witnesses Patrick Heslin and Mary Moran Andrew Dempsey - Clergyman The only Christy baptisms I could find were: Hannah lawful (daughter) of Miles Christy and Mary Hagans born 3rd June 1855 at Bathgate and baptised June 10th. Sponsors Francis McShane and Anne Haggans Clergyman Andrew Dempsey James lawful (son) of Anthony Christy and Catherine O'Brian born 20th July 1855 at Linlithgow and baptised 24th July 1855. Sponsors James Rourke and Anne O'Brian Clergyman Andrew Dempsey No others I'm afraid" "Glasgow, St Andrew Marriages I could not find anything to do with James Meechan and Jane McCormick in these records. Unfortunately they are not indexed and so it took a long time to go through all of the records. I did make a note of any Meechan, or other spellings, marriages as I went through, just in case they might be family members, but did not write the full entry 18 June 1836 Peter Michan born in Parish of St John, Co Sligo and Mary McCann born in the parish of Baladie, Co Sligo" 18 November 1836 Jas Mighan born in Co Sligo, Parish of Ballisdon, Ireland and Maria Ward born in the same county Parish of St John, both now residing in Barony Parish of Glasgow 1837 - 1839 None 21 February 1840 John Meighan born in Co Sligo and Cath Freil from same county 23 November 1841 John Michan of Co Antrim and Jean Flahaty of Glasgow ********************************************************************** You can see that if you happened to be descended from any of these people you would sometimes have both an Irish county and parish of birth. Unfortunately, searching these records is both tedious and time-consuming....but they DO exist! RosemaryMeechan Rosemarymee@yahoo.co.uk 28 Aug 2005"

Whilst on the subject then, can any reliability be placed on a religion attaching to a clan name nowadays? Janet ----- Original Message ----- From: "Les Horn" <leshorn@ythanonich.freeserve.co.uk> : BlankHi all : : The perennial question about research into Roman Catholic ancestors has : risen again. The Scottish Catholic Archives, an agency of The Bishop's : Conference of Scotland, has just ( 24th Nov) revamped its web-site However, : as before, it states "The Scottish Catholic Archives holds parish registers : for nearly all Scottish parishes founded before 1855. These registers are : currently un-indexed. Researchers are welcome to visit the Archive and : conduct their own research. Limited searches can be made of the registers : held at Columba House, but requests must be very specific. There is a fee : for searches conducted by staff." : http://www.scottishcatholicarchives.org.uk/Genealogy/tabid/70/Default.aspx : : Rosemary Meechan's posting to this List in 2005 is worth a look at : http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/sct-argyll/2005-09/1125655122 : as is the following article by her which, hopefully, has reproduced well : here. : : Regards : Les : ========================== : Lochaber and North Argyll Family History Group - http://tinyurl.com/y6te7n : e-mail - landnafhg@fsmail.net : ========================== : : "ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH RECORDS :

It might also be mentioned that the National Archives of Scotland has photocopies of all pre-1855 Roman Catholic parish registers (apart from a small number lost through fire or enemy action) and they are to be found in the RH21/ fonds. As with the original records these copy registers are un-indexed. Searching under reference RH21 at http://www.nas.gov.uk/onlineCatalogue/ will provide a list of the parishes with their foundation date. Donald Maclean.