First of all a comment about the surname Silver. I have poured over the census and OPRs of quite a few of the Mearns parishes and Silver was (and still is) a fairly common name in these parts, in particular Laurencekirk and Fordoun. However I have not taken any particular interest in it as it does not enter my "tree". You can find the Statistical Accounts at http://edina.ed.ac.uk/index.shtml. Then, in the top right hand corner of the screen select Statistical Accounts of Scotland from the pull down menu, and login (it is free). Then you select the county or parish you want and either the 1791-99 Accounts or the 1845 Accounts. I don't think the site is complete yet for all parishes in respect of all the earlier Accounts but the Mearns seemed to be complete. The site is interesting if you are interested in the life and times of the inhabitants, but it is of very limited use from a genealogical standpoint because you do not get names apart from a few local lairds and ministers. Note that in these accounts the letter "s" in the middle of words is written with the old symbol which is closely akin to "f". You soon get used to it. Please believe me when I assure you that were were no cafes in Laurencekirk in the 18th century. As an aside, I had just come to the end of one account, Fordoun I think, when the next page showed the start of the account for the parish of Uig. Uig is in Lewis and I thought it might be interesting to find out what was going on in Gaeldom in this era. Now at the end of each account there is a section headed Miscellaneous Observations. Most reporters (invariably the minister of the established church) would here record items which were unique to the parish, e.g.in relation to drought, disease or something of such nature. The minister at Uig however evidently thought that some anatomical statistics were important for posterity when he recorded (page 289) " Very near the manse there lives a woman, who has four distinct breasts or mammae. She has several stout healthy children and suckled each of them, and likewise one of the minister's children. She has nipples and milk in each of the four breasts, the two upper are situated immediatley under the armpits, and being distended with milk, are very troublesome to her for the first two or thee months after delivery. Such a lusas naturae is very uncommon." The account does not elobarate on how the minister organised or conducted such a detailed survey of his flock. Happy hunting Alan Moir ----- Original Message ----- From: [email protected] To: [email protected] Sent: Monday, June 18, 2001 10:02 PM Subject: Re: Bleachfield Where do we find the Statistical Account of Scotland on the Internet. I am researching the family name of Silver and everything I do comes up blank. Maybe this could be of some help to me. If anyone out there has any info re family name SILVER I would very much appreciate anything at all. There was a large family of Silvers in St Cyrus from around 1860 and before in Laurencekirk and surrounds. I believe two of male member of the Family emigrated to Canada in the early 1900's. Also two female members left Scotland for New York around the same time. Any help at all would be very much appreciated. Frances