Liverpool & South West Lancashire FHS - Forum

Hi all just a quick musing. I know personally that my father's family name was Orrett, but his records showed him as Orritt, and ancestors over the years have both variations. Doing a lot of research about families with different names in GRO etc.

Question is - what surname should I put the person down as in the tree? Do others keep the same family surname for all offspring, regardless of what GRO has, or have different surnames for sons and daughters who were registered incorrectly?

Thanks,

John

I use the same surname usually. For me it's been a matter of preference where different spellings have been used. Here are some examples from my tree:-

Albach, Albeck, Albridge: Albach
Leacy, Lacy: usually Leacy
McGuiness, McGuinness, McGinnis etc: McGuinness
McCaughan, McCaughran etc: McCaughan
Lockyer, Lockier: Lockyer
Harvey, Harvie: Harvey
Hanna, Hannah: Hanna
Willet, Willets, Willetts: Willetts
Keeney, Kennah etc: Kennah
Keed, Keid, Kidd: Keed
Galavan, Gallivan, Galvin: Galvin

The exception is Mcylchreest and Mylchreest the former is used on earlier generations of the tree, the latter on later generations as this change reflects the gradual historical dropping of the Mc in the Isle of Man.


Blue

My main problem has been with Louis/Lewis Crosby/Crosbie, however many programmes allow you to enter a second or maybe even a third name for an individual and call them perhaps an alias so that on looking at a tree you can see at a glance a number of possible spellings.

We have to remember that our ancestors were often illiterate and the spelling would have been the best guess by either the registrar or minister.

Thanks for your thoughts. I tend to keep to the same spelling as the surname is currently known. I have a letter from Liverpool Registry office from a good few years ago, when my father asked for his name to be amended to Orrett from Orritt. The Registrar wanted a copy of his birth certificate before they would do anything.

In your own records it should be made clear where a particular spelling of the surname was recorded.

We have our own modern spellings of our names and places and there is nothing to say which is correct.

In my own family I spell my surname De Gier.
However I have cousins who spell it De Geir; Degier; De-Gier

My Great Grandfather was born overseas, probably in or around Nice, France. On his Marriage Certificate it is shown as De Ghir and his 7 children have 5 different spellings on their birth certificates including De Gheis! Of course this is probably due to the fact that he and his wife were largely illiterate and the official completing the form entered what he heard or what he thought he heard.

Incidentally, we also have a debate as to whether the G is hard as in gear or soft as in Ranger...and you think you have problems!!

Alex