Stewarts of Balquhidder

[Alex & Mary]

Our link is to Mary Ferguson (1813-1896) daughter of Duncan Ferguson and Mary Stewart almost certainly of the above Line 6. We have also researched their son Murdoch (1800-1882) a soldier in the 79th. The British Army Birth Index has confirmed the exact birth dates of his 6 children (1825-1839) although we haven't been able to view the original entries. We have a death certificate for Duncan Ferguson (1770-1859) (son of Murdoch Ferguson) who died in Criniegart, Gartmore but we can't confirm that he was the father of our Mary. We would love to hear from anyone else with links to the above Mary Stewart. Happy to share any of the data we have.
Alex & Mary

[Belinda]

Hi there, Alex and Mary

What is the British Army Birth Index and where do you find it?

I have two different Scots ancestors (both Grahams with Stewart connections) who served in the British army but no idea of which regiments they were in, so have been stalled on army service to date. I do know details of wife and children and would be interested to track details of their service records. One served in America and died there, but was survived by wife and some children who returned to Scotland. The other served in India before arriving in Australia.

Belinda

[Ryk]

Alex and Mary

Welcome to the Forum. Your family is found here:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~rykbrown/stewart_of_dalveich.htm#6%20Line%20-%20The%20Stewarts%20in%20Ardveich%20and%20Coilmore
I have not yet updated the Dalveich page with your new info, but I hope to get that done soon.

As you and I have discussed privately, prior to you joining, this is the same branch as Shane. He has now registered here at the forum so I will send him a PM notifying him of your posting. I would encourage you both to discuss your family connection here.
_________________
Ryk Brown
Descendant of the Stewarts of Dalveich (Ardvorlich)
Sliochd Iain Dubh Mhor

[Alex & Mary]

Hi Belinda
(You'll need to find the websites yourself as this website won't accept my copies - says I need 5 postings before I can give them to you)

The index can be accessed on-line through the findmypast website which is linked to the National Archives. Index pages are very cheap but you have to buy a minimum subscription. I was looking at the new Passenger Lists so it was OK. The index only gives Child Name, Place, Year, Regiment, Volume, Page - no parents but my six children (spread over 14 years) were said to be on two consecutive pages out of over a thousand volumes of originals. I suspect that the Regimental Returns are listed under smaller units to account for the above proximity.
Using Name & the Military section in the above website (no charge for the initial query) the result is subdivided into
Armed forces births 1761-1994
Armed forces marriages 1818-1994
Armed forces deaths 1796-1994
Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914-18
National Roll of the Great War 1914-18
Army Roll of Honour 1939-45
Other army lists and roll calls 1656-1888

Some are pages eg all Stewarts, some are records ie match name. I didn't find many births recorded before 1800 despite the fact that it says 1761. I think that the issue is that the wife had to be attached to the regiment. Fortunately mine was. There's a lot more if your relative was an officer eg 1798 Army List gave me the regiment of a man I knew was an Adjutant but I didn't know his regiment.

Back to births
Data below comes from the National Archives website.
Follow Military links to the Research Guides British Army: Useful Sources for Tracing Soldiers

Regimental Registers of Births, 1761-1924
The regimental registers of births, 1761-1924 are indexed: the index gives the regiment and place of birth of children born to the wives of serving soldiers, if they were attached to the regiment. If you have some knowledge of offspring or areas of service, this can be an easy way to narrow the field.
The index can be seen at The National Archives, and at the Family Records Centre, but the records are held by the Office of National Statistics, and are not on open access. To actually identify the correct child, parent and regiment, you may have to buy more than one certificate from the ONS.
Haven't found out yet how to buy a certificate from the Office of National Statistics!!

Some of my data below to give you an idea of what you might do
NAME PLACE YEAR REGT VOL PAGE OTHER SOURCES

Mary Quebec 1825 79th 55 21 c1828 Canada
Jannet Quebec 1827 79th 55 21 c1827
Duncan Quebec 1833 79th 55 21
Gilbert Quebec 1835 79th 55 22 c1835 Canada
Murdock Edinburgh 1838 79th 55 22 c1838 Edinburgh
Margaret Edinburgh 1839 79th 55 22 c1840 Edinburgh

The Other Sources column is mine.

Hope this helps

Alex & Mary

[Belinda]

Thanks, that's a great help. Will investigate further.

Belinda

[Ryk]

[SLaurie]

Greetings all,

I've been away a while. I suffered a hard drive crash resulting in the loss of ALL my family history data. Fortunately, my grandfather and I have/had similar databases so I'm hardly starting over from scratch. Back up your files, friends. Back up your files.

Anyway: while reviewing my source material I came across what seems to be a discrepancy between baptism dates given for James STEWART of Coilmore (son of John STEWART & Catherine McKERCHER, spelled "McArchir"). The GROS ref. data supplied by the Scotland's People website gives 31 Aug 1781 for the baptism date of James STEWART; the Int'l Genealogical Index transcription of the record agrees with that date. However, the scanned image of the register page in question appears to give 27 Nov 1781. In fact, from top to bottom I see entries for Oct 5th to Nov 27th.

Is there something I'm missing?

Shane

[Belinda]

Hi there, Shane.

I think there's been a snarl up at ScotlandsPeople and you should query them about it. I did a search there for James Stewart, born Comrie parish, between dates 31 Aug 1781 and 31 Aug 1781 and got one match. When I changed the dates to 27 Nov 1781 I got no matches. The short details for the 31 Aug 1781 record were:
31/08/1781 Stewart, James Alexr. Stewart/Cath McArchir M Comrie Perth 341/0020 0166.

I presume you did a VIEW of the record for 31/08/1781, and was confronted with something with dates in November. Weird. As I say, ask them what's going on. I've found them quite responsive to plaintive queries.

Belinda

[SLaurie]

[Ryk]

Welcome back Shane!

I am presently in the midst of transcribing all Stewart entries from the Comrie OPR and I have already surpassed 1781. I can tell you from my own personal reading of the film that the entry in question shows Alexander Stewart and Catharine McArchir in Wester Ardveich having a son James baptised on 27 NOV 1781.

I cannot explain the August entry. I have looked before and after this entry in the film and there is no such August entry. The IGI and the Scotland's People index is indeed in error. I will correct the Dalveich page accordingly.

And, yes, Shane, I would be very grateful if you could forward another copy of your branch descendant report as I seem to have lost the previous one on my old computer.

Slainte
Ryk
_________________
Ryk Brown
Descendant of the Stewarts of Dalveich (Ardvorlich)
Sliochd Iain Dubh Mhor

[Alex & Mary]

Have had a similar problem to Shane's re indexes. One of my marriages was 20 years out. IGI and SP index gave the same wrong date. Bought the record & established the error. Contacted SP and my understanding is that the original index came from IGI and is used by SP. If they found an an error when linking the images they corrected the index but errors did slip through. The error I told them about will take some time to correct but will be done.
Best Wishes
Mary