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General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: ScouseBoy on Friday 01 July 11 11:33 BST (UK)
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How Common is it for people to prefer their middle name to their first name, and then reverse the order?
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my grandmothers 3rd husband (yes 3rd :o and shes still going through them!) had the name john harry at birth. unfortuanltly he had a brother john james and his father was john also. so john harry was known as harry, john james was james and john sr was john.
after the death of his brother john harry became john 2 and john sr was john 1! then when john harrys father john 1 died john harry became harry again as he didnt want to use his desceased fathers name!!
so i would say it could be quite common!
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It's very common with the men in my family. Don't know why - glad I had a daughter. ??? ;D
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My grandmother was Alice Dorothy but always known as Dorothy
Censuses and other documents are in either name and only rarely show both names
I myself went through a phase of using my middle name in my twenties ( to avoid confusion at work where there was already many others with the same first name). I now use a shortened version of my first name
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My grandmother was Alice Gertrude but was always known as Gertie. In fact it wasn't until her funeral that I actually discovered that her name was Alice. Why she preferred Gertie to Alice I don't know. ::) ::) ::)
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my grandmothers 3rd husband (yes 3rd :o and shes still going through them!) had the name john harry at birth. unfortuanltly he had a brother john james and his father was john also. so john harry was known as harry, john james was james and john sr was john.
after the death of his brother john harry became john 2 and john sr was john 1! then when john harrys father john 1 died john harry became harry again as he didnt want to use his desceased fathers name!!
so i would say it could be quite common!
Thats a cracking story and as you say could well be very common. Frederick is the one in our family that keeps reoccuring...
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My Grandad was John Richard, but known all his life as Dick. His daughter (my Aunt) was Doris Margaret but known all her life as Margaret. Like an earlier posting, it wasn't until her funeral that I knew that her real name was Doris.
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Also pretty common in the more recent generations of my family to be known by the middle name (especially if the first name is that of a parent). I can only think of a couple of people where the order of the names has changed between certificates or censuses (though the latter often only has the name used rather than both).
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another example in my family tree
My 3x gr grandmother always showed up on censuses and death cert as Maria.
When i finally tracked down her marriage - she was named as Judith Maria
From there it was only a few minutes work to find her baptism - as Judith with no mention of Maria at all
Where & when she adopted the name of Maria will probably never be known
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My dad (deceased) was named Emmet Matthew after a son of his grandmom who died young. He always hated his name and when he joined the Navy, he had it changed to Matthew Emmet. For the rest of her life, his grandmom gave him such grief for changing his name :o During my FH research I could not locate any records for this deceased son "Emmet" until I came across cemetery records, went to the the cemetery and found out this sons name was Francis Emmet! :o Oh what my dad endured all for naught! I hope he's laughing in heaven ::)
Deb
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My Grandad was John Richard, but known all his life as Dick. His daughter (my Aunt) was Doris Margaret but known all her life as Margaret. Like an earlier posting, it wasn't until her funeral that I knew that her real name was Doris.
but a second name is a real name!
At least it is if you're either christened or registered with it!
maybe it's just as well I have only one given name
eadaoin
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I don't think that the people always necessarily themselves choose to use their second name - it's probably been instigated by their parents. I think maybe for reasons of the same names being used across families, as in naming patterns etc. or just naming after a chosen person..
Or, I dunno, lots of reasons I suppose, although my friend has a sister everyone calls Paula, and her registered name is Olga! Olga was a name further back in her father's family, and "had" to be used. But her Mum didn't like it, had wanted her named Paula - so she was Paula!!
I suppose too that most births would have been registered by the "man" of the house, so mother probably didn't get much of a "legal"say anyway!!
So there's always more than one way to "skin a cat" ;D ;D
Jeanne
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G'day
For over 7 decades I have been known by my middle name.
My sister was also called by her middle name.
Our elder brother was only known by his first name.
My father b1898 and his brother were known by their 3rd name.
In fact my father was better known by his nick-name.
The practice does not go back further than their being.
In my life the only complications have been with officialdom.
I have learned to use my first name for official communications etc.
My first real problem occurred in my first week at school.
I did not answer to my first name at roll-call hence,
I was not marked as being present.
Regards
EDO
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Like EDO I have always been called by my middle name. I use both names on official documents and only twice in my long life have I ever been called by my first name.
The first time was at infants school but mother removed me to another where they used my second name and the other time was recently when doing jury duty.
That was quite perculiar as the rest of the jurors called me by my first name (because this was always used when the usher called out the list) and it took two or three days to get used to it.
As for mother not liking my first name - she had adopted me but kept both my birth names even though she did not like the first name my birth mother had given me ???
At work when any lists go out for people to attend training or they send me my P60 each year the put my first name with my second name in brackets ;D presumably so everyone knows it me and not some new person on staff.
Jean
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My husband has 3 Christian names and is known by the 3rd one; I have 2 Christian names and am known by the 2nd one.
I was going to have just one name, the story goes, but when Dad registered my birth, he added his grandmother's name to it as a first name.
Have never used my first name, and it causes all sorts of problems ;D
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I've switched my first and middle names, added a name to the beginning and kept my maiden name as a middle name after getting married.
My dad's brother is known by his middle name as is hubby's uncle and once I start going back along the lines there are numerous people who have switched their first and middles names.
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My parents deliberately chose to give us none family with no middle names to break that... ;D
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Having dug around the records about a branch of the family from Nova Scotia, I found that swapping given names around was common there. "George R Smith" in one census is likely to show as "Robert G Smith" in the next, or have the middle names omitted completely. This applied to all official records. People just seemed to use what was their favourite name at the time.
I found this exasperating until I realised that it was normal in the province.
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My Grandad was John Richard, but known all his life as Dick. His daughter (my Aunt) was Doris Margaret but known all her life as Margaret. Like an earlier posting, it wasn't until her funeral that I knew that her real name was Doris.
but a second name is a real name!
At least it is if you're either christened or registered with it!
eadaoin
Precisely, Eadaoin!
I have always been known by my second name. Only officialdom and people who don't know me call me by my first name which I hate (for various reasons). I get really p****ed off when people say "Oh is xxx your real name?"
Most of the females in my dad's family were known by their second name.
My mum was known by her second name, which was the name her mother picked for her, but the priest who baptised her insisted on putting a saint's name first! It was an obscure saint called Balbina so we can understand why she wasn't known by that one, but by Pearl which was her parents' choice.
Dawn M
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One place I worked had the computer system login names of the form firstname-surname, where firstname had to be the official firstname. Only if there was a clash were variations allowed.
The chap responsible for the policy only realised what he had done when he was forced to type "Valentine-", which he hated and never used.
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A great aunt of mine, born Honor Ann Jane, married as Ann Jane, emigrated as Jane, was sent a copy of her obituary notice that someone kindly found for me, she died as Anna .......... neither wonder we all go gray haired at an early age doing our family history ;D ;D
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In my husbands family the men on his mothers side have all been called George Frederick. So one generation was known as Fred and the other as George. On his fathers side, all of the children were known by their second names! Confusing when you are asking about people. Me: "what can you tell me about Ann?", Father in Law: "oh I didn't have an aunt Ann, I had an aunt Jane", Me:"yes, Ann's first name was Jane" Father in Law: "was it? I don't think so, I didn't have an aunt Jane"....... Me:"what about James?" Father in Law: "I don't know a James" Me: "your uncle, James Richard" Father in Law "I had an uncle Dick" Me: "well Dick is short for Richard" Father in law: "Is it? I don't remember anyone called James"......even showing him the census info, he still didn't get it! The only one out of all of his aunts and uncles that was called by his first name was my father in laws father!
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I remember wondering why the post to my Gran was always addressed to E Collins when her name was Theresa until I came to find out that Theresa was her 3rd name her full name was Elizabeth Catherine Theresa. Her sister was always known as Margaret and it was only when she died that I found out her full name was Mary Margaret. That made more sense though as she was named after her mother, so it would have got a bit confusing with 2 Mary's in the house. Quite a lot of my family, particularly the Mary's were known my their middle name's at one time or another. ???
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If I can't find someone using their first name, I try their middle name. The only puzzle for me is why the parents don't just reverse the names in the first place.
My Dad was one of 4 brothers and the only one who was known by his first name, although confusingly his brother Harry Samuel was called Harry by his wife and Sam by everyone else. Their eldest child was named Harry but called something else all his life and he only found out he was called Harry was when he got his birth cert to apply for a passport! Similarly, my Uncle George was really called Jeuel George and the eldest uncle, Jabez John Thomas was called Jim. Work that out!
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I went to a boys Grammar school in the 1960s. If I remember correctly boys were addressed by their surnames,
In my class there were two Hughes's so I was known by my initials, which was better than being addressed by my surname, I think.