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Thank you for this. That is sad. RIP. Kate was a great gal and a great host to our family. We also met her daughters, including Lorna who was in from Australia.

All the very best,

I have in my line a John Blue b. abt. 1727 of Drumgarve, Kintyre who married a Mary Hyndman around about this period.

JJen & Schoch. Very good information. Especially from the Foyle Civic Trust. Thank you very much. All the best...

Thanks mowsehowse. That seems to validate the studies I have read. There seems to have been a slow shift in the use of middle names between the end of the 18Th and beginning of the 19Th centuries. As the 19Th century waxed the use seems to accelerate and it became quite common by mid century.

I read a pretty detailed statistical article on the use in America, but I can't locate it any longer. Almost no middle name use before the Revolution, except amongst some gentry. Then it picked up after the Revolution with many choosing middle names from the Founders, the most popular of course being George. Of course many also chose a family surname as a middle name, to establish the connection.

So far everything I have learned supports that our known Robert John was the first in our paternal lineage to receive a middle name. Thank you for your personal analysis.

Here is one of the articles: http://www.genfiles.com/articles/middle-names/

Thank you Aghadowey.

We have both versions alternating consistently, according to their baptismal records. For example, my father was Robert John, named after his grandfather Robert John. My grandfather was named Robert, after his grandfather Robert, b.c. 1811. In the church records, marriage records, Griffith's, Abercorn Estate records, memorial stones, death certificates, etc. the names remain consistent with the personages. I haven't come across a case where a middle name was omitted or added. That is, Robert is always recorded as Robert and Robert John is always recorded as Robert John. Beyond that we just don't know. Except that, according to anecdotal information for our earliest Robert John his grandfather is just Robert. You are right that this Robert might also have been a Robert John. For this Robert we have no birth/death/memorial records to guide us (only the Spinning Wheel list). But something tells me, no, and our earliest Robert John was the first in our lineage to pick up the middle name John. Hence, I am just trying to surmise the origins of that given middle name "John" and the possible mechanics from whence it came?

I did wonder about the names Robert & John being chosen from both grandparents. I think you meant paternal and maternal? However, the earliest Robert John we know of had a maternal grandfather also named Robert. Would that suggest anything?

Yes, it IS complicated and I can see I am taking us deeply down into the weeds. I was just hoping there were some unwritten occasionally applied conventions to guide me. Unraveling the elements of the naming tradition has yielded very successful rewards in my research many times in the past. It's like following cairns. However, the use of forenames as middle names has perhaps too many possibilities. Still, I hope to learn more about what the possibilities may be. Faint clues can sometimes lead us to the Promised Land.

I hope other researches are able to shed some useful light on this topic, as I believe that light may offer guidance to some few who are also searching through similar murky waters.

"Thinking is the hardest work there is. That's probably why so few choose to engage in it."

- Henry Ford