Record of Birth to single mother?

[bobed]

Hi,

I'm usually in the Ireland section.

I'm following a link from Co. Down in Ireland to Isabella Neill, born in Scotland (don't know location) about 1874/75. Her mother was also Isabella and shows on the local 1911 Irish census as being single, so I'm guessing that she maybe went to Scotland to have the child.

Are births without a possible father recorded in the same way? I had a look at Scotland's People, but without being sure if I was getting much success for my credits. Any suggestions?

TIA

[daval57]

If Isabella was born out of wedlock, then there is no reason it shouldn't be recorded as Neill, unless her mother chose to mention fathers name on birth record.

Most folk will recommend that you try and get as many indexes for each credit (20p) that you spend on SP.  Aim for 25 for each credit.
I had a quick play with your name (see screen shot).
For 2 credits, this will give you every Isobel, Isabel, Isobella, Isabella, Isa etc from 1870 to 1880.  It'll also include mis-spellings such as Neil / Neal.
You can then go through and chose which ones you think are most likely, and pay the extra 5 credits (£1) for those. 

You obviously don't need to pick such a wide date range, I only did this as an example.  Using 73 to 76 gives 24 results.  Depends on how sure you are of year of birth.

PS If you suspect mother came from Ireland to Scotland, I'd look at births in Greenock or Glasgow first.

Dave

[hume]

Hi TIA and Dave,

I'd probably be trying the IGI first to narrow down some results. With such a common name, you could spend a lot of credits on different families!

Here's a link to it: http://www.rootschat.com/links/0bq/. I put in Isabella (no surname) born within 2 years either side of 1874 in British Isles -> Scotland. In the mother's box, I entered Isabella Neil and then hit search. There's 6 results for that search - 4 (at least) look to be births out of wedlock, with variants O'Neill etc.

hume24

[bobed]

Thanks for the replies!

I've followed your advice, but I still didn't hit it lucky. At least I have a few of the records to view now. One of the records did show as 'illegitimate", but I don't think its the one.

The dates and names should be accurate as they are coming from the newly released Co. Down census from 1911. The two Isabellas have caused confusion when I have been checking the family from local sources, but I now know that they were aged 64 and 36 in April 1911.

I'll keep trying, thanks again.

bobed

[bobed]

Just to update:

I've found her! On checking my own records, her birth date was shown as 1873, so I guess her mother put the wrong age on the census form!?

She was born in Govan, Lanark. I found her on SP.

So thanks yet again for the guidance.

bobed

[daval57]

Excellent bobed.
Well done.