I need help to Decipher a Baptism Record Please

[MonicaL]

Hi Pat

This is a great site for first name variants, particularly biased towards Scotland www.whatsinaname.net/php/search.php?action=search2&search_name=hugh

Monica 

[Skoosh]

Folks,  this is an entry in Scots concerning Gaelic speakers, the Macdonald here doesn't pronounce the "d" so the effect if something like Machkonel, ch as in loch, which the clerk renders as McConel. Hugh is generally Uisdean, but in some districts was indeed Eoghann or Ewan or Evan.   Skoosh.

[patval]

Thank you Skoosh, we have family records of a Hugh b 1756 in Moulin Perthshire, yet can only find a Ewan baptised with same parents on same date 1756........ that probably solves the puzzle for us.......

How confusing it must have been for some, this switch from Gaelic to English.....

We have family letters dating dating 1818 to 1836 from a son in Port of Spain to his father in Turriff Scotland, they are written in excellent English.. The father was b 1761 in Inverness (brother to Hugh/Ewan b Moulin), he was an excise man, as was his father who we believe was born in Edinburgh to an English teacher...... perhaps this is why their written Engish is so perfect.....

Pat

[Skoosh]

Cheers Pat, English usage bacame the fashion after the Union so we still tend to be a bit bi-lingual, depends who we're talking to! the Gaels had a harder time, with English only, in the classroom. Don't speak Gaelic but know a few words. Macdonald, as I've said, sounds like McConel, but nothing to do with Conel in this instance, MacDougal sounds like McCool, and just to confuse things, Macdonald generally, is Domhnullach, pronounced Donalach! with no Mac at all, if you're not confused, read it again. I think Macdonald is the only name so honoured. Most Gaels of that time would be unlikely to read/write the language and confusion arises with clerks writing phonetically into Scots script.   Skoosh.

[Forfarian]

how they managed without use of V or J,K,Q.W,X,Y or Z I can't imagine....

They just used other combinations of letters to represent those sounds when necessary. It's a very common misconception that the sounds ascribed to various letters in the English language are inevitably ascribed to the same sounds in other languages.

Consider the use of 'j' in Spanish, or 's' in Hungarian, or 'w' in German, or 'c' in Polish, for example, or initial 'r' in Brazilian Portuguese.

In Gaelic, the combinations 'bh' and 'mh' are pronounced like English 'v'. The English sound 'k' is written as 'c' in Gaelic.

The sound written as 'Cu' in Gaelic is sometimes transliterated as 'q' in English, thus the mountain Cuinneag is anglicised as Quinag.

[Forfarian]

We have family letters dating dating 1818 to 1836 from a son in Port of Spain to his father in Turriff Scotland, they are written in excellent English.. The father was b 1761 in Inverness (brother to Hugh/Ewan b Moulin), he was an excise man, as was his father who we believe was born in Edinburgh to an English teacher...... perhaps this is why their written Engish is so perfect.....

I doubt very much that Gaelic was spoken in the Turriff area in the 1800s, other than by people who moved east and south from the Highlands.

An exciseman was a civil servant and would have to have some education, and I doubt that a monoglot Gaelic speaker would have been employable in eastern Scotland. The son almost certainly attended a school where the teaching was in English, so even if his father was a native Gaelic speaker the son would have been educated in English.

[Skoosh]

Inverness, at that time was largely English speaking, and very good English too by all accounts, somewhat in contrast with to the good folks of Turriff!     Skoosh.

[patval]

Hi everyone, you were all so helpful, and knowledgeable, your English/Gaelic advice has helped me along…. I have another queerie…. If you don’t mind that is…

I am searching for a John Warden born 1729.. We are sure of the date because he was an excise man (as were his three sons and a grandson) we have Johns excise salary records which give age at death as 62 in 1791… and I imagine this to be accurate…. He was moved around with his job starting 1750 in Dundee, then on to Moulin, Dunkeld and Inverness….. Trying to find his parents we can find only two births for a John Warden in 1729 one born in St Cuthberts Edinburgh to an English teacher called John Warden… However, as a minus… John the English teacher was son to Adam Warden teacher in Alyth..(Recorded on OPR) and we have no other Adams in the family. … Then there was a John Warden born 1729 in Barony to a John Warden & Janet Petticrew. … This John was in General Whilemans Regiment, Janet was from Dounward Riddarie……………………… Does anyone have military knowledge of Glasgow at that time………. Most sites I find refer to the mid 1800’s and later.
I am probably asking impossible questions    but the birth of John is becoming all consuming.…. Many thanks….

I have attached a copy of the relevant section of the OPR if it helps

[Skoosh]

Pat,  this was a soldier in Gen' Whiteman's Regiment, was he an Englishman. There was no Barracks in Glasgow at that time, soldiers were billeted with the population. Riddrie I can see from my window, it was certainly a country area in the Barony Parish, Glasgow, I don't understand what the Downward part means. Riddrie House, now a cemetery, is at the top of a hill, maybe at the lower part.    Skoosh.