Kirkhill burial ground - Cambusnethan parish

[broofer]

 I'm interested in the BELL & GOURLIE headstone
ScotFamTed

Long shot, but would this include Donald and Duncan Bell, both killed in the 1849 explosion at Wishaw?

[Lodger]

No luck I'm afraid. Bell is a fairly uncommon name in Cambusnethan parish. If you can give some more details, parents names for example, I can check the records I have.

[Skoosh]

@Lodger, I take it Cambusnethan is pronounced minus the bus?

Skoosh.

[Lodger]

The local way of pronouncing it is Cam'nethan but I always assumed that the proper way was was to include the "bus".

[Skoosh]

I'm thinkin Camslang here!

Skoosh.

[broofer]

Of the two brothers, Donald was the elder, and born outside Lanarkshire, whereas Duncan was within.
I have tried looking at both births, but can't find a pair of parents in common.
The website of accidents makes grim reading, but the newspaper account of the Wishaw explosion states they are natives of Islay. Before I investigate that further I will be travelling through the area next weekend, and have allocated a day to give myself more background.
I will be trying to build up my knowledge of 'poor relief' Duncan's widow Mary was refused because she was not on tjhe paraochial roll. althouigh she was a pauper with 4 kids under 10, and another on the way.
It may be due to a change in the law, or the disruoption on the church, or simply that she had moved from Dalserf. If I find out more I'll post it.
I can understand that there are no graves, but I expected a memorial.

[Forfarian]

I will be trying to build up my knowledge of 'poor relief' Duncan's widow Mary was refused because she was not on tjhe paraochial roll. althouigh she was a pauper with 4 kids under 10, and another on the way.
It may be due to a change in the law, or the disruoption on the church, or simply that she had moved from Dalserf.

In 1849, it has nothing to do with the kirk or the disruption thereof, because from 1845 responsibility for looking after the poor was the Parochial Board's job, no longer the kirk session's.

What normally happened was that anyone who was in dire straits applied to the parochial board of the parish they were living in. If they had 'settlement' in that parish, it was up to that parochial board to deal with them appropriately.

However if they did not have 'settlement', the parochial board would do its utmost to find out where the person's settlement was, and get that other parochial board to meet the cost of dealing with them. This is why the surviving parochial board records go into so much detail about where people were born, had lived and for how long.

You acquired 'settlement' in various ways. One was by being born in the parish. Children could be held to have 'settlement' in the parish where their father was born. A married woman acquired 'settlement' in her husband's parish of 'settlement'. Or you could acquire 'settlement' by living continuously for five years in the parish.

So if Duncan's widow and children were born in Dalserf, Cambusnethan Parochial Board would instruct their Inspector of Poor to write to Dalserf and basically say, "We have one of your paupers here. We have paid her some money to tide her over pending your decision what to do with her. Please reimburse us, and tell us how to dispose of her case". Dalserf would then look at the case and decide what to do - they might give her a small amount of money each week, or they might offer her a place in the poorhouse - and if they did and she refused the offer of the poorhouse, she would not be admitted to the Register of Poor, or she would be struck off it if she had previously been admitted to it.

Saying that she could not have relief because she was not on the parochial roll sounds a bit like putting the cart before the horse - it was the parochial board that decided who was and who was not on the parochial roll (if by this they mean the Register of Poor).

[broofer]

 [ Thanks - to  me this kind of background information is often more interesting than just tracing your ancestry back ]

Mary had  been refused relief by Cambusnethan

The case then went to the Board of Supervision [ covering several parishes ]
The Board of Supervision was established under the 1845 Poor Law Act. One of its tasks was to hear appeals by paupers against inadequate poor relief granted by Parochial Boards. These appeals were recorded in the Board of Supervision minutes

Their minute of 3rd Jan 1849 states

.....the board declined to interfere the applicant not being in receipt of parochial relief

Another reason given for refusal ( not in this case ) is that the applicant is in the poorhouse

I would like to think that Mary had sufficient spunk to extricate herself from her situation by 1, being sufficiently young and able-bodied, and so escape the poorhouse,  2. getting her children into work, and 3. finding a new husband in 1857 - another coal miner !

[Forfarian]

Still seems an odd way to go about it - parochial board refuses her relief, so she appeals to the supervisory board, who decline to get involved because she has been refused relief  - yet that is the very decision she is appealing against?

I have (and have actually read) a book titled A History of the Scotch Poor Law, by Sir George Nicholls, 1856. The same gentleman also wrote A History of the English Poor Law (1898) and A History of the Irish Poor Law (1856).

He writes, "The chief characteristic of Scottish Poor Law administration, as contrasted with that of England, is the pertinacity with which all claim to relief of behalf of the able-bodied poor has been resisted". So I would not be surprised by a decision to refuse relief to Mary for herself alone. But I am surprised that relief was refused to four children under the age of 10. Children of 8 or 10 might have been expected to work, but younger ones would be regarded as disabled (i.e. unable to earn a living) by youth.

I have now looked at a transcription of the 1851 census and I see that Mary is described as a pauper (which normally implies being on the Register of Poor) and that the two eldest girls were both employed as tambourers. Also that only the eldest child was born in Dalserf, the other five being born in Cambusnethan, so it appears that Mary and the eldest child had been living in Cambusnethan for at least nine years. I am at a loss to understand how Cambusnethan could have refused relief for them, and especially for the ones born in Cambusnethan, all of whom were under 8 when their father was killed.