What can I glean from middle names?

[manui]

I am researching a family from Paisley with the surname Smith. The generation born in the 1870s and 1880s were largely (and helpfully) given surnames for middle names. Where that middle name was Taylor, the significance was obvious - their mother's maiden name.

Lawrence was a grandmother's maiden name, but Allan, Murray, Raeside and Cockburn are all a mystery. Are they likely to be from generations even further back,  or does one look 'sideways' to find a connection? Are there any rules for this that were generally followed? (I know about the first-name system of father's father, mother's mother, etc.)


Any guidance gratefully received,
Manui

[RJ_Paton]

Any patterns seem to change from family to family but the "usual suspects" are often:
Godparents
Grandparents
The minister
Other family especially if there was a recent marriage into the. Family
Friends
And sometimes if the child is illegitimate the fathers surname

[jakky]

Hi Manui,

I don't know how useful this is but my great granddad had the middle name Linger, I  found out he was illegitimate, but the family who lived next door to them in the village were named Linger.  I assumed from that that one of the sons of that family was his father.  It apparently was quite common to do this, and in some cases even the local squire or the vicar's name was used so the mother received money to bring up the child,


Jakky

[manui]

Thanks for these comments.

With a surname such as Smith, the possibilities for coincidences must be quite high.
However, John Murray Smith (b 1886) was the son of a tailor, and the grandson of a Thomas Smith (tailor), and he had a sister called Margaret Raeside Smith.

Now I have found a Thomas Smith (tailor) who married Margaret Raeside in 1856 and had a son called John Murray Smith in 1862.

So far I haven't been able to work out a connection, but this seems to be rather too much of a coincidence, so I'll have to keep ferretting.

Manui

[manui]

A postscript that might give other researchers some ideas:

As mentioned earlier, the surnames Taylor and Lawrence used as middle names in a Paisley Smith family were both family-member maiden surnames.

It turns out that the middle names Allan, Murray, Raeside and Cockburn also had close family connections.

I am amused as to the way in which Allan was used:
Marion Taylor married John Allan in 1863. She had a niece born in 1879 who was named Marion Allan Taylor, and another niece born in 1884 named Marion Allan Taylor Smith.

Thomas Smith had married Janet Lawrence in 1845, but Janet must have died quite young because Thomas also married Margaret Raeside in 1856. Margaret Raeside happened to be the daughter of John Raeside and Janet Murray, so they called a son John Murray Smith in 1862.
One of Thomas' children from his first marriage, William, had a son in 1886, and he was also named John Murray Smith - as were sons in two following Smith generations.

A nephew of William Smith's wife (Mary nee Taylor) married Martha Cokburn in 1884 - William and Mary named their second youngest child Martha Cockburn Smith in 1891.

William and Mary then named their youngest daughter Margaret Raeside Smith, clearly after William's step-mother.

A Ferguson / Taylor family from Paisley who emigrated to the US also gave some of their children strings of family surnames as middle names, so it might well be that others of you will find similar instances.

Happy hunting everybody!
Manui

 

[RuthieB]

Manui, Thank you for coming back to add that postscript. Many of my Brown relatives used surnames as middle names - it's good to know that there'll be a connection out there somewhere, even if it's not immediately obvious!
Cheers, RuthieB

[scozzie]

There's a fairly general tradition in Scotland about middle names, but sometimes you find weird ones.  My family for instance.  On my mum's dad's side, since 1864, the first son has been given the middle name Gibson.  And my middle name is my great-grandmother's maiden name - Clark.  Grandma (born 1898) got it, my Mum got it, now me.  Could have been worse!!

[trish251]

One of my Scottish families used their siblings surnames as given names for their children. This made it much easier to find the families, but sometimes caused confusion. e.g. Two families had surnames Johnston and Scott. They ended up with cousins  John Scott Johnston  and John Johnston Scott   
There were two Janes with similar names.

I think there will usually be family relationships shown in Scottish given names - at least until the end of the 19th Century.

Trish

[manui]

Thankyou for the contributions. I thought it seemed likely that surnames used as middle names would mostly end up having origins somewhere within the family, and I am glad that it seems to be turning out that way. No doubt exceptions will exist though . . . .

Manui