Alexander McDonald 1861 Alvie Census, 2 wives? Lookup Request

[Vic H]

Can someone take a look at the original entry for the following family. Does Alexander have 2 wives?
as per Ancestry Transcription:
1861 Census
Name:   Alexander Mcdonald
Age:   61
Estimated Birth Year:   abt 1800
Relationship:   Head
Spouse's name :   Jane Stewart [Jane Mcdonald]
Gender:   Male
Where born:   Laggan, Inverness
Registration Number:   90
Registration District:   Alvie
Civil Parish:   Alvie
County:   Inverness
Address:   Balchroie
Occupation:   Farmer Of 50 Acres
ED:   6
Household Schedule Number:   9
Line:   1
Roll:   CSSCT1861_12
Household Members:   
Name   Age
Alexander Mcdonald 61
Jane Stewart   49
Jane Mcdonald   49
Donald Mcdonald   25
James Mcdonald   24
Elizabeth Mcdonald   22
Catherine Mcdonald   21
Jane Mcdonald   19
Christina Mcdonald   17
Ann Mcdonald   15
Alexander Mcdonald 14
Susan Mcdonald   11
Margaret Mcdonald   9
Jessie Mcdonald   6

kind regards & appreciation in advance
Vicki from OZ

[DonM]

There appears to be 4 Alexander's with a wife named Jane in Alvie.  Ages, 51, 52, 57 and 61.

https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk 

Will cost you about the price of 4 coffees to get the actual records according to someone around here.

Don

[Vic H]

Thanks DonM
I subscribe to https://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk and have spent all my credits on certs. I really did not wish to spend any more on what could plainly human transcription error, as Alexander had a sister Jane born about the same time as his wife. Not knowing how things work in Scotland and what memberships hence access are available, I just thought that I would ask, sorry.
No worries & thankyou Vicki

[Forfarian]

Scotland's People indexes her just once, as Jane Stewart McDonald, 49. There is no other Ja*n* M*cDonald aged between 47 and 51 in Alvie in 1861.

So it looks as if Ancestry's transcriber has recorded her twice, once using her maiden surname and once using her married surname.

Moral: don't believe anything you find online unless it's an image of an original document. And especially don't trust Ancestry and similar commercial web sites.

However much we may all wish it were otherwise, Scotland's People remains pay-per-view (albeit modestly priced compared with some) and there are only three other ways to look up the census:

- Go to a library or family history centre (in Scotland) which has microfilms available free of charge
- Go to a LDS Church Family History Centre near you and arrange to rent the relevant microfilm
- Go to the Scotland's People Centre in Edinburgh or a linked local archive and pay £15 for a day's access to the records

[Vic H]

Forfarian, thank you for your reply. Gut feeling told me, it was transcription error. Plus I had followed through on his sister so I knew it wasn't her. The confusion I faced was 2 Alexander's  marrying a Jane/Jane in 1835 one being Jean  Stewart b. Braemer Aberdeenshire,  the other Jane McDonald b Laggan Invernesshire. So imagine my surprise when clicking on both Jane's in Ancestry both wives, both same age, but the different p.o.b.'s Transcriber must have  been doing some creative guesswork instead of just transcribing. Once again thank you & stay safe. I do subscribe to Scotpeople & Pay as a final resort for proof as I don't accept all of what ancestry offers.
Cheers Vicki from Oz

[Forfarian]

From the (much better) transcription of the 1851 census at https://freecen1.freecen.org.uk/cgi/search.pl, which allows you to 'walk' through an enumeration district household by household so that you can see who the neighbours were and where they lived, I am pretty sure that Alexander McDonald and Jane Stewart lived at the place marked on the mid-19th century six-inch Ordnance Survey map as Ballachroichk in Glen Feshie. See https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=16&lat=57.08608&lon=-3.89867&layers=5&b=1

It is now named as Balachroick, though the buildings there now are obviously too recent to be the ones that the McDonald family lived in.
See https://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NH8400
and https://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NH8500

[Vic H]

Thank you for the link. I will check it out. You are correct, I have all the Census info from 1841 to 1901 for most of the family. Son Donald at Ballachroichk, maintaining some siblings & mother. I live in outback Australia so all me research is online. No nearest LDS, & the LDS online doesn't offer the Census material.
Ta Vic