Looking For Help

[JacobusV]

Apologies, stealing a quick 2 minutes while at work, you are correct, it was Sarah McKenzie who died on board HMS Sheldrake. I didn't read it right.

J

[Neale1961]

Re - death certificate for John TURPIE 1903

I think you’ll find there is an error in the naming of his mother. It should be Christian Duncan. John is with his mother Christian in the 1841 census.
 John Turpie and Christian Duncan’s marriage is noted earlier in this thread.
It is not surprising that his daughter Jessie could not remember the name of someone who had died before she was born.

[Neale1961]

Re - death certificate for Sarah McKENZIE / TURPIE 1906

The mention of the ship Sheldrake on Sarah’s Turpie’s death cert. is indeed odd. There seems to have been several ships with that name, so it’s not clear which one it was, (not that it matters really). It hardly seems likely that Sarah, a widow of 3 yrs, would be living on a ship. Her husband John Turpie had appeared in various census as engine man, steamboat fireman, and later in life as a railway fireman and railway labourer. It is quite possible that his grand-daughter remembered him working on the HMS Sheldrake and that entry on the certificate refers to him, while the address Bo’ness Road refers to Sarah Turpie’s address. I can’t imagine John at the age of 82, with senile decay, still doing the hard physical labour of a steam boat fireman.


The informant on Sarah TURPIE’s death was her granddaughter Sarah GLOAG (born 1871) who had married George TRACEY in 1896. The granddaughter Sarah had spent most of her life in Edinburgh, while her grandparents lived in Kinghorn and Burntisland.
I couldn’t find Sarah Tracey or her husband in the 1901 Scotland census.
One has to ask how reliable she was regarding the names of her grandmother’s  parents  (her great-grandparents). We have all come across death certificates where the names of parents were wrong, or ended up belonging to a different branch of a related family. I wonder if that may be the case here.
(When I was 30, I would not have been able to tell you my great grandparents’ first names, let alone their maiden surname.)

I would be inclined to still look at the possibility of Sarah McKenzie / Turpie’s parents being Samuel McKENZIE and Jane / Jean MCLAUCHLAN. (as noted in reply #13).

If we consider those names, then, the children of John and Sarah Turpie follow the traditional Scottish naming pattern.
•   Jane  1846-1863 (named after mother’s mother)   
•   Christian / Christina 1847-1871 (named after father’s mother)
•   John 1850 -1930 (named after father’s father, and after father)
•   Jessie / Janet    1851 - 1915
•   Samuel 1864-1913 (named after mother’s father)
•   Sarah 1856-1859 (named after mother)   
•   Sarah 1862-1877 (re-named after mother)   


The problem is conflicting information for Sarah on the census.
The 1851 and 1901 census has her born in Ireland, while the 1861-91 census has her born in Leslie.

If born in Scotland, where is she on the 1841 census? No record found.
If born in Ireland, the 1841 census is Wemyss is a good bet, as this is where she married a few years later.
If she didn’t arrive in Scotland until after the 1841 census, why was she in Wemyss? Was she visiting McKenzie relatives there?

If it were my family, and I was trying to solve the puzzle, I would be looking at the marriage banns for Sarah McKenzie and John Turpie on the chance that some other bit of useful information may come to light. I have suggested this several times already during this thread.

[Neale1961]

I do have one other mystery to add in another post about great great grandparents who lived in the same area and at the same time as two people with the exact same names. Difficult to differentiate who are my actual great grandparents and who isn't.

J

Jessie TURPIE married 10 Sep 1870 Burntisland, Fife to John GLOAG
Children: – Sarah, Robert, Catherine, Jessie, John, Margaret, Joseph, Christina, Johan, Jane, Lilias.
•   John Gloag died in 1897 Newington
•   Jessie remarried to John Roberts HALL in 1901 Newington
 ------------

The other couple are John GLOAG and Jessie BOAG who married in 1871 in Alloa (Clackmannan), and then emigrated to USA in 1883.        No children.

There should be no confusion between the two couples. Quite easy to differentiate between them.

[shanreagh]

The HMS Sheldrake that was likely around at the time when Sarah died and John was noted as being a Marine Fireman was most likely this one

'HMS Sheldrake (1889) was a Sharpshooter-class torpedo gunboat launched in 1889 and sold for breaking in 1907' Wiki

Usually, apart from pennant ceremonies (can't remember the correct term) marking the decommissioning of a naval ship, often these ships were alongside for months or years after laying up.

So the ship might have been tied up and looked after by a small crew.  if tied up at a wharf there may have been nightwatchmen or firemen assigned to watch over the ship.  There may even have been quarters nearby for families.  Older men with marine engine knowledge would be useful to have around while a ship was tied up awaiting the wreckers. They could have a role maintaining fire doors, looking after firefighting equipment and general fire watching.  Perhaps they may have stayed on board?

To explore this byway we'd need to search where HMS Sheldrake was tied up prior to the death of Sarah and John.  If it was along the road mentioned by jon_ni     'A Bo'ness Road runs from Bo'ness to Grangemouth, crossing the Avon. Docks in both' then I think it would be quite possible that Sarah may have stayed on after John's death especially if she had a little house landside in the shipyards.

[Neale1961]

John died in Sommerville Street, Burntisland, not Bo’ness.
Same address as 1901 census when he was a railway labourer.

[shanreagh]

John died in Sommerville Street, Burntisland, not Bo’ness.
Same address as 1901 census when he was a railway labourer.

Thanks.  The ref to HMS Sheldrake must have come from somewhere for a granddaughter to mention it in the registration of the death of her grandmother.  Docks, railway workers, marine firemen etc are not mutually exclusive.   People seemed to retain their working life occupations.....hence John's as Engine Fireman

However it is likely a byway.

[Daisypetal]

Could this be Sarah (GLOAG) and George TRACEY living in Surrey, England in 1901?

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X9X6-63W?lang=en


Daisy

[Neale1961]

Good find, Daisy. Yes that'll be them. I knew George was English, but didn't think of looking for them that far south.
It further illustrates my point that Sarah had never spent much time with her grandmother, and probably didn't know much about her great-grandparents, or their names.