Number of surname spellings!

[tessie31082]

Oh my gosh - 1st time I've had this problem! I have a family who so far have at least 6 different surname spellings

Going to be a bit of a task to find any children born and died between 1837 and the 1851 census and any between when they married in 1825 and the 1841 census lol!

How many spellings of one surname have you come up against?

Tessie

[Jill on the A272]

Glazier, Glasier, Glaisher, Glaysher, Glayzer, Glasher and Glaiysher from Fernhurst and Easebourne in Sussex. I used wildcards eg Gla*er to find them.

[bcbrit]

Blair, Blaire, Blare, Blar, Blear, Blais and Blait.

The funny thing is that the Blair family knew how to spell their name on documents, letters etc, but the census enumerators did not!

bcbrit

[Anne in Carlisle]

McQuone, McQuorn, MacQuone, MacQuorne, McKewn, McKwen ... and any other variation you can think of until .... ta da! They all started calling themselves Mellor.

Anne

[tessie31082]

Glazier, Glasier, Glaisher, Glaysher, Glayzer, Glasher and Glaiysher from Fernhurst and Easebourne in Sussex. I used wildcards eg Gla*er to find them.

Wow! Yes I think I'll be writing lists so I remember which spellings I've tried/done!

[Sylvia C]

Cadd, Cad, Cod, Ladd, Lod

Cottrell, Cottrell, Cotrell, Cotrel, Cottrell, Cottel

I had 3 or 4 for Hayhurst ................

Then added in the census mistranslations.

How about Porst


Like Jill, I use wildcards, even using *a"st on one memorable occasion

If all else fails ............... forget the surname, try searching for child by first name, with age +/5, place of birth, sibling and one parent, all of them on forename only.

That's how someone on GR found the "Porst" family for me.

That taught me that lesson!!!

[Karamazov]

My McCartneys are a nightmare: they change their minds between censuses and across births, marriages and deaths as to whether they want to go with the Gaelic or anglicised version of their names. I’ve found them as:
McCartney, McCarthy, Mulharta, Mulhartah, Mulhartha, Mulhartagh, Mulharter, Mulhartee, Mulhartaugh, Mulherlagh.

So that’s 10 variants I’ve come across. Actually, there might even be a few more if I could be bothered checking through baptismal spellings - what I call the whisky priests weren’t known for their consistency! There can also be further search complications where newspapers favour M’Cartney or there is a space gap Mc C....
Never have I made more use of wildcards than with this lot!
At least things settled down in the 20th century with most going with McCartney, although even then one brother opted for McCarthy for himself and his family. I don’t know for sure but I think there might have been a bit of a falling out in the family.
Despite the headaches they’ve caused me, I still think it’s a shame that the Gaelic versions have fallen by the wayside.

Christine

[kylejustin]

I find most names will have a variation or two, but usually picked up by phonetic search options. Sometimes it gets irritating when you find variants and the search function doesn't equate them....so you have to literally search under all the ones you can think off. Or when you have no idea what the start of the word is.....and you can't begin the word with an * or ?.....

Irish shane became shean, sheehan, sheahan, sheene in australian records. An absolute nightmare to trace.

have a french name that would be prounounced "de blay" but usual spelling is "desbleds". Found as debled, deblet, debles, deblez, desblez, desbles and blet. That last one really screwed me up as it was a marriage record and the wife's name alternated between variants of ledean and deshan...

another french name is le forestier. But found as forestier, sometimes they added the town they came from: halescourt. So becomes le forestier D'halescourt. It becomes tricky as sometimes they drop the "forestier" and go by halescourt, alescourt, alescour, allecour etc

one of my german names is prounounced "luke-ah", in german found as lukke, lucke, lucca but in australia as lucan, lucas, lucker, luker.

[Anne in Carlisle]

And the very worst ones are those that might start with a different initial letter eg Tennison or Jennison. The wild cards usually require a first letter so you need to think what those might be.
Anne

[Caroline]

Lewcock is fun to track down even today, never mind in early parish registers- https://lewcock.net/lewcock-surname-variants/



Not much left by the time I put in wild cards. Finding them in a census i n the early days with seriously wonky transcriptions used to be easier if I just put in first name, year and place of birth.

Soundex and other "helpful" index searching doesn't work either as I often get Lewis or any other name ending in cock. I need to examine all Lococks, Laycocks and Leacocks who are 99.9% of the time different families altogether. My pet hate is the ones which do not recognise that Lu and Lew are the same sound ......

Gamson is another good one to find. So is de Fraine.

[ozgirl]

My maiden name is Dutch - I was going through the church records for one of the small towns they came from and at the beginning of the ledgers there was a note about looking for different spellings of a name, and using my maiden name as an example said that there were at least 23 different versions of this name! Listing them all would take far too long - the most common spelling is Kraaijenbrink, then there are Kraijenbrink, Kraajenbrink, Krijenbrink, Kreijenbrink, Kraaijnbrink, Kraaienbrink, Kreienbrink and many more; the first K can be a C, the last K can be CK so the permutations are endless .

[GallowayLass]

Cadd, Cad, Cod, Ladd, Lod

Cottrell, Cottrell, Cotrell, Cotrel, Cottrell, Cottel

I had 3 or 4 for Hayhurst ................

Then added in the census mistranslations.

How about Porst


Like Jill, I use wildcards, even using *a"st on one memorable occasion

If all else fails ............... forget the surname, try searching for child by first name, with age +/5, place of birth, sibling and one parent, all of them on forename only.

That's how someone on GR found the "Porst" family for me.

That taught me that lesson!!!

I have some of your 2nd list who are Cotterell or Cotterill

[Tilly Mint]

I have Ansboro, Ansbro, Ausbro, Ausboro, Ausborough, Ansborough, Ansbrow, Ainsborough, a pain when they lived in the U.K., India, South Africa and Italy

[tessie31082]

It's amazing how many spellings/mis-transcriptions there can be for one name haha! Thanks for the tips

[Sylvia C]

I have some of your 2nd list who are Cotterell or Cotterill

Oh ............... I forgot those two!!

Any of yours come from Lancashire, mainly the Manchester to Ashton/Dukinfield area, possibly some from western Cheshire.

I have a friend whose maiden name was Cotterill, but we've never found a connection ...... hers were from the Cheshire group.

[Gmelliottuk]

I've had numerous on different legs of my tree

Elliott, Elliot, Eliot, Eliott, Elat, Eliat, Elyatt, Elwood

Kirk, Kirke, Kyrke, Kyrk

Foweather, Forweather, Foreweather, Foeweather

Huteson, Huitson, Hutson, Hootsan, Hughtson

Too many for my liking ?

[TrevorFranklin]

loyal, = lloyall, loyale, loyal, layal, lowel, I have even had variations that merge into Lilly and lillie!
poole, = pool, polle, pole, powal, poolly, pol
Graystone = grayston, greyston, graystone, gayston, gaystone

And that is just three of my main research lines

[GallowayLass]

Oh ............... I forgot those two!!

Any of yours come from Lancashire, mainly the Manchester to Ashton/Dukinfield area, possibly some from western Cheshire.

I have a friend whose maiden name was Cotterill, but we've never found a connection ...... hers were from the Cheshire group.

Can’t renember off the top of my head whether they are Cheshire or Shropshire. They are long ago married ins. I’ve got a lot of bods in that Bermuda Triangle where Cheshire, Staffordshire and Shropshire meet. I’ll look it up when I next have the laptop fired up and let you know.

[GallowayLass]

Sylvia C Hopefully you will find something below that rings a bell.

I have James COTTRELL marries Ann MOORE 30 October 1800 at St Michael and All Angels, Middlewich, Cheshire, England. No further information on this couple.
Daughter Eliza COTTERILL baptised in the same church 25 March 1815. Father is a shoemaker. Abode Middlewich.

10 November 1833 Eliza COTTERILL married William ACKLEY (usually spelled ACKERLEY) at St Mary, St Denys and St George, Manchester, Lancashire, England. Later records show him as a boatman.

William ACKERLEY was born 1 July 1812 in Middlewich, Cheshire and was baptised 21 October 1812 at St Michael and All Angels, Middlewich, Cheshire, England. His parents were William ACKERLEY (boatman) and Mary YEARSLEY. I have no further information on this William but Mary YEARSLEY was born 1786 in Sandiway, Cheshire, England, daughter of Isaac YEARSLEY (glazier) born 1747 Dunham, Cheshire, England baptised St Mary, Bowden, Cheshire, England died 1798 Sandiway, Cheshire, England and Mary STREET born 1761 Tatton, Cheshire, England baptised St Mary, Rostherne, Cheshire, England died 1845 Sandiway, Cheshire, England. This couple married 1778 St Mary, St Denys and St George, Manchester, Lancashire, England and are both buried St Mary, Weaverham, Cheshire, England.

Eliza ACKERLEY nee COTTERILL died 1877 at 2 Boothen Road, Stoke upon Trent, Staffordshire, England and was buried at St Peter ad Vincula, Stoke upon Trent, Staffordshire, England. William ACKERLEY died 1888 at Shelton Old Road, Stoke upon Trent, Staffordshire, England. He was buried with Eliza. Their grandaughter Mary Eliza ACKERLEY b.1872, m.1893 d.1941 was my Gt.Granny HARRISON.

[Sylvia C]

Wow, GL

I'll have to do some digging ............. it is some time since I dived into that family before the 1870s.

I'm just about to go to bed, so maybe tomorrow I'll have time to look.