Ancestry clues?

                                                        The White Hart Hotel, Port Ellen, Islay

A message I send on Ancestry got a response, well, actually two responses before I replied. That prompted me to look at my own family tree on the website. The link between me and the person I am corresponding with is far back at the fourth grandparent level on my tree, my 4x great grandmother, Janet McCuaig.

Although I haven't done much research on the McCuaigs, I recall exchanging emails with McCuaig researchers back in the day when email and online lists were the extent of genealogical research on the World Wide Web. But now we have super databases like Ancestry and it was throwing up hints on my own family tree linked to my Janet McCuaig. Maybe I could find out more about the McCuaig line. That way I would know more when I exchanged information with my correspondent.

There were two hints from different trees when I clicked the hint leaf for Janet McCuaig. Both listed the birth of my 3x great grandmother, Flora Gilchrist to Janet McCuaig. We all agreed on Flora's birthdate. It was looking good. One of the trees didn't have any further data about Janet. The other had much more information including Flora's marriage to Lachlan Hunter and the births of all of that couple's children. Everything on that tree looked good but what was this? The death date of Flora's husband, Lachlan Hunter, was listed as 1859. That didn't seem right.

Included in Flora Hunter's time line attached to that tree was a citation for the 1841 census. I checked my copy of that census. If the tree owner had looked at the census entry didn't they wonder why Flora and children were listed but Lachlan was not? A glance at the 1851 census would have confirmed that Flora Hunter was listed as a widow and their son, Hugh, was listed as a farmer of 20 acres employing one labourer. There is a lesson to be learned from this. It looks like I'll have to look closely at anything I find on others' trees and make sure of the research.

My foray on Ancestry hadn't given me much more information to share with my correspondent about the McCuaigs. For that I'll need to delve into the information in Hugh Hunter's will (the son who was listed as the farmer on the 1851 census) and the family connection to the White Hart Hotel in Port Ellen. Sometimes old fashioned research yields the best clues.

Sources:

Ancestry.ca family tree hints

FamilySearch 1841 census Scotland, Argyll, Kildalton film 1042720

FamilySearch 1851 census Scotland, Argyll, Kildalton film 1042355