I need help with John Scoon (or Skeen) who married Betty Winlaw (b. Ancrum Roxburgh 1779)
I am at a bit of a brick wall with my 4 x great grandpa John (I think he was most probably SCOON, although the surname seems to be inter-changed with Skeen or even Skene). What I know for sure is that his wife was Betty Winlaw, but haven't found their marriage! They had several children, firstly in Jedburgh: John b. 1805, Margaret abt. 1806 & William 1808, then in Kelso James b. 1814, Isabella b. 1815, Elizabeth b. 1817 /1822 and Adam b. 1827. (I've only found baptisms for James and Elizabeth in Kelso relief church).
Their eldest son (also called John) became a sawyer and married Elizabeth Stewart in Kelso, he seems to have been known mainly by the surname SKEEN. In the 1840s he and his family were living in Edinburgh when they were struck with fever. His wife died and he abandoned his children and went to Wooler (I think). There is a newspaper article in 1848 which reports a case for the new poor law - and this led me to the court case involving the family - basically the towns of Edinburgh and Jedburgh arguing over who should pay for the abandoned children! This was a great find and it gives me the only real information I have on John Scoon senior and the various places he lived. But unfortunately not where he was born.
The good news is that by 1851 John Skeen (junior) had collected his children and the family were living together with his new wife in Wooler, Northumberland.
There are several possibilities for the birth of John Scoon senior, about 1770 - 1780. There are multiple family trees with possibilities and also errors!
Any suggestions?
Many thanks, Jenny
Best Answer
-
@LegacyUser ScotlandsPeople just recently added a bunch of kirk session records that are free to flip through, since they haven't been indexed yet. You may be able to find him in those!
1
Answers
-
Have you tried looking at the sire Scotland's People? It's a paid site, but you can still search their research for free which may help. If that doesn't help, you may need to set up a research strategy session with someone at the Family History Library. Here's the link https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Virtual_Research_Strategy_Sessions
I hope that helps.
0 -
Thank you for your reply Lorene,
Yes I have used Scotland's people and have got some useful information on relatives. But the problem with finding John Scoon's origin is that there are several possibilities in the baptisms, (as well as the surname confusion). I have had a zoom session with a very nice gentleman from the family history library. He suggested some things to me, (posting here was one of them!). But unfortunately I can't access the Family history records unless I go to a connected library, and of course that isn't possible at the moment, I'm not even sure where there is one in Wales... Anyway I watched some very useful sessions at rootstech this weekend and I think I need to examine the Kirk Sessions and Poor Records for the parishes where John Scoon lived and hope they give more detail. But I don't think it is going to be possible until we are past this epidemic - so my ancestors will have to wait! Well they've been waiting for 200 years already - so I'm sure they won't mind
0 -
The ScottishIndexes website has a database of "Kelso Dispensary Patient Registers." It has records for Skeens in the time period you are looking at and gives instructions on how to order the records if you find what you are looking for.
1