Recent Research Additions

May 2022

Children of John Neil and Mary Anne Chrystal.

Continued reworking my family history files. Did some research in the online archives and uncovered baptismal registrations of the births of the children of John Neil and Mary Anne Chrystal. I had previously had brief records of the BMD registrations for some of the children but found baptismal registrations for Marry Anne (1881), Sarah (1883), Agnes 1888, John (1890), Timothy (1893), Elizabeth Chrystal (1895), Susan (1897), Charles (1899), Isabella (1901) and Isabella’s burial register entry (1908). I also found the previously mentioned Elizabeth Chrystal Neil (b1895) at her marriage to John McGowan 24 Apr 1914 and her death on 22 Dec 1965 at the age of 70. I found his death registration 14 Sep 1949. I also found the birth of a child to the previously mentioned Sarah Neil (b 1883) who had married Robert John Fullerton. The child, Matilda, was born 1908. I looked up the 1911 Census and found them at 135 Coburg Street, Laurieston, Glasgow with their children Robert (4) and Matilda (3) I also looked up the baptism of Matilda who was born 5 Apr 1908.

John McDonald Neil

I also came across the baptismal registration of my father, John McDonald Neil in 1918 and discovered that the each register actually had a space for a subsequent marriage which had also been filled in with the details of his first marriage to Elizabeth Mary Johnstone - quite a find.

Timothy Chrystal Neil and Jane Downs

I also looked at the second marriage of my Grandfather, Timothy Chrystal Neil, who married Jane Downs in 1928 (I am especially interested in this branch of the family after being in contact a few years ago with my half first cousin, Linda Hislop Neil,) who was the daughter of the Timothy Chrystal Neil born to TCN and Jane Downs. Linda had told me about some of the family on her side but I mainly just had a scattering of BMD references and not much else. I was interested in any brothers and sisters of Jane Downs and came across the baptisms of other children born to Thomas Downs and Mary Ann Drummond: Thomas Downs (1896), Edward(1897),Jane (1898), Michael (1902), Mary (1904), Sarah (1905). I also looked up the death of Jane Downs 10 March 1950.

Thomas Downs and Mary Anne Drummond – some notes on their parentage and family

I struggled to fit the known baptisms I found with census returns and I was wondering if there were two families involved. I found an interesting Ancestry tree at https://www.ancestry.co.uk/family-tree/person/tree/106837715/person/352223239125/facts?_phsrc=boX256&_phstart=successSource This this gave a lot of detail but I need to work through it properly sometime. There are a lot of siblings for both of them but I was trying to figure out the children of Thomas Downs who married Mary Ann Drummond

This listed children as follows

John 1890-

Thomas 1891-

James Carson 1894-

Jane 1898-1950

Agnes Reid 1900-1901

Sarah Drummond 1905-1935

This didn’t sit particularly well with me so I decided to put it on hold for a bit and move on with other stuff.

July 2015

Thomas Neil Quarrier

The entry in the Cathcart Register of Mortality that records that "Thomas Neil Quarrier residing at Coustonholm died of Cholera on the 7th February 1854 aged 60" which we had known of before is given an extensive examination HERE to see if it has any bearing on "our" Thomas Neil.