William Shepherd Myles (1842-1895) and Janet (Jessie) Malcolm (1845-1915) married on December 28, 1867, in Leslie, Fife, Scotland. They had both grown up in Fife, William in Cupar and Janet in Leslie. William, aged 25, was a shoemaker and Janet, 22, worked in a factory. Between 1869 and 1886 William and Janet had ten children.
They started their married life in St Andrews and St Leonards, a parish in the old county of Fife, about 13 km east of Cupar. Cupar is the historic county town of Fife and today has a population of around 11,000 but was half that in the late 19th century. Initially the Myles Malcolm family moved between Cupar and St Andrews and St Leonards, presumably related to William’s work. In 1877 they had moved to North Leith across the Firth of Forth. Leith was then a separate municipal borough, only becoming part of Edinburgh in 1920. In 1886 they were back in Fife, in Dysart, a town and former royal burgh located on the south-east coast between Kirkcaldy and West Wemyss. Dysart was once part of a wider estate owned by the St Clair or Sinclair family.
A traditional naming pattern was often used in Scotland and the Myles Malcolm family loosely followed this. It goes something like:
- 1st son named after father’s father
- 2nd son named after mother’s father
- 3rd son named after father
- 1st daughter named after mother’s mother
- 2nd daughter named after father’s mother
- 3rd daughter named after mother
It can make it easier to determine that you have the right family but on the other hand there can be a proliferation of the same name across generations, which can lead to confusion.
My paternal great grandfather, George, (named for his father’s father) was the first child, born in 1869 at Crail’s Lane, St Andrews and St Leonards. George lived with his family in Fife, North Leith and back to Fife attending school at least until the age of twelve. In 1896 he had moved to Glasgow, was working as a warehouseman, and had just had his first child with Helen (Nellie) Anderson who had been deserted by her husband, William Whyte in 1894. Helen and George had a son, George, (my grandfather) in 1903. George and Helen, who never officially married, lived in Glasgow bringing up their two children and Helen’s son from her marriage to William Whyte. They retired to Dunoon, where George died in 1950.
His sister, Janet Dall, born in Provost Wynd, Cupar, in 1871 does not seem to have followed the naming convention. Janet was a very popular name in Scotland, often affectionately known as Jessie, and is peppered throughout her wider family. Dall is the surname of her maternal grandmother. Janet was living with her family in North Leith in 1881 where she attended school. I didn’t pick her up again until 1908, when at the age of 37 she married Hugh Ross in Kirkcaldy and Abbotshall. She died in Lanark, in 1966, at the age of 95.
Elspeth Dall, (mother’s mother) was, born in Burnside, Cupar in 1873. In 1891, she was a nursery maid with the Love family in Kirkcaldy and Abbotshall and in 1896 she married Thomas Robertson in Dysart. They had at least one child, named, Janet. Elspeth died in Dysart in 1945, aged 72, and is buried in the Dysart cemetery.
In 1874, Elizabeth Shepherd, (father’s mother) was born in Crail’s Lane, St Andrews and St Leonards. Elizabeth and Elspeth are essentially the same name; however, I assume William and Janet wanted to use both the maternal and paternal grandmothers’ names. Elspeth and Elizabeth are often found in the same family. In 1897, Elizabeth married David Gibb in Dysart and they had at least two children. She died, aged 79, in Kirkcaldy in 1953.
William’s namesake, William Shepherd, (father’s maternal grandfather) was born at 12 Trafalgar St, North Leith in 1877. He worked in the linen industry from the age of fourteen, as a tenter and linen dresser. In 1898 he married Joan McLaren Walker in Dysart and they had at least one child, John. William died in Kirkcaldy in 1928, aged fifty.
Andrew Malcom, (mother’s father), their sixth child, was born at Trafalgar St, North Leith in 1879. In 1901, he was a boot maker in Dysart. In 1903, he married Margaret Henderson in Thornton, Fife and they had two children, Annie Dickson and William Shepherd. Andrew joined the 1/8 Middlesex Regiment in 1914 and was killed in France in October 1916, aged 37. He is buried in the war cemetery at Etaples.
Mary, born in 1881 at Trafalgar St, North Leith, is a bit of a mystery. I can’t find any Marys in the wider family, and she wasn’t given a middle name. In 1901 she was living with her parents in Dysart and working as a linen weaver. At the end of 1901 she married James Hutchison. James and Mary had 6 children and emigrated to South Africa. Their first child was named Henry Moncrieff Laird Hutchison, after his paternal grandfather. I can’t help but feel it was a rather grand name for the son and grandson of a plumber.
James Shepherd, (father’s grandmother), on the other hand, could have a whole post written just about him. I think of him as the grey sheep of the family although he did settle down around the age of thirty. He was born in 1883 at Trafalgar St, North Leith. In 1901 he was living in Dysart with his mother and those siblings still at home and was working as a joiner’s apprentice.
In 1905 James sailed to New York on the SS Caledonia. On arrival at Ellis Island, he was detained as an “alien held for special enquiry”. The reason given was CL meaning Contract Labourer. Possibly they needed to check that he did in fact have a contract for work. He was released within a couple of days and apparently made his way to Canada. This adventure was presumably not a great success and in August 1906, he returned to Scotland on the SS Sicilian, departing from Montreal.
He didn’t seem to fare much better on his second adventure. On January 26, 1912, he was admitted to the Liverpool Asylum for the Infirm and Destitute and discharged on 23 February. Liverpool, NSW, today is a suburb of Greater Western Sydney but until the 1950s was a satellite town with an agricultural economy. It’s unclear exactly why he was admitted but he clearly had nowhere to live. His last known abode was Sydney. I don’t know how long he had been in Australia. The only information given in the Asylum records is his birthplace in Scotland and the name, address, and maiden surname of his mother.
I lost track of James for a few years and rediscovered him on the electoral register in Brisbane, in 1922, living with Alice Louisa Dowler. Alice was recorded on the electoral register as Alice Myles although James and Alice didn’t marry until 1924.
Alice was born in 1886 in Birmingham, England and in 1906 she had married William Evans in Birmingham. William and Alice emigrated to Australia in 1912 with their daughter Lilian and settled in Brisbane. During WWI William returned to the UK and served with the Border Regiment in France, where he was killed in action in 1915. In 1917 Alice gave birth to a son, John Malcom Myles who was not registered until 1947, when James was named as his father. James worked as a carpenter throughout his working life in Brisbane, where he died in 1969 aged 86.
Children nine and ten were twins, Alexander Strachan, (pronounced Strawn) and John Malcolm, (mother’s brother) born in 1886 at 220 St Clair St, Sinclairtown, Dysart, Fife.
I couldn’t find the name Alexander in any of the extended family, however Alexander Strachan was a Church of Scotland Minister, in Cupar, in the late 16th century. In 1605 he was denounced for not retreating from his Presbyterian principles and he was exiled from Scotland. In 1843 the Free Church of Scotland broke away from the Church of Scotland, an event known as the Great Disruption. The Minister of Cupar joined the Free Church but William senior’s family stayed with the Church of Scotland. I wondered if Alexander Strachan had been a bit of a hero in Cupar for sticking to his principles. Whatever the reason, Alexander was bestowed this rather romantic sounding name.
Both twins worked as linoleum labourers from the age of fifteen. Linoleum was a new industry established in Kirkcaldy in 1847. In June 1906 Alexander Strachan travelled to New York on the SS Columbia. On 23 September that same year he died, aged 19, in Pittsburgh of typhoid and is buried in Homewood Cemetery in Pittsburgh.
In 1909 John emigrated to the US, travelling to New York on the SS Furnessia. He married Janet Herd in New Jersey in 1912. Janet had also emigrated from Scotland and in 1912 was fresh off the boat. Janet and John lived in New Jersey where John worked all his life as an electrician. They had three children. John died October 1957, aged 71, and is buried at Rosedale and Rosehill Cemetery in New Jersey.
The thing that struck me about this family was their mobility. Janet and William’s ancestors had lived for centuries in Fife. Ten years after their marriage William and Janet have moved their family across the water to Leith. Their oldest son, George takes himself further afield to Glasgow. James really got moving and having tried out the US and Canada, took himself off about as far as he could go. Then came the twins and although Alexander’s foray to America sadly resulted in his death, John appears to have settled successfully into New Jersey and I am sure he has many descendants there today.
Our Folk Stories 
Great read 🙏
LikeLiked by 1 person