Vivien <mdpalmer(a)ukgateway.net> wrote:
Walter Williams was my rather confused gt gt grandfather, maybe because he
was a brewer!
In 1851 in Worcester he thought he'd been born near the River Dee, but by
1861 he thought it was in Brecon!
Having searched IGI for 1784 to ' 94, I can only find Walters in South
Wales, so I am more inclined to believe Brecon. (He was not too sure about
his age either!)
Would anyone know if Walter was a name not used in the North or are IGI
records incomplete?
===============
Dear Vivien,
Welcome to the Breconshire List.
In fact, both of your suggestions are correct.
A brief study of the 1881 census shows that in the late 19th century,
although the given name Walter appeared throughout Wales, it was far more
common in south and mid Wales than in north Wales. The study suggests that
less than 15% of Walters were in north Wales at that time. This picture is
unlikely to have been very different in the late 18th century. However, this
does not mean that the name was rare in north Wales - so one should not
discount the possibility.
In their book "The Surnames of Wales", Rowlands and Rowlands describe a
similar situation with the incidence of the *surname* Walters (and its
spelling variant Waters), stating that these names are ".... largely
confined to south Wales and only found very occasionally in north Wales...".
[Rowlands, John & Sheila (1996) "The Surnames of Wales", Federation of
Family History Societies (Publications) Ltd., Birmingham; ISBN
1-86006-025-0]
The IGI *is* an incomplete resource for the Welsh counties. I quote Chris
Pitt Lewis: "In Wales the Mormons have not been allowed to microfilm and
index the parish registers, as they have in many English diocese. Therefore
the Welsh IGI contains only a small number of entire registers. But this is
less serious than it seems, because they have been able to microfilm and
index the Bishop's Transcripts, and the majority of these are on the IGI."
.... "It cannot be denied that the IGI contains less information for Wales
than for some English counties."
There are also other reasons for not finding a particular entry in the IGI
for Wales; e.g. the manner in which the IGI indexing of entries prior to
1813 tries to accommodate the Welsh patronymic naming tradition.
[Pitt Lewis, Chris, "The IGI for Wales", in Rowlands, John & Sheila (1998)
"Welsh Family History - A Guide to Research" (2nd edition) Federation of
Family History Societies (Publications) Ltd., Birmingham; ISBN
1-86006-065-0]
I strongly recommend both of the above sources to anyone new to Welsh
research.
Kind regards,
John
----------------------------
John Ball, Ystalyfera, near Swansea, Wales, UK
E-mail: wfha(a)clara.co.uk
Homepage:
http://www.wfha.clara.net/
Images of Wales:
http://www.wfha.clara.net/walespic/
Welsh Family History Archive:
http://www.wfha.clara.net/wales/
GENUKI Breconshire Maintainer:
http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/wal/BRE/
Joint Administrator for BRE, MGY, POWYS, & RAD mailing lists
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