lumsden-ross ancestors from glasgow

[lumsden-ross]

would dearly love any information on the lumsden ross family from glasgow grandmother jessie lumsden Ross born
in 1900 migrated to south island new zealand married
william francis Everest Easton born in 1899 Popalar England
my father has told me of a old wives tale which his mother
jessie told him...
that in a town somewhere in glasgow the women of the time
had been sleeping with a man who came from the sea....
and that these women feared / checked their children and their childrens children for defects at birth , the story
was that children would one day be born with webbed hands
and feet...
now you all may be laughing at this story... but could someone in scotland
tell me if it is an old wives tale or a story handed down in the village at that time...

cheers

[Polwarth]

Hello
I'm a little confused - Glasgow is a large city and was a city at the time you are talking about ie 1900... do you mean that your granny came from a village or small town NEAR Glasgow?

Interestingly,I have 3 friends who all have webbed toes, all three between small toe and one next to it! They are not related, and they do not come from from the West Coast...

And I'm almost certain tha your grandfather would have been born in POPLAR, which is a district in the East End of London!

[lumsden-ross]

hello polwarth
thank-you for your reply...
i have my fathers birth certificate and it has that my grandmothers birth place glasow scotland.yes you are right my grandfather is from poplar england i mispelt put an extra a in....my grandmother got that story from her mother which would of been sometime in the 1800s...your friends should try to research if this story is fact/fable
as my father has asked us to check our childrens children for this defect...i really just asumed that their was a village near the sea...(near glasgow)i do not know where my great-grandparents are from in scotland all i know is that the scottish keep their maiden names ie jessie lumsden ross
my grandmothers mothers maiden name was lumsden then she married a ross .....well i think this is fact.

cheers

[Polwarth]

That's not strictly true (about Scottish women keeping their maiden name) -I should know, I'm a Scottish woman!

Historically, the naming patterns in Scotland were often:
first boy named after paternal grandfather, second boy after maternal grandfather, first girl after paternal mother, next after maternal.... If however, there is no male to carry on the mother's family name, it is often given as a middle name...

As Glasgow is on the River Clyde - there are many towns on the banks of the river..

I come from Edinburgh, so I'm from the East Coast - I think my friends have already found out that webbed toes is quite a common Scottish trait - not just from areas around Glasgow. Nothing to do with fables, just hereditary traits!

[lumsden-ross]

hello polwarth

thank-you for your reply this is why it is good to have a site as this one...so with the knowledge from people like yourself can help the people out here in the the world...


cheers