Paternal Line.

Researcher
Allan William Cairnduff 

Background History.

I have selected for my project, one of the three paternal lines, from Hugh Cairnduff to my father James Martin Cairnduff. With the small amount of information handed down through the family. I was told that Hugh Cairnduff was born and married in County Down, Northern Ireland. His wife was called Sarah Cowan, and they came to Scotland around 1861 and settled in Neilston, Renfrewshire.
I knew that Hugh was buried in Neilston cemetery; I visited the cemetery and eventually found the gravestone. The inscription on the gravestone stated that he was killed in an accident in 1896,age 57. Buried in the same plot was Sarah and their eldest daughter Martha. I recorded all the details, took a photo, and this was the first bit of information I needed to start my research.  Gravestone photo on page 5..

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Unfortunately the records in Ireland are not as complete as we have here in Scotland, and to research the records would be challenging. Hugh was born five years before the Great Famine in Ireland and must have faced great hardship in those early years; County Down was one of the many areas badly affected by this great disaster in Irish history

Research.

Through a search on the familysearch.org website, I found the marriage result for Hugh Carinduff, born in 1840 and married 1 August 1861 in Newtownards County Down, to Sarah Cowan born in 1839, Hugh’s father was listed as William and Sarah’s father listed as James Cowan. My first result for Hugh was in the Valuation rolls for 1865, found on Scotland people website, Hugh is living in a house in (Ouplaymuir) Neilson Renfrewshire and the surname given was Carnduff. I then searched the 1871 Census, and found Hugh and Sarah, now with a family of five, in Neilston. The entries for the children’s names were Martha, Robert, Agnes, James and Jane (Carnduff). (On the SR birth images, it’s noted that Hugh is employed as a labourer) Therefore from the information gathered so far, Hugh and Sarah came to Neilston after their marriage on 1 August 1861 and before 28 Feb 1862; when Martha their first child was born in Neilston.
All of the 5 children births are recorded as born in Neilson as confirmed in the birth record images. It is possible that the impending first birth was in some way the reasons for them moving to Scotland. I have checked through the 1861 census records for Neilston to see if Hugh or Sarah may have had family already in Neilston. I did not find any other Cairnduff or surname variations of any individuals, but did find 3 Cowan families recorded in Neilston, but their records all show were born in Scotland. My next step was to investigate each of the relevant 10 yearly census records for Neilston up to 1911, and adjacent towns. I used an Excel spreadsheet to enter and sort the GROS data, and through the records saw when an individual married and new families were formed. The next step was to find and download birth, marriage and death record images; as this will result in specific dates, employment and more. All information was then recorded onto the group sheets.
On the Scotlandpeople website by searching for births in Neilston I found the following, Annie Mullarkey Cairnduff born 13 Mar 1878, and died 1 Dec 1879 Neilston, daughter of Hugh and Sarah. Also a birth record image for Mary Jane Smith Cairnduff (Polly) born 22 Jan 1883, Neilston (Illegitimate), she was listed on the 1891 Census age 8, but in no other, I could not find any death record of Polly, but the birth record image did confirmed Hugh and Sarah’s’ marriage information in Ireland, and may not have been the parents as entered, but were recorded as such. She is more likely to be the daughter of Robert Cowan Cairnduff.

(New information update: 15 May 2017) Confirmed that Polly Cairnduff married on the 28 Dec 1905 to Joseph McDavid in Blackfriars Glasgow, then immigrated to New Jersey USA in 1939 with 2 daughter's Sarah Cowan McDavid born 26 Oct 1906 and Grace Nicol McDavid. born 23 Nov 1913. Records show there were two other births Mary Smith McDavid b 21 Mar 1908-d 14 Apl 1911 & Joseph McDavid b 10 Aug 1911-d 25 Aug 1911 Garnagadhill Glasgow.

Another birth record found was for Robertson Cairnduff born 8 Feb 1893 Neilston and died 26 Aug 1893. On the birth image it states Mother as Jane and birth as (Illegitimate), the mother of this child is possibly Jane Rayside Cairnduff, as there is no other Jane Cairnduff in Renfrewshire at that time. Jane had two children born in Paisley 1894 and 1896, before getting married in 1900 to James Sproul in Bury England, another child was born in England in 1901, and one more in 1911 in Barrhead. All carried the surname Sproul.

Hugh Cairnduff was killed on the 20 January 1896 in a horrific railway accident at Nielston station; I searched the Paisley Daily Express archive in the Paisley library and found the fatal accident article, dated 21 January 1896, and this can be seen on page 6.
I have used the Scotlandpeople website to find the majority of information, and LDS Website for Irish and England birth searches. I have also visited the Paisley Library for searching on Ancestry.com, and the Woodside Crematorium book of remembrance website to confirm a small number death entries.

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Note 1:The surname variations occurs in many of the records, and is seen in the census records from 1871 onwards, with three variations of Hugh’s family surname, but by comparing the names of the parents and children, I’m in no doubt that the family records being looking at, are correct. The variations may be due to poor literacy of the parents, the enumerator, or perhaps the official had difficulty in understanding the Northern Ireland accent. The surname variations.1871 Census. Carnduff, 1881 Census. Cavenduff, 1881 LDS Census. Caranduff, and 1891 Census. Cairnduff.  

Note 2: Some images may not be available On Scotland People, as per NRS policy, 100 year for Births, 75 years for Marriages, and 50 years for Deaths. I have also had personal interviews with Allan Murray Cairnduff (Stonehaven), Robert Cowan Cairnduff, (Linwood) Mamie MacArthur, (Neilston) Robert Patrick Cairnduff, (Durban South Africa.)

My descendants have some very interesting characters and stories, some tragic. Hugh and Sarah Cowan have passed down their names to many of their descendants; Cowan crops up in various middle names and in one Christian name, their offspring through time moved from Neilston to Barrhead, Paisley, Glasgow and further afield.
Many of the family members in modern times have emigrated to other countries, we can find them today in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, USA and Canada, I have myself lived for 12 years in Johannesburg South Africa, and 18 years in Dublin, Ireland, it seems that we have within our family this need to explore new places. In Hugh’s case it may have been a necessity to gain employment and better prospects to raise a family.
In 1864 the Caledonian Railway company was carrying out substantial work linking Neilston, Barrhead, Paisley and Glasgow, this work would require a large workforce and records show Hugh was one of them, Hugh was killed 32 years later while working as a railway linesman. There were also many factories in the Neilston, Barrhead, Paisley area, and thread mills required a very large workforce, it is recorded in employment information and from marriage images that a number of Cairnduff individuals were employees in these industries.   
Music played a big part in my family, Archie Cairnduff, my Grandfather and his brothers were all musically gifted and started  ‘The Cairnduff Band’ from Neilston. They would play various local venues in and around Neilston and Barrhead, in 2009 I visited an old aunt called Mamie McArthur in her home, at Mafeking Terrace in Neilston, In the hope of finding out more about the family, she was able to tell me a good bit more about the family and the Cairnduff band, and the practices they had each week in the very house I was sitting in. Mamie also arranged for me to visit Robert Cowan Cairnduff my grandfather’s cousin; he was in a care home in Linwood. I met with him and we chatted about the family, and he told me about his son John McArthur Cairnduff and his family in New Zealand, unfortunately Robert died just two months later aged 81.
Archie Cairnduff my grandfather was a very good pianist, when I was young we would sit and listen to him practising on Sundays, during our visits to our grandparents in Rowan Street, Paisley, even in retirement he would play at various functions if requested. Recently I found a reference on James Cairnduff, Hugh’s 2nd son; it is recorded on his marriage image, that he was a professional pianist.  Both my own Parents could also play a piano, It seems that this musical attribute has been passed down to many family members.

I have never had the need to buy commercial genealogy programs; the programs I use are already on my computer, which are in Microsoft office. Excel is great program for collecting data sorting and storing the information and is especially useful for Census information. I also use Excel for building family trees by inserting text boxes onto a spreadsheet, adding lines and arrows which are easily inserted to link the information boxes and updating is simple and quick. A Spreadsheet can easily be adapted to insert vertical lines to form e.g.: 10 year timelines in which the information text boxes can be placed, this can greatly help to identify related information. When completed I select the area I require, copy and paste into Paint.net, a good, easy and free program which will do everything I need it to do. The finished project can be saved out to any Picture format you may choose or for inserting into a Word Document. For an html page I use a gif format for the picture files, they are smaller and will load up in a web page much quicker. Dreamweaver 8 is the program I use to build CCS Web pages for my website, it’s simple to use and I have used it for some time, since I completed a course on Dreamweaver and CCS web design, in IBAT College in Dublin.
Once the html page is on the internet it’s there for all to see. I use Ancestry.com freepages to host my website; hosting the site is free, and the only restriction is that you have to display a small Ancestry banner at the top and bottom of each web page. Promoting interest on the Internet is assisted by correctly naming web pages but especially photos which are inserted into web pages, the reason for this is that all the major search engines scan web pages, and now index images on webpages, by correctly naming your webpages, and especially the images, will be picked up by search engines, and result in your web pages being ranked high in a search term. There are now many genealogy and family research websites on the internet, Facebook and Groups to join where your information can be shared and may result in you receiving back new information from others with a similar interest.

With all of the new technology coming to us, we need to keep updating our methods of working, recently I have had to change my web pages to accommodate not just for a desktop pc or Laptops but now for smartphones and tablets to display correctly all web pages, clearly and correctly positioned. A good friend in Canada died a few years ago, he used a website to host his many years of family research, the site closed shortly after his death, because his website subscription elapsed and was not renewed, his son did not have the same interest in family history. Fortunately I had a digital copy of all of his information with sources references etc., it’s now displayed on a page on my website, and when required I update with any new information.
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My entire collection of document files, photos, scanned images or any information of value, I store onto my computer’s Hard-drive and backup to an external hard-drive, I recently started to use OneDrive to also store all of my information externally. I try as much as possible to avoid paperwork opting for digital storage of all information.