SIGs, Ontario Genealogical Society, Toronto Branch

The Toronto Branch OGS Scottish Special Interest Group (SIG) welcomes members of all levels of experience who are pursuing Scottish family history research. Members of the SIG are committed to contributing in roughly equal measures, in a variety of ways, to its successful and mutually-rewarding operation.

The first Scottish SIG meeting was on February 15, 2011.

The next meeting will be October 17, 2011. For more information on this SIG, contact scottishgroup@torontofamilyhistory.org

Useful Scottish links:

Scottish Way of Birth and Death (and Marriage, Divorce, etc.)
University of Glagow, Dept of Economic & Social History
http://www.gla.ac.uk/departments/scottishwayofbirthanddeath/
introduction/

This site gives a good introduction to the Scottish laws and traditions for Births, Marriages, Deaths, etc.

Discussion on Use of a Married Woman's Maiden Name

A series of messages on Rootsweb Fife message list gives examples of the uses of maiden names, and how they can confuse researchers. Click here to view the messages.

Scotland's People: "RCE" (Register of Corrected Entries) indicator

Some records on Scotland's People have an "RCE" indicator. Click here for a transcription of an exchange on the Fife mailing list of Rootsweb that discusses how to use this feature.

Precognition in Criminal Cases
A precognition is a statement taken from a witness to a crime before the case goes to trial. It is a unique process in Scottish law. This article describes the general process and examines how it is done in one city.

Post Office directories

Chris Paton's Scottish GENES Blog gave the following hint and links:

"A useful tip before spending credits on ScotlandsPeople is to remember that the National Library of Scotland, in conjunction with the Internet Archive, has digitised over 700 Post Office directories for Scotland - 600 are accessible through the NLS website at www.nls.uk/family-history/directories/post-office, the rest on the Internet Archive directly at www.archive.org. The cut off point for the collection is 1911/12, and so if you are unsure about whether a find on the 1911 search page is that for your man or woman, you could try to find them on the directory first, where extra information such as a trade may help you to narrow down further before committing to the extra 5 credits."