Cannon to Canning

[Ambersand]

Hoping to get some clues.
For some reason, a few members of a family in Kintbury, Berkshire, England with the surname “Cannon” changed the spelling to “Canning”.
This took place over a period ranging from late 1700s to early 1800s.
Sometimes they’d get married as Cannon, then have the children baptised as Canning. Some even had their weddings registered under both names.
A few decades later, some of them switched back to Cannon.
I note that in a US record of name changes that a Joshua Cannon registered a name change to Canning in the US Berkshire around the same time.
There were landed gentry called Cannon, living in the area, but they didn’t do it.
I’ve traced the line, mostly connected to James Cannon/Eleanor Jacob back a few generations and it was still Cannon.
Any thoughts on what might have prompted some of them to do that?

[Lesley Robertson]

I doubt whether it was deliberate if it kept switching - people tended to speak their names to the parish clerks, who wrote down what they thought they heard. If they weren't all accustomed to the same local accent, mistakes were made and few couple would have thought to check or argue with the Parish Minister.

Scotland was worse than England - I have one baptism where the spelling was different for the child, father and grandfather!

[pwholt]

It is also likely that the Cannons could not read anyway so they did not know what was happening to their names. I have heard of another family which changed from Herring to Heron, to which they were very attached, so much so that they had a heron emblem on their front screen door! They were a bit embarassed when their researcher made her report. We've had atrocious things done to our surname when my husband gave it over the telephone to a Londoner. I also know of a marriage which was searched for for years. The name was WOOD but local dialect pronounced it as 'OOD. The vicar recorded it as HOOD. pwholt

[suemalings]

Hoping to get some clues.
For some reason, a few members of a family in Kintbury, Berkshire, England with the surname “Cannon” changed the spelling to “Canning”.
This took place over a period ranging from late 1700s to early 1800s.
Sometimes they’d get married as Cannon, then have the children baptised as Canning. Some even had their weddings registered under both names.
A few decades later, some of them switched back to Cannon.
I note that in a US record of name changes that a Joshua Cannon registered a name change to Canning in the US Berkshire around the same time.
There were landed gentry called Cannon, living in the area, but they didn’t do it.
I’ve traced the line, mostly connected to James Cannon/Eleanor Jacob back a few generations and it was still Cannon.
Any thoughts on what might have prompted some of them to do that?

Just in case you haven't seen it - on Ancestry there is a tree with Joseph Cannon born Kintbury, marrying Hannah Challis in St. Mary's, Kintbury. 7 children.