Can not read old handwritting

[Suzanne Yelton]

I have two documents from 1700's Scotland that I can not read. Both concern an ancestor and may be important to making a connection to Scotland. If anyone can help I would be very grateful! This is my first post so perhaps someone can guide me through the process.

[Lesley Robertson]

First of all, welcome to the British Genealogy Forum! You'll find that we have a community of helpful people here.

The trouble with 18th century scottish handwriting is their use of "secretary hand", a sort of shorthand with standardized abbreviations. Some letters were written differently, and there were also a couple of extra letters (yogh and thorn).

As long as the files are not enormous, you can always post key bits here for people to try, but that isn't practical for whole documents.

There's an article in the Help section of Scotlands People HERE about reading early handwriting which might help. It'll certainly explain what's going on and there's links to other very useful sites.
I have found the tutorials on the Scottish Handwriting (National Records of Scotland) website HERE very helpful.

[Suzanne Yelton]

Thanks for the lovely welcome! I have isolated the areas of the documents and they are not large so could probably be posted here. I'm a Senior citizen so please bare with me Thank you so much!!

[Sue Mackay]

I can't make it all out, but the first extract seems to say

James YELTON ??? April born child buried fourth ????

The second looks as if it has a place name M'oro. Could this be Middlesborough?

Robert YELTON M'oro Burgess and Margaret BROWN his spouse A.S.N. [alternative surname?] JAMES
w [witnesses] James SPOTSWOOD, John BLAIR, barbers, John EISTON ???maker, Max??? SCOTT M'oro and Robert BROWN ???

I'm sure someone else can do better!!!

[Lesley Robertson]

The third word in the first one is indweller, and I think that the last two words are Brouns houses, I think.
Suzanne, what parish is that first one for?

The second one is for an area of Edinburgh. I'll have a look when I get home...

[Megan Roberts]

The second looks as if it has a place name M'oro. Could this be Middlesborough?

As it's a Scottish document could it be Musselburgh rather than Middlesborough?

[Suzanne Yelton]

The third word in the first one is indweller, and I think that the last two words are Brouns houses, I think.
Suzanne, what parish is that first one for?

The second one is for an area of Edinburgh. I'll have a look when I get home...

Lesley, the first one is from here:



You ladies are wonderful!! Thank you so much and your guesses are certainly better than mine LOL!

[arthurk]

Another opinion:

James Yelton indueler a Still Born Child Buried South Brouns House

Robert Yelton Merd Burgess and Margaret Broun
his Spouse a S.N. James w. James Spotswood
John Blair Barbers John Eiston weegmaker
Alexander Scott Merd and Robert Broun pursi
vant

I think Merd will be an abbreviation for Merchand - an old form of Merchant
S.N. will stand for Son Named
weegmaker I think will be wigmaker - the OED has old variants of periwig including peiriweig and piriweeg
pursivant may be a variant of pursuivant, which at one time meant messenger

[Suzanne Yelton]

I am trying to prove that the child James, born to Robert & Margaret Broun Yelton in 1712 was not the James who was stillborn in 1714! Not sure why this couple would have had to sons named James... very confusing!! The James Yelton in my family shows up in American in 1743, Overwharton Parrish, Stafford County, Virginia when he marries Isabel Henson. Prior to that date, he is nowhere to be found! We are very sure he must have come from Scotland (because that is the only place we find records for Yelton in the 1700's). My group of genealogists have been working on this for over 35 years!

[Suzanne Yelton]

One more quick question, where it say: a S.N. James w. James Spotswood, could that mean that James was placed with James Spotswood as an apprentice????