Tuesday 22 September 2009

George Shaw Forrester

George Shaw Forrester is recorded in the 1881 Census at Carrickstone, Cumbernauld, aged 7, grandson of Joseph Shaw and Agnes Waugh. From his birth entry it was found that he was the son of their daughter Jane and James Forrester. Interestingly both the father and grandfather are recorded as informants. Was the father reluctant to be identified or was grandfather Joseph unsure if the unmarried father would be accepted as a true informant as he probably didn't attend the birth?
Three years after George was born his mother married James Stark in 1877, which is probably the reason that George is living with his grandparents.
By the 1891 Census George Shaw Forrester is working for his uncle, James Shaw, at Ramoan Farm. After that the census trail goes cold.
I came across an entry about George on a website by Roy Forrester where the birth of George was recorded (but to the wrong daughter). I contacted Roy and we agreed that George didn't appear on any later census and that we didn't know what had happened to him. I speculated that he might have emmigrated to Australia, like his youngest uncle William Marshall Shaw.
A few months later Roy forwarded an e-mail to me from Margaret Forrester, the grandaughter of George. Apparently he had married a Margaret Collins in Grangemouth in 1903. They then went on to have five children in Cumbernauld. In 1924 they all emmigrated to Brisbane, Australia. So right destination, wrong time and wrong reason!
Although I now know what happened to George I am still left with the mystery of where he was in 1901.

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