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2024 Week 35: All mixed up!

On my 2 x great grandfather John Young's death certificate, his father is listed as James Young and his mother as a Helen Ravelton. John died at the age of 78 and was a widower. His son James was a witness on the death certificate and both of John's parents were marked as deceased.

Ravelton is not a common name and therefore you would expect researching Helen in the Parish records to be relatively easy, even when you consider its various spellings - Ravelton/Revelton/Raveltoun. However, with names getting passed on down through families, mix-ups can occur and this is what has happened in Helen's case and has led to lots of trees having the wrong Helen, the wrong dates or the wrong parents. Many even have the wrong James Young as her husband!

I myself have also made mistakes in researching her and her husband James Young - James Young is a very common name in this area and indeed throughout Scotland. In my case too, the Youngs and the Raveltons are also closely connected.

It has taken a while to get to what I believe are the correct people and  positioning of them in my tree. At one point I was even considering that my John Young was maybe brought up by his grandparents and it was their names on his death certificate! However, this is how I have 'unmixed' the Youngs and the Raveltons, with the pertinent records available:

John Young (1801-1879) is indeed the son of a James Young  (1764-  ) and a Helen Ravelton ( 1765 -  ). In turn, James Young is the son of a James Young (1739 -   ) and a ... Helen Ravelton ( 1729 -  )! This 'new' Helen is the daughter of a James Revelton and an Elizabeth Gibb, who would be my 5 x great grandparents.

Turning back to my original Helen Ravelton ( 1765 - ), her father was a John Ravelton  and her grandparents were .... James Revelton and Elizabeth Gibb. So my James Young - Helen Ravelton marriage was a marriage of first cousins.

Screenshot from my tree on Ancestry.co.uk

It is little wonder that so many family trees have got all those relationships and people mixed up. Some mistakes are understandable, but there is at least one tree who has one Helen getting married at age 8! 

I hope I have got it all worked out now. If I'm wrong, I hope someone will be good enough to tell me!


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