My Wooff Raynor Morgan Hartley Ancestry

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Name Index

A Note On Surnames

As we move further back in time, family surnames often change for example Wooff can appear as Woof, Woofe or Woff. This is often due to literacy levels or lack thereof as people rely on others be they clergy or authority officials to write their names in records. Without reading and writing skills it's rather difficult to check whether the name has been spelt "correctly".

On this site I have taken the decision to follow the convention of using the earliest found spelling (generally related to the birth or christening) as the surname for that individual. From July 1837 (when civil registration of births, marriages and deaths began in England and Wales) where a parish record e.g. christening conflicts with the civil registration (birth index record and/or birth certifcate) then the surname at civil registration is used.

This can mean that the father may have one surname and the children another variation, occassionally this may also mean siblings have different surnames. It's important to record these differences as family branches can adopt either spelling as their surname and as literacy improves this then becomes their family surname even though other branches in the same family may adopt a different spelling.

The following list shows the order of precedence of surname sources used.

• Birth Certificate
• Birth Registration Index
• Parish Record of Birth/Baptism
• Online Transcript of Birth/Baptism
• Marriage Certificate
• Marriage Registration Index
• Parish Record of Marriage
• Online Transcript of Marriage
• Death Certificate
• Death Registration Index
• Monumental Inscription
• Parish Record of Death/Burial
• Online Transcript of Death/Burial
• Census returns

Copyright © 2006-2007 Catherine G Wooff
URL: http://www.wooff.co.uk

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This Page Updated: 6 April 2007
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