William Oman

ninatoo · Post by **ninatoo** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 12:17 am

Hi all,

I have been trying to help a friend with her tree recently and have a couple of stumbling blocks, highlighted in bold below, so I hope people here can point us in the right direction.

William Oman was born about 1828, probably in Midlothian. We are unsure of his parentage. Because of this we can't confirm where he was in the 1841 census. He married Isabella Drummond in St Cuthberts, Midlothian in 1849. We have the OPR for this marriage and it mentions that William was a blacksmith, and Isabella was the daughter of Robert, a shoemaker.

By 1854 they were in Australia, in Victoria. I can't find a ship's record for them. This is when a son John Thomson Oman was born, followed by William, 1856, Isabella, 1857, Catherine, 1857, Helen/Ellen Patterson 1859 and Robert 1861. We cannot find William and Isabella on the 1851 census for Scotland, although there is a possible William living with a Cameron family. But then, where is Isabella?

Also given that the first known child was born in 1854, there ought to be two more born before that...I was hoping they would all be there in order to get a clue about the parent's names (as per Scottish naming patterns).

So the middle names Thomson and Patterson seem to be clues...I found Isabella's parents are most likely Robert Drummond and Isabella Patterson, but when they married in 1823, Robert was a coachman, not a shoemaker....so I am unsure about this.

According to another researcher, the death registration (on some Australian Indexes on CD's) for William does not have his parent's names. He died in 1911 in Victoria, Australia. I am not sure how this researcher knows it is the correct William, but we are finding out who the informant was.

So in summary, I think we are trying to establish:

a) Who were the parents of William Oman, and possible confirmation of the parents of Isabella?

b) When did they immigrate to Australia?

c) Where can we look to attempt to find out more? (We have looked at most things online, but feel free to make suggestions, as you never know what we might have missed).

I hope this isn't too confusing!

Thanks in advance!

Nina

speleobat2 · Post by **speleobat2** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 12:59 am

Hi Nina,

Here's a Robert Drummond, Shoemaker from the 1841 Census. His wife is Isabella and they have a daughter Isabella who is 11. She would be 18-19 years old in 1849 when the marriage with William took place.

Name: Robert Drummond
Age: 50
Estimated Birth Year: abt 1791
Gender: Male
Where born: Midlothian, Scotland

Civil Parish: Edinburgh St Cuthberts
County: Midlothian
Address: 2 James Place North
Occupation: Shoem
Parish Number: 685/2
Neighbors: View others on page
Household Members: Name Age
Elizabeth Drummond 3
Isabella Drummond 40
Isabella Drummond 11
John Drummond 9
Mary Drummond 13
Robert Drummond 50

What were the names of the two children believed to have been born before 1854?

Carol

ninatoo · Post by **ninatoo** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 1:07 am

Hi Carol,

Thanks for that, I just found it myself!

I am not sure of the names....my theory is that if they were known they may have given a clue to the names of William's parents, given the tradition of the first son named after father's father, etc.

Nina

Post by **SarahND** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 1:52 am

Hi Nina,
This doesn't help, but it looks as though William was counted twice in 1851, with a 7-yr age difference

Unless you think that one parish in Edinburgh is likely to have two blacksmiths by the same, not-that-common name...?

There is the one you mentioned who is stepbrother to Peter Cameron, living at 42 Brown's Street, Edinburgh St Cuthberts (age 23 born in Edinburgh)

Then, at 7 Carnegie Street, Edinburgh St Cuthberts, there is another William Oman, blacksmith, who is a lodger in the house of Jane Wallace, age 63. This William is 30 and was born in Canongate, Edinburgh... One fascinating thing is that Jane Wallace, head of household, has the occupation "Town Pauper"

As I said, it doesn't help much, since Isabella isn't at either address. Could she have been giving birth at the family home somewhere? Since the Ancestry index doesn't give the marital status, I can't tell whether either one of these or both are married men... Have you seen the image for the one you mentioned?

All the best,
Sarah

Post by **SarahND** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 2:07 am

SarahND wrote:Unless you think that one parish in Edinburgh is likely to have two blacksmiths by the same, not-that-common name...?

W-e-l-l, maybe there were two of them!! I just thought to see if any were left there in 1861 and sure enough, there is:

1861
4 Paul Street, Edinburgh St Cuthberts, Midlothian
William Oman, 39, Head, born St Cuthbert, Edinburgh, Smith
Mary K Oman, 32, Wife, born Edinburgh
John Oman, 9, Son, born Edinburgh, Scholar
William Oman, 7, Son, born Edinburgh, Scholar
Mary Oman, 5, Daughter, born Edinburgh, Scholar
Helen Oman, 3, Daughter, born Edinburgh

Wait

These children look eerily similar to the ones you listed

Could Mary be Isabella? But your Omans were in Australia by then... Hmmm.

k Sorry if I'm confusing things further...

Regards,
Sarah

ninatoo · Post by **ninatoo** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 2:11 am

Hi Sarah,

I just looked at the census images. The 23 year old IS married. The 30 year old is not. Hmmmm. So if the 23 year old is our William, where the heck is Isabella?

I scrolled through 900 odd 1851 census records at Ancestry for Isabella, no surname and none of them even look close to her.

The 1861 census does look interesting, doesn't it. But my friend is sure our William was in Australia by 1854, and also that Isabella was his wife until death in Australia.

Thanks for the help so far!

Nina

speleobat2 · Post by **speleobat2** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 2:47 am

Nina,

I guessing that you have already looked at the Index for Assisted British Immigrants for Victoria? There are 8 Omans listed from 1840 to 1861. One William in 1857. The year is off unless he had been somewhere else and then returned to Victoria?

Isabella may just have avoided the census in 1851. My great uncle Jack managed to do that in both 1920 and 1930. He was just ornery!

Carol

ninatoo · Post by **ninatoo** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 3:12 am

Hi Carol,

I am not sure if I have looked there or not; I have been looking at so many things. Is there a link to it please?

Nina

Currie · Post by **Currie** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 3:47 am

Hello Nina,

If William Oman ended up in a Gold area in Victoria or even if he didn’t its more than likely that he would have been a gold seeker. If he was a mad keen gold seeker he may well have gone to California after he heard about the 1849 strikes and maybe come to Australia from there. There was no great difficulty for gold seekers to get from California to Australia after the major finds in New South Wales and Victoria in 1851. I wouldn’t rule out that possibility. If that theory was reality maybe the missing kids, if any, were California born.

You can get the whole Oman BDM Index from the Victoria BDM at http://online.justice.vic.gov.au/bdm/in ... chCriteria
For the whole period, they’re only 158 Oman records over 8 pages at 99 cents a page. If the parent’s names were recorded they’ll be in the index. There are only 8 William Oman deaths in Victoria right through to 1985. There’s also a marine Oman death around 1870 on the same site. On NSW BDM http://www.bdm.nsw.gov.au/familyHistory/search.htm there’s maybe the death of the son 6279/1936 OMAN WILLIAM (F) WILLIAM (M) ISABELLA, SYDNEY

A Victoria deaths certificate will be about the same as an 1855 Scottish one and show the names etc of any children. But the people in the index are probably all related and there should be enough info there to link most of them together including those born elsewhere but dying in Victoria without having to refer to a death certificate.

This is possibly the other researcher you mentioned http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi? ... =I95345167 I’m not sure I understand her shorthand but it seems to be indicating a 1860 death in Streatham, Victoria, or maybe 1911 Lismore Victoria? If you search for Oman at the State Library of Victoria you’ll find reference to a 1915 Streatham School photo with a tribe of Oman kids. http://sinpic.slv.vic.gov.au/cgi-bin/Pw ... PAGE=First
If the family was that well established in the area you’d think his death would have occurred thereabouts.

Here’s another researcher’s 1998 enquiry that mentions an Elizabeth Oman born c.1804 http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/read/GE ... 0902048774

The Oman family are on this Streatham cemetery index. Isabella’s there but not William, maybe his death was too early for that cemetery. http://members.datafast.net.au/marrtronics/STREATH.HTM

Here’s Lismore cemetery index which seems to rule out the 1911 death.
http://home.vicnet.net.au/~marr/LISMORE.HTM

Hope this helps,
Alan

ninatoo · Post by **ninatoo** » Mon Feb 18, 2008 4:08 am

Wow, Alan, that's fantastic.

I think my friend has had contact with some of the researchers you mention, but I am not sure about all of your finds. Thanks so much for that. I wonder how some came to the conclusion that William died in 1860? We are under the impression that he died in 1911, but then again, it wouldn't be the first time something was disproven.

That is an interesting idea you have about the gold fields. It has been circling around my mind, but I haven't asked my friend about it yet. Given that the gold rush was going on, it can't be discounted, so thanks for giving us another avenue to pursue.

Nina