McNEIL OF GREENOCK AND LIVERPOOL

 

Edith (Dixon) Timmins (1912-2002), daughter of John and Jessie (Wilson) Dixon, remembered that her paternal and maternal grandmothers were Margaret McNeil and Hannah McNeil respectively and that Margaret and Hannah were sisters. Parish registers and census returns showed that their father was John McNeil, an engineer residing in Liverpool. The initial clues to the origin of John were his age and his birthplace of Scotland in the 1841 census returns, along with the presence in his household at that time of a James McNeil, an apprentice plumber, whose age was given as 15 and birthplace as Scotland. This was clearly a different individual from John’s son James, who was much younger, and indeed another James McNeil appears in the same household as a six-year-old.[1] The older James McNeil seems to have been the James McNeill, plumber, who married Elizabeth Murray on 6 April 1851 at St Martin in the Fields, Liverpool. The marriage record shows James’s father as John McNeill, a labourer. This cut the likelihood that James was a nephew of the John McNeil who married Hannah Sewell and, on the assumption (based on his surname) that James was a close relative of John, it seemed that he was either a brother or a cousin of some degree. In the former case, the John who married Hannah Sewell would also be a son of John McNeil, labourer. James McNeil would seem to be the man listed as aged twenty-four and born in Scotland in the 1851 census returns for Liverpool.[2] Although the ages do not match, he was probably the James McNeill listed as born at Greenock in Renfrewshire in the 1861 returns.[3]

 

Geoffrey Daniels (1916-2005), husband of Margaret and Hannah’s granddaughter Helen Dixon, recalled a vague tradition that Helen’s McNeil ancestors may have come from Dumbarton. The registers of that parish show that a John, son of John McNeil and Margaret McNeil, was born on 6 June and baptised on 10 June 1810.[4] The parents were evidently the John McNeil and Margaret McNeil who were married at Abbey, Renfrewshire, in 1803, when John was recorded as a soldier in the 92nd Regiment of Foot. He served in the 92nd Regiment from 1794 until 1806 when he was transferred to the 9th Royal Veteran Battalion.[5] He was discharged in 1814 and subsequently worked as a labourer for some time. Towards the end of his life, he lived in Glasgow. He died in 1853.

 

Confirmation that Margaret and Hannah’s father John was the one baptised at Dumbarton is obtained from the registers of seamen’s tickets, where a record of 1847 shows that John McNeil of Liverpool, engineer, was born at Dumbarton on 6 June 1810.[6]

 

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McNEIL

 

1          JOHN McNEIL of Greenock, Renfrewshire, and Glasgow, Lanarkshire, soldier in the 92nd Regiment of Foot and 9th Royal Veteran Battalion, was born ca 1776 at Greenock[7] and died on 25 April 1853.[8] He married ca 12 March 1803 at Abbey, Renfrewshire, MARGARET McNEIL.[9] She was born ca 1782 in Argyllshire.[10]

 

Children of John McNeil and Margaret McNeil:

i               CHRISTIAN McNEIL, bap 3 Feb 1805, Weeley, Essex,[11] bur 22 Mar 1805, Weeley.[12]

ii              ARCHIBALD McNEIL of Glasgow, blacksmith, b 4 Mar 1806, bap 5 Mar 1806, St Mary Magdalene, Colchester,[13] d ca 1846;[14] m ca 2 Aug 1835, Greenock, JANET STEWART PRINGLE.[15]

iii             NEIL McNEIL, b 30 Apr 1808, bap 1 May 1808, Dumbarton.[16]

2              iv             JOHN McNEIL (1810-1849); m HANNAH SEWELL.

v              DONALD McNEIL, b 18 Dec 1811, bap 22 Dec 1811, Dumbarton.[17]

vi             CATHERINE McNEIL, b 2 Mar 1817, bap 9 Mar 1817, Greenock.[18]

vii            DANIEL McNEIL, b 2 Aug 1819, bap 9 Aug 1819, Greenock.[19]

viii           JAMES McNEIL of Liverpool, plumber, b ca 1825, Greenock,[20] d 25 Apr 1866, Liverpool;[21] m 6 Apr 1851, St Martin in the Fields, Liverpool, ELIZABETH MURRAY.[22]

 

2          JOHN McNEIL of Liverpool, Lancashire, engineer, was born on 6 June 1810 at Dumbarton[23] and died on 1 March 1849 at Whitehaven, Cumberland.[24] He married on 24 September 1833 at St Peter, Liverpool, HANNAH SEWELL,[25] daughter of James and Mary (Sawyers) Sewell (see here). Hannah was baptised on 29 November 1812 at Beaumont, Cumberland, and died on 14 February 1849 at Liverpool.

 

Children of John and Hannah (Sewell) McNeil:[26]

                                i               JAMES McNEIL, b Liverpool,[27] bap 15 Feb 1835, St Peter, Liverpool.[28]

                               ii              MARGARET McNEIL, b Liverpool, bap 27 Jun 1837, St Peter, Liverpool,[29] d 31 Oct 1908, West Derby, Lancashire;[30] m 24 Dec 1864, Ireby, Cumberland, EDWARD WILSON DIXON[31] (see here).

                               iii             JOSEPH McNEIL, bap 19 May 1839, St Peter, Liverpool,[32] d 26 Jul 1839.[33]

                                iv             MARY McNEIL, b 6 Jul 1840, bap 9 Aug 1840, St Martin, Liverpool,[34] d 14 Aug 1840.[35]

                               v              HANNAH McNEIL, b Jul 1841, Liverpool,[36] d 24 Oct 1881, Burnopfield, County Durham;[37] m 26 Aug 1866, Carlisle register office, Cumberland, JOHN WILSON[38] (see here).

                               vi             MARY ANN McNEIL, dressmaker, b 26 Nov 1843, Liverpool;[39] m              DOBBS.[40]

                                vii            WILLIAM McNEIL, b 21 May 1846, Liverpool,[41] d 16 Jul 1849, Liverpool.[42]

                                viii           CATHERINE McNEIL, b 20 Jan 1849, Liverpool,[43] d 10 Mar 1849, Liverpool.[44]


[1] 1841 census returns, Liverpool (National Archives, HO 107/564/16, fol. 9).

[2] 1851 census returns, Liverpool (National Archives, HO 107/2177, fol. 598).

[3] 1861 census returns, Toxteth Park (National Archives, RG 9/2701, fol. 93). The ages given in the returns are implausible as, barring a swift remarriage, James McNeil was not likely to have a wife aged 55 and a daughter aged two months. The ages may be out by twenty years from the intended values.

[4] Dumbarton parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk).

[5] Discharge papers (National Archives, WO 97/1135).

[6] Register of seamen’s tickets (National Archives, BT 113/278).

[7] In Oct 1806, John was said to be aged 30 and born in the parish of “Ald Kirk” near Paisley. In Jul 1814, he was said to be aged 38 and born at Greenock (discharge papers, National Archives, WO 97/1135). The 1851 census returns for Glasgow (National Records of Scotland, 644/1 202/24) indicate that he was 75 and born in Greenock. It seems that “Ald Kirk” refers to the old parish of Greenock, which existed alongside the new parish of Greenock from the 1740s: The New Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. 7 (Edinburgh and London, 1845), 454-55.

[8] Chelsea registers (National Archives, WO 23/27).

[9] Abbey parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk).

[10] 1851 census returns, Glasgow (National Records of Scotland, 644/1 202/24). A possible baptism, which has some onomastic support, is that of Margaret, daughter of Neil McNeil and Christian McNeil, on 7 Apr 1782 at Kilninian and Kilmore.

[11] Weeley parish register abstracts (www.freereg.org.uk/search_records/58182779e93790ec8bd30023).

[12] Weeley parish register abstracts (www.freereg.org.uk/search_records/5817ee3ee93790ec7590ae40).

[13] St Mary Magdalene, Colchester, parish register abstracts (www.freereg.org.uk/search_records/5cfe5656f493fdc59e4cb9b2).

[14] 1841 census returns, Barony (National Records of Scotland, 622/8/13); 1851 census returns, Greenock (National Records of Scotland, 564/114/7).

[15] Greenock East parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk). The marriage entry names the bride as Janet Stuart, but their children’s baptism records give their mother’s surname as Pringle, and Janet Stewart Pringle was baptised at Greenock in 1809. Ruth Margaret (Daniels) Davies, a great-granddaughter of Margaret (McNeil) Dixon and Hannah (McNeil) Wilson, has DNA matches with descendants of several children of Archibald and Janet’s daughter Margaret McAra McNeil.

[16] Dumbarton parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk). Perhaps the Neil McNeil who married Margaret Denby at Edinburgh in 1838.

[17] Dumbarton parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk).

[18] Greenock East parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk).

[19] Greenock East parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk). He may have been the Daniel McNiel, blacksmith, who married Sarah (Wood) McVoy in 1839 at Liverpool when his father was given as John McNiel, bottle blower. There was a Daniel McNiel, with a wife Sarah, who subsequently served in the 1st Dragoon Guards and had a son Richard Wood McNiel baptised at Canterbury in 1844.

[20] 1851 census returns, Liverpool (National Archives, HO 107/2177, fol. 598); 1861 census returns, Toxteth Park (National Archives, RG 9/2701, fol. 93).

[21] Death certificate.

[22] St Martin in the Fields, Liverpool, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com). There was another James McNeil who is recorded as a boiler maker, aged 31, in the 1851 census returns. However, he appears to have had a marriage proclamation with Ann McGuinnes at Greenock in Feb 1841 so would not have been the apprentice plumber living with John McNeil in Jun 1841.

[22] Marriage certificate.

[23] Register of seamen’s tickets (National Archives, BT 113/278); Dumbarton parish registers (online at www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk).

[24] Female Orphan Asylum admission papers (Liverpool Record Office, 362 SAL 2); death certificate; The Cumberland Pacquet, 6 Mar 1849. John drowned by falling from the side of the steamship “Whitehaven” into the sea during a storm.

[25] St Peter, Liverpool, parish registers (Society of Genealogists, London).

[26] The Cumberland Pacquet, 6 Mar 1849, states that “We understand that McNeil bore an excellent character; that he had buried his wife only two or three weeks ago, in Liverpool, and that he has left a family of seven children to deplore his untimely loss”. The Female Orphan Asylum admission papers (Liverpool Record Office, 362 SAL 2) show that in May 1849, Hannah McNeil had two brothers of the ages of 14 and 3 years and two sisters of the ages of twelve and six years. The same records show that in Nov 1850, Mary Ann McNeil had one brother of about 15 and two sisters of 13 and 9 respectively. This appears to have been corrected from two brothers.

[27] 1851 census returns, Liverpool (National Archives, HO 107/2176, fol. 312).

[28] St Peter, Liverpool, parish registers (Society of Genealogists, Mf 2976).

[29] St Peter, Liverpool, parish registers (Society of Genealogists, Mf 2977); 1871 census returns, Lowick (National Archives, RG 10/5189, fol. 4).

[30] Death certificate.

[31] Marriage certificate.

[32] St Peter, Liverpool, parish registers (Society of Genealogists, Mf 2978).

[33] St Mary’s Cemetery registers (Liverpool Record Office, 352 CEM 4/1/1).

[34] St Martin, Liverpool, parish registers (online at www.ancestry.com).

[35] St Mary’s Cemetery registers (Liverpool Record Office, 352 CEM 4/1/1).

[36] Female Orphan Asylum discharge registers (Liverpool Record Office, 362 SAL 9/1); 1871 census returns, Tanfield (National Archives, RG 10/4955, fol. 93). Hannah was baptised on 2 Aug 1841: St Peter, Liverpool, parish registers (Society of Genealogists, Mf 2979).

[37] Death certificate.

[38] Marriage certificate.

[39] Female Orphan Asylum admission papers (Liverpool Record Office, 362 SAL 2); Female Orphan Asylum admission registers (Liverpool Record Office, 362 SAL 3/1/1); 1881 census returns, Wavertree (National Archives, RG 11/3717, fols. 145-46).

[40] 1881 census returns, Wavertree (National Archives, RG 11/3717, fols. 145-46). Perhaps William James Dobbs (1871 census returns, Bedminster, National Archives, RG 10/2507, fol. 5).

[41] Birth certificate.

[42] Death certificate.

[43] Birth certificate.

[44] Death certificate.