I love learning family members’ middle names. Sometimes they are unusual or passed down in the family. But sometimes they are the mother’s or grandmother’s maiden names. So if a relative has a middle name that sounds an awful lot like a surname, you may have hit on a female relative’s maiden name.
My grandfather and two of his siblings have the maiden names of their mother and both grandmothers as middle names:
- Charles Thompson Wilson, born May 1907 – Thompson was his mother Mary’s maiden name
- William Gibson Wilson, born September 1908 – Gibson was his paternal grandmother Mary Ann’s maiden name
- Theresa Dunning Wilson, born December 1909 – Dunning was her maternal grandmother Elizabeth’s maiden name
Week 23 (June 3-9): Namesake
