----- Original Message -----
From: Dawn Henderson 
To: 
Sent: Wednesday, August 18, 1999 3:32 PM
Subject: Re: McNeal Reunion


 Regarding the spelling of names,  it is important to keep
an open mind.  Take my Henry McNeil, for example. He had
five sons.  The children of his oldest son list themselves
as McNeal.  The children of the other sons (clearly the
majority) list themselves as McNeil.  I've found Henry under
several spellings including McNeel. Spelling simply wasn't
critical in the early 1800s. Family stories concerning this
line vary.  I've always heard that the line is Scottish.
Another researcher has a family story that they came from
Ireland. One does not necessarily rule out the other of
course.
>

        I have seen a person's name spelled more than one
way in the same document.  That is not unusual.  Sometime
with census records, the name was spelled according to the
"accent" of the census taker.  One ancestor named 'Ezra' was
called 'Isrey' in a census.

        I do not think it was that uncommon for a line "to
be Scottish" and yet "come from Ireland".  This is the story
that I get on my GREGG ancestors - Scotland to Ireland to
the Colonies.  The same thing occurs with ancestors from the
continent.  They stopped somewhere in the British Isles for
a period of time before crossing the ocean.

Larry Noah - [email protected]
 My family is at -  http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~lrnoah/
 Links can be found there to websites for mailing
 lists NCOrange-L, BrickChurchNC-L and BEARSE-L.

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