Irish Names being Anglicized - c.1900

kassie

I'm wondering if anyone could shine a light on something for me?

Did the British anglicize the names of the Irish back in the early 1900s? I'm trying to do up a family tree for my family and there is one thing that has me puzzled...

My great grandfather and all of his family (parents and siblings) are listed on the 1901 Census as Eggenton, he later went on to join the Free State Army (and we suspect the Irish Republican Army). He is listed on those Military records as Egerton. All of our relatives (even my great grandfathers siblings families) are known as Egerton now. So that would have meant that whole family at the time would have had to change their name and not just my great grandfather (it was suspected that he went AWOL from the Free State Army to join the Irish Republican Army and that is why he changed his name but why would all of his siblings have changed their names also?)

So... I had a thought last night that maybe the Eggenton name became anglicized around the early 1900s because of the British being in the country at the time?

Is this a possibility? If so, are there any records of any such Anglicization?

Any light or info would be greatly appreciated.

pinkypinky

Absolutely not.

Irish people had anglicised their own names much earlier in the 19th century. From about 1880 onwards, we start to see a resurgence of Irish surnames with the Celtic Revival. A lot of people swapped between Irish versions and English versions or used O/Mac sometimes and not others.

Have you looked at the actual handwriting on these records or are they just transcriptions? It would be easy to misread Egerton as Eggenton.

kassie

I have a photo of the handwritten military records (available on the military archives website) and its clearly written as Egerton. That is another option we think might have happened, that over the course of a few years that the family name was changed to Egerton from Eggenton due to peoples pronunciation. As other similar family names are Egginton Egglington Eggerton.

I'm assuming there was no official paperwork needed back then for such name changes? Such as a Deed Poll like we have nowadays.

pinkypinky

Ok, but what about the census - have you seen a handwritten version of that too?

Egerton and Eggenton are not considered variants of each other but both have individual different variants.

Changing your name by deed poll, even in the modern sense, doesn't exist in Ireland. You just start using a different name and building up records in that new name. There would be no records in the past of name changes. The most likely thing that caused yours is some form of illiteracy. Person X says name is Egerton and isn't great at reading, so when Person Y writes down Eggenton (possibly because they misunderstood an accent) Person X doesn't realise it's spelled differently. Then its new spelling is on official documentation and used henceforth.

kassie

I've both printed and hand written copies of the census nd both read Eggenton. Might just be that it was changed/lost in translation over the yrs

Vetch

Is Eggenton an Irish surname? There seems to be very few instances of it in the census.

pedroeibar1

I agree with almost everything Pinky has said. Firstly Eggerton/Egenton is an English (Anglo-Saxon) locative surname and is not and never was and ‘Irish’ name. If the family’s genealogical links mentioned are correct it is an example of name ‘drift’ which we all know happens – Dowling, Dowley, Downing, Downey being a typical example.

Not relevant in this case, but the bit about name change by deed poll needs a bit more clarification. Names can be and are changed by deed poll in Ireland, it is not a complicated process. You simply swear an affidavit that you have given up your former name and henceforth your new name is ‘whatever’.. You sign the deed in the presence of a witness who must also swear an affidavit before a solicitor or commissioner for oaths. It is not really necessary to register this in the Central Office of the High Court office but it makes things easier for certain events.

.Back in the days before divorce it was more frequent than today – e.g. John Smith’s marriage breaks down, he and wife split, no divorce possible, they go their separate ways. John Smith meets Mary Jones and they set up together. Mary Jones changes her surname to Smith, so the children of that union are baptised ‘Child, son/daughter of John and Mary Smith (formerly Jones)’. So everybody is content with the proprieties, no neighbours peeking from behind curtains and the head nun in the local school does not ask awkward questions.

kassie

Vetch wrote: »

Is Eggenton an Irish surname? There seems to be very few instances of it in the census.

When we assumed all of our ancestors were Egerton, we presumed that one of them came from England as Egerton is a huge name in the UK. When we went digging, we learned that we were in fact Eggenton (first names of family members and address matched) and there are very little of this name on the 1821 to 1911 Census forms. It could be that if I had the resources to dig back further that it did come from the UK.

Out of curiosity - are there other census forms available to view anywhere on the web?

On looking through another Eggenton file I downloaded from the Military Archives there was question as to the name spelling, the Military referred to them as Egginton/Eginton in its correspondence but the man in question said his name was spelled Eggenton but used Egginton/Eginton for the avoidance of any doubt when writing to the Military (as that is what they used). And in some of the hand written letters it is easy to see how the name could have been misinterpreted as at a quick glance in old handwriting Eggenton could be mistaken for Egerton.

The more I think of it the more i'm accepting that it was just "drifted" (to quote pedroeibar1). But all of my great grandfathers siblings changed to Egerton... we are attending the local church where they lived shortly to look up their baptismal (and possible marriage) certificates, and hope that talking to other cousins will help shine a light on the matter.

pinkypinky

There's no earlier complete census than 1821 for the UK or 1901 for Ireland.

srmf5

As others have already said, I'd say that it's just a natural change in the spelling over time. A surname on my mum's side changed from Feenaghty to Finerty to Finnerty. Even with it being spelled Finnerty, my dad said that his father always pronounced it as 'Feenerty'.