The genealogical enigma continues

I saw my cousin last week and we had a chance to talk at length about my grandfather. She is very keen on the royal link which made for lots of outrageous speculation and laughter. When she left I found myself wanting to review the facts in order to check that we weren't fabricating a mystery. After all, I don't want to be putting a huge amount of effort into chasing what-ifs when a completely mundane explanation of Grandad's missing birth certificate is right under my nose.

For example, I took another look at my grandfather's name, David Scott Ritchie. My mother, his daughter, grew up with the surname "Scott-Ritchie". The double-barrel form of surname often happens when the surnames of spouses are joined together. Now, I know my grandmother's surname wasn't Scott, but what if my great-grandmother's surname was? In other words, what if Maude Scott married somebody Ritchie and they named their son David Scott Ritchie?

Well, I tried this theory out and turned up nothing useful.

So I went back to my notes to remind myself why I was so sure that David's mother Maude had married David Scott Ritchie Sr. Perhaps, I thought, I was placing too much weight on the fact that my grandfather's name was the same as the husband of Maude Alice Parker. None of the surviving members of my family actually remember what Granny Maude's maiden name was.

What I found though was undeniable evidence that David's mother was Maude Alice Parker. I had in my possession a statutory declaration which served as my grandfather's birth record, stating that Maude was living at 22 Albert Street when David was born in 1902. I also had a copy of Maude Parker's marriage certificate which shows that she was living at that same address. One document came directly from my grandfather and the other came from the Government Record Office. There is no doubt that Maude was born Parker and no doubt that the man she married is the man who spent the latter part of his life in the asylum at Hanwell.

So the enigma continues. My grandfather, senior businessman and world traveller, bearing the noble likeness of Henry Duke of Gloucester, was the son of a cook and a mentally-challenged butler. Perhaps it is no wonder Grandad never spoke about his childhood or teenage years. Yet there must be records relating to his scholastic achievements, if nothing else. I am determined to find these, and anything else besides, because a man with so much charisma and talent is a man whose story deserves to be told.

Photo credit: "Blowing questions" by Brian Yap.