Santa found with elf, turkey and trimmings

A baby Santa has been found together with a sleigh and snow, an elf, turkey and all the trimmings – in a festive search of Scotland’s families.

 
Researchers at National Records of Scotland (NRS) found the merry monikers during a look through the birth, marriage, tax and census records on the Scotland’s People website.

Santa Bianchi was a baby girl born in Glasgow in 1901 to her mother Lucia and her father Pasqualo who was an ice cream dealer.

Advent Allan of Bridgeton, Glasgow, was born on 7 December 1871, while Henry Christmas Clarke was born on Christmas Day in Inverness in 1876 and went on to become a priest.

Another who made December 25 extra special was William Snow – a soldier who married in Edinburgh on Christmas Day in 1805.

While some were named after the December 25 celebration, others had accidental Christmas connections, such as Angel Maria Lopez, born in Glasgow in April 1873 and named after his father.  

Julia Tinsel was born in 1882 at Logie in Perthshire, while George Turkey was living in Rose Street in Edinburgh according to the 1841 census.

Meanwhile, Agnes Elf O’Brien was born in Peterhead in 1899. It’s not known if she had any connection to Robert Sleigh, a shoemaker found in the 1878 valuation rolls.

A Frederick Trimming – presumably from a family of Trimmings – married Elizabeth Hurly in Edinburgh in 1868.

NRS also found a historical namesake for George Bailey, the fictional lead character in Frank Kapra’s 1946 Christmas classic movie It’s a Wonderful Life, played by James Stewart.

Hollywood star Stewart, born in Pennsylvania in 1908, had strong Scottish family roots. However, the George Bailey found in Scotland’s People was a stage carpenter who was recorded living with his wife and two daughters in the Ferryhill area of Aberdeen in 1901.

Alison Byrne, Chief Executive of NRS, said: “This list of Christmas names gives a glimpse into the treasures which lie in our archives.

“We can’t promise everyone has an ancestor called Santa or Elf but if your relatives owned or rented property or were born, married or died in Scotland it’s likely that they’re in our records.”