James Douglas' family names

James Douglas (ca 1820 - 1891) was the son of William Douglas and Margaret Usher. He married Barbara Riddell (1830-1904), daughter of John Riddell and Helen Scott.

The two had six children together that I am aware of:

• Margaret Usher Douglas
• Helen Scott Douglas
• William George Douglas
• John Riddell Douglas
• Thomas Lunn Douglas
• Barbara Douglas

The first four names come from the names of their parents. The last two were named after James' step father (Thomas Lunn) and Barbara. But the interesting thing is where the name George comes from in William George Douglas? Could that be a clue to another family name?

James Douglas Tailor?

James Douglas (ca. 1822 to 1891) is the brother of John Douglas, my third great grandfather. I had previously thought that he had been a tailor in Owen Sound, largely based on advertisments and directory entries that I had seen:

James was the Deputy Registrar of Grey County from at least 1870, so this would have been his career prior to that. The ads suggested 1852 as the date of establishment of the business, so he would have been in that profession from 1852 to before 1870. It does make some sense that he might be a tailor as his step-father, Thomas Lunn worked in the garment industry previously and James may have worked with him at some point.

I started, however, having my doubts and started suspecting that there was a second James Douglas living in Owen Sound at the time. Sure enough I found that there was a James Douglas (1830-1898) also living in Owen Sound at the time:

I found an obituary for the second James Douglas, and sure enough he was a tailor who came to Canada in 1852. So my hunch was correct - it looks like there are two different individuals named James Douglas and the one connected to my family is not the tailor.