HEBBORN FAMILY HISTORY & NEWS - August 2002.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

A family member once remarked that a certain person with the same surname living in the same area "was nothing to do with our family". I am convinced that the person is related, probably a fifth or sixth cousin. So far, I haven't proved it conclusively.  As families disperse around the country and around the world we tend to lose track of our blood relations. How many second cousins with the same surname have you met?  When it comes to second cousins along female lines you might well pass one in the street and not realise you were related.

When it comes to third, fourth and more distant cousins of male descent they may well have a different surname! All my Hebborn second cousins share a great grandfather who appears in the baptism register as William HEPBURN. By the time of the 1851 Census he had become William EBBORN and when he married a year later he was again HEPBURN. His children were variously HEPBURN, EBBORN, HEBBURN and HEBBORN.

As we look back through the Baptism Registers we discover that William's father is recorded as HEBORN his grandfather as HEBRON his great grandfather as HEYBORN and his great great grandfather as HEEBORN. So which is the right name?  I say, all of them! In days when the majority of the population couldn't read or write, the parson could only record what he heard. He may have had to interpret an unfamiliar regional accent. The vicar who recorded William's baptism was from Northumberland. In that part of the country a name pronounced Heh'burn was usually written as Hepburn. It seems that when he left the parish his successors interpreted our family name as Ebborn, Hebborn and Hebburn.

Spelling was not so important in days gone by. Even the Immortal Bard wasn't restricted to one spelling of his name.  I believe that surnames started to become standardised with the introduction of the registration of births, marriages and deaths in 1837 and the process was completed with the introduction of compulsory education in 1871. How your ancestor was taught to spell his surname at that time is probably what you use today. Just because it happened to be Ebborn, Heyborn, Hebburn, Hebbourne, etc., doesn't mean that the current bearer of that name is not distantly related. 
 
 In modern society where we are increasingly recorded, monitored and controlled by computer, I wonder how long before we replace our names with a number or a bar code!  As any ex-serviceman will know, you will soon learn your number, but will you learn to love it?

22071795 Hebborn, J. [R.E.M.E. 1948-50]