Yearly Archives: 2015

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old

Remembering the members of the Brimer / Brymer families who lost their lives in the two World Wars. Poppy

Private William BRYMER (Regt No 11280) of the Kings Own Royal Lancaster 1st Battalion was killed in action in Belgium 24 May 1915. He is commemorated on the Ypres (Menin Gate) Memorial, Belgium.

Corporal Phillip Alfred BRYMER (Regt No 9451) of the Hampshire Regiment 1st Battalion was killed in action in France 1 July 1916. He is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Picardie.

Flight Sub-Lieut Charles Torryburn BRIMER of the Royal Naval Air Service drowned (failed to return from patrol) 4 December 1916. He is commemorated on the Chatham Naval Memorial, Kent.

Sergeant John Webster BRYMER (Regt No 252608) of the Royal Engineers died of wounds in France 22 August 1917. He is buried at the Saint Sever Cemetery Extension, Rouen.

Private Andrew BRIMER (Regt No 2769227) of the Princess Louise’s (Argyll and Southern Highlanders) 14th Battalion was killed in action in France 27 March 1918. He is commemorated on the Arras Memorial, Pas-de-Calais.

Private Robert D BRIMER (Regt No S/23955) of the Seaforth Highlanders 4th Battalion was killed in action in France on 20 July 1918. He is buried at the Marfaux British Cemetery, Champagne-Ardenne.

Boy 1st Cl. Ernest Anthony BRYMER (P/JX 158209) of the Royal Navy, HMS Royal Oak died 14 October 1939. He is commemorated on the Portsmouth Naval Memorial, Hampshire.

James Simpson BRIMER, a civilian, who died on 13 March 1941 as a casualty of war. He was a victim of the Clydebank Blitz – two devastating air raids on the shipbuilding town of Clydebank, Scotland which left 528 people dead, 617 seriously injured. He is commemorated at Old Dalnottar Cemetery, Glasgow.

Vera BRYMER, a civilian who died 27 April 1941 at the corner of Victoria Street and Baker Street, Portsmouth, Hampshire as a casualty of war.

A.B. Isaiah BRIMER of the Merchant Navy, S.S. Dartford died 12 June 1942. He is commemorated on the Tower Hill Memorial, London.

Sergeant (W.Op. / Air Gnr.) Stanley BRIMER (Service no 1101057) of the RAF (VR) 58 Squadron died 12 June 1942. He is buried in Bilbao British Cemetery, Spain.

Major Hew R G BRYMER (Regt No 64625) of the King’s Shropshire Light Infantry was killed in action in Burma 22 April 1945. He is commemorated on the Rangoon Memorial, Burma.


Brimer-Brymer database last updated at 2016-07-02 00:29:43 with 4028 census records and 2856 individuals

A Chelsea Pensioner aged 28?

Today I came across an 1851 census record for a BRYMER family living at 2 West Port Arbroath[1]. My curiosity was piqued. What causes you to be a Chelsea Pensioner at the age of 28?

Name Relation Condition Age Occupation Where Born
Alexander BRYMER Head Married 60 Land Measurer Auchterhouse, Angus
Janet BRYMER Wife Married 50   Liff and Benvie, Angus
Alexander BRYMER Son Unmarried 28 Chelsea Pensioner Auchterhouse, Angus

Fortunately, I was able to find his army record online which detailed his career from enlistment to medical discharge[2].

Alexander was born in the parish of Newtyle near the town of Dundee. He attested for the 91st Regiment of Infantry on the 9th March 1840 aged 17 years and 8 months and gave his trade as writer – an old Scottish word for solicitor. He enlisted for a Bounty of £3 17s 6d. His description was given as 5 feet 51/2 inches, dark hair, blue eyes and a fresh complexion, with a large brown and hairy mole on the back of his left thigh. His girth around the chest was 31 inches and he bore a satisfactory vaccine cicatrix on either arm.

Alexander served 5 years and 8 months in the Cape of Good Hope between 1842 and 1848. Part of the regiment fought in the 7th Cape Frontier War against the Xhosa people from 1846-1847 but Alexander is not listed in the medal roll.

He was regarded as having good conduct and was promoted to Corporal on 21 May 1843. He was jailed in 1844 and 1845 for drunkenness and remained there for two days on both occasions, being demoted to Private after the second incident. He was promoted to Corporal again in 1848 and then Sergeant in 1849.

He served a total of 10 years and 164 days before being discharged on medical grounds and put on third pay. He is recorded as having necrosis of the tibia and secondary venereal disease which had not responded to 37 days of treatment. On discharge he was described as 5 feet 71/2 inches with brown hair, grey eyes and a sallow complexion.

His pension was stopped on 12 August 1855.

[1] Census. 1851. Scotland. Arbroath, Angus. 272/00 019/00 004. http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk : accessed 10 November 2015.

[2] War Office (Great Britain). Discharge Papers. 24 October 1850. BRYMER, Alexander. Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders (Princess Louise’s) – 91st and 93rd Foot. Service Number 1241. Collection: British Army Service Records 1760-1915. http://www.findmypast.co.uk : accessed 10 November 2015.


Brimer-Brymer database last updated at 2016-07-02 00:29:43 with 4028 census records and 2856 individuals

The 1939 Register

This past week saw the release of the 1939 Register causing great excitement for families researching their ancestors in England and Wales.

The 1939 Register was taken because with war imminent, the government needed to issue National Identity cards to the population. The Register was used when rationing was being planned and eventually formed the basis of the National Health Service registration system.

The Register is important as it is the only national census type resource available from 1921 – 1951. The 1931 census was burnt and the 1941 census did not take place because of the war. The Register continued to be updated until 1991.

Things to bear in mind when searching the 1939 Register:

  • The Register will tell you full name, address, date of birth, marital status, occupation and  whether a person was a member of the armed forces or reserves.
  • The Register will not tell you a place of birth.
  • The Register does not include a person who was on active military duty.
  • The Register will not show people who have not reached their 100th birthday unless they died before 1991. People who died after 1991 can be ‘opened’ by providing a death certificate.
  • The Register includes people who had already been evacuated and were therefore not at their expected home address.
  • The Register recorded name changes which took place between 1939 and 1991 such as marriage, divorce or adoption. Both names are shown on the record and index.
  • The Registers for Scotland and Ireland are not included.

The actual records from the Register can be accessed for a fee from Findmypast or for free by visiting The National Archives. The indexes can however be searched freely online and will reveal full name, birth year, borough or district and county. It has therefore been possible to identify 52 people with the surname Brimer and 59 people with the surname Brymer. This does not take into account any transcription errors which will only become obvious when looking at the actual record or when searching for a specific person. It also does not indicate how many people of these surnames cannot be viewed because their birthday is less than 100 years ago and they did not die before 1991.

The highest density of both surnames was found in Durham. The table below shows which counties the families were living in.

County BRIMER BRYMER
Bedfordshire 2 –
Berkshire – 1
Cheshire 2 –
Cornwall – 1
Cumberland – 1
Devon 2 –
Dorset – 3
Durham 21 16
Essex – 1
Flintshire – 1
Glamorganshire 1 –
Gloucestershire – 1
Hampshire 2 7
Herefordshire – 2
Isle of Wight – 2
Lancashire 10 –
Leicestershire – 1
Lincolnshire – 2
London 5 8
Merionethshire – 1
Middlesex – 3
Northumberland 3 1
Surrey 3 5
Sussex – 1
Worcestershire – 1
Yorkshire East Riding 1 –
Total 52 59

 

Only three Brimer and twelve Brymer women are shown as changing their name between 1939 and 1991. This number will obviously increase as more records are opened. There are also two men with both Brimer and Brymer names recorded and at least one case of a Brimer woman living with a Brymer man!

I am looking forward to examining the records in full to learn more about the families in 1939.


Brimer-Brymer database last updated at 2016-07-02 00:29:43 with 4028 census records and 2856 individuals

Surname Variants and Deviants

 

A surname variant is a long term change in the spelling of a name, usually over several generations[1]. E.g. Brymer and Brimer are variants of the same name.

A surname deviant is a transitory change in spelling which may be caused by a clerical error either at the time the record was originally made or at the time of transcription. It usually occurs randomly and inconsistently.[2] E.g. Brimer has been transcribed as Binner or Bruner and Brograve has been transcribed as Brymer on various online census records.

Deviants can obviously cause a lot of problems and result in ‘missing’ records. FamilySearch[3] provide a couple of useful tools which can help:

  • Commonly Misread Letters Table – this shows how indexers and transcribers sometimes misread handwriting. For the Brimer and Brymer surnames the common mistakes, in order of probability are as follows. Bold mistakes are especially common:
Intended Common Mistake
B R P S
r e s i ei a
i e c l
y g q j z p ej ij if
m w rr ni in iv ev ai ui iu
e i c
r e s I ei a

 

  • Phonetics Substitution Table – this shows how a name was sometimes misspelled when the record was created because the official misunderstood what the informant said for example as a result of an unfamiliar accent. It was compounded by high levels of illiteracy when people did not know how to spell their own names.
Original Letters which might be substituted for the original
B p v bb pp
r rr wr rh
i a e o u y ei uy aye
y i e ij
m mm lm mb mn n
e a ee I o u y ie ea
r rr wr rh

 

It is staggering that there are 24,710,400 possible combinations for Brimer and the same again for Brymer – plenty of scope for those missing records to be found! The number of combinations and the combinations themselves can be worked out using a selective substitution table developed by Andrew Millard.[4]

[1] Kennett, Debbie. (2012) The Surnames Handbook: A Guide to Family Name Research in the 21st Century. Stroud, Gloucestershire: The History Press. pp. 49-59.

[2] Ibid

[3] FamilySearch. Spelling Substitution Tables for the United States and Canada. https://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Spelling_Substitution_Tables_for_the_United_States_and_Canada : accessed 23 October 2015.

[4] Durham University. Palgraves Selective Substitution Method for Generating Surname Variant. http://www.dur.ac.uk/a.r.millard/genealogy/SelectiveSubstitution.xls : accessed 23 October 2015.


Brimer-Brymer database last updated at 2016-07-02 00:29:43 with 4028 census records and 2856 individuals

What is the meaning of the Brimer or Brymer name?

The surnames Brimer and Brymer are usually considered to be variants of surnames Brebner, Bremner or Brimmer. Various meanings have been suggested for these names:

  1. Derived from the name of an ancestor, ‘the son of Brihmar.’ In Domesday Brihtmar, Suffolk; Britmar, Somerset; Brihmarus and Brumarus, Suffolk.[1]
  2. The old form was Brabener, ‘the brabander’ i.e. a native of Brabant. In the Caithness pronunciation of the name the medial b is sometimes heard. Artificers and traders from the Low Countries of the continent settled in Aberdeen and elsewhere on the East Coast at an early date. “The braboner, webster craft or weaver trade, holds eighth place amongst the nine trades” of Dundee (Warden, Burgh laws of Dundee p. 503). The name was common in East Ross, Mar and Strathdon in the sixteenth century.[2]
  3. From the Anglo-Saxon Bremman, Breme or Brim to extend, to amplify to the utmost limits; to be violent, furious, to rage; a violent, bold, furious man; “Foughten breme,” that is, “He fought furiously.” Bremmer, a native of Bremen, Germany.[3]
  4. A passionate man, from brim, to be violent.[4]

It will be interesting to see what the research project at the Bristol Centre for Linguistics in the University of the West of England  write about the Brimer and Brymer surnames  in the The Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland which is not due to be published until 2017. It will contain details about the etymology of all surnames with 20 or more bearers in the UK in the 1881 census, their linguistic origin, geographical origin, number of bearers and geographical distribution in 1881, and the current number of bearers according to the most recent (2011) UK census.[5]

 

[1] Bardsley. Charles Wareing Endell. (1901) A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames. London: H. Frowde. p. 142. https://archive.org/details/adictionaryengl00goog : accessed 19 October 2015.

[2] Black, George Fraser. (1946) The Surnames of Scotland. New York: New York public library. http://forebears.co.uk/surnames/brymer#meaning : accessed 19 October 2015.

[3] Arthur, William. (1857) An Etymological Dictionary of Family and Christian Names. New York : Sheldon, Blakeman & Co. p. 57. https://archive.org/details/etymologicaldict00arthuoft : accessed 19 October 2015.

[4] Sims, Clifford Stanley. (1862)  The Origin and Signification of Scottish Surnames; with a Vocabulary of Christian Names. Albany, New York : J Munsell. p. 21. https://archive.org/details/originandsignif00simsgoog : accessed 19 October 2015.

[5] UWE. Family Names of the United Kingdom (FaNUK) http://www1.uwe.ac.uk/cahe/research/bristolcentreforlinguistics/fanuk.aspx : accessed 19 October 2015.


Brimer-Brymer database last updated at 2016-07-02 00:29:43 with 4028 census records and 2856 individuals