JAMES CHALMERS FINDLATER JNR - Bef 1915
James Chalmers FINDLATER (Jnr) was born on 14th July 1891 in Hamilton, Lanarkshire, Scotland. He was the eldest of the eight children of James Chalmers FINDLATER Snr (who is #13 on our list) and Christina GRANT (who is #20). Both of his parents and at least five of his siblings also, eventually, ended up in New Zealand but that will be discussed on the page dedicated to James Chalmers FINDLATER Snr.
James ran away from home at an early age and became a steward on both sailing and steamships. He visited New Zealand on some of his voyages and eventually he decided to stay here permanently.
We know that James was in Auckland on 23rd December 1915 when he married May Winifred BELL, but from his obituary (see link below) we get the information that he had tried to join the New Zealand Expeditionary Force in 1914 which would suggest that James was in New Zealand at least in 1914, but, at the moment, I still haven't pinpointed the exact date of his final arrival. It is quite probable that he was discharged from one of the ships that he worked on whilst it was in a New Zealand harbour rather than travelling here as an immigrant. Perhaps one of his descendants could help with the information? His extensive obituary details part of his travels, plus his life in New Zealand.
James was finally accepted for enlistment with the N.Z.E.F. on 31st May 1917 & was discharged with the rank of Sargeant on 17th Sept 1919. He was awarded the British War Medal & the Victory Medal.
James & May had at least two children:-
- Verena Grant FINDLATER (b: 6th Feb 1917 d: 18th Nov 2003). The "Grant" part of her name came from James' mother. Verena married Eric Sydney HARRISON (b: 13th Sept 1905 d: 18th July 1986) in 1944.
- Murray James FINDLATER (b: 25th July 1923 d: 9th May 2016). Murray was originally registered as James Chalmers FINDLATER and then was immediately re-registered under his current name. It could have been an error by the Registrar or that there was some disagreement between his parents. Murray married Lyndsay GORDON (b: 1st Sept. 1928 d: 11th Dec 2008) in 1952. According to the obituary report in the Taranaki Daily News, Murray & Lyndsay had three children, seven grandchildren and three great-grandchildren up the time of Murray's passing.
I note that there is a Findlater Street in Matamata, which is where James died, and I assume that this street is named after him.
James Chalmers FINDLATER Jnr was the commandant of the Legion of Frontiersmen for 27 years and a copy of the extensive obituary prepared by the Legion of Frontiersmen can be found here.
Now we come to the error which was mentioned on our Facebook page. The astute among his descendants will have noticed that his birth date above is given as 1891 and not 1889 as shown on all the NZ records. The date above is the birth date given in the official Scottish births, deaths and marriages records (see a copy of the registry entry here). There are two possible reasons for this discrepancy.
Firstly that he actually was born in 1889, but not registered until after his parents marriage. There are two problems with that assumption a) he is not shown on the 1891 census with his parents and b) you would expect him to be registered immediately after their marriage (which was in 1890) rather than 12 months later.
Secondly that he falsified his date of birth when he ran away to sea, which is highly probable, and not an unusual occurence, as it is exactly two years earlier than the correct date. From that time on it then became too hard to correct as the false date would have been shown on his discharge papers and he would probably need to use those papers to prove his identity whenever he needed to in New Zealand.
I'm fairly certain that the second reason is the correct one. In reality did it matter? The answer is no, as nobody was ever going to check with the Scottish records (at least until Family Historians got involved) and it made no difference to his life and family in New Zealand.
Note that the family tree for James Chalmers FINDLATER Jnr has not yet been completed nor uploaded into the webtrees software.
