What’s in a name?

Jackman isn’t a very common name although it can be quite common. There aren’t that many of us in the world yet the name derives from a servile position. Jackman is a boy’s name of Old English origin and comes from an occupational surname meaning ‘servant of Jack’, see what I mean. However, it does bear a relation to the Hebrew Jack, which also means ‘God is gracious’. Not too bad then.

A quick search of the internet gives conflicting information however. According to Find My Past, I have a rare surname! It’s not in the top 1000 UK surnames! It has 28,400 records for the Jackman surname, the oldest one dating back to 1541.

Ancestry says there are 110,000 census records available for the last name Jackman, while Forebears says it is the 23,935th most numerous family name on a worldwide basis, held by approximately 1 in 322,415 people. Family Search has 798 people in its Family Tree and Google found 532,325 records for the Jackman last name. Make of that what you will.

Jackman is primarily found in English speaking countries, especially in the Americas. Oddly, it has the highest density in Saint Pierre and Miquelon, located near the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. An archipelago of eight islands, it is an Overseas Country and Territory (OCT) of the European Union. 

Why the sudden interest then? Only because I came across the name on page 68 of ‘Mrs Miniver’ by Jan Struther – ‘Undiluted lane-pontifex was not to be thought of, so generally made it an excuse for asking as many people as their dining-room table would hold, and that meant getting Mrs Jackman in to help with the washing up. On the morning of the dinner-party Mrs Jackman sent a message to say that she couldn’t come after all, as her mother was queer.’

It is so unusual to come across my own surname in a book. Of course she had to be common to counterbalance the rareness of the name. It made me think, which is a dangerous thing to do.