The one that got away

Not all private detectives' lives can be traced - which, given their jobs, they might have been appreciative of

Although I can often find details of individual private detectives - their parents, their spouse, their children - it’s harder to find out the details of what they actually did in their professional lives. Unless they had the money to advertise in the press, or were mentioned in specific cases covered by the newspapers, much of what they did was - necessarily - in the shadows.

And sometimes I fail to even flesh out a private detective’s private life even. For example, I know that John McIvor was a private detective working in Glasgow in 1891. I know he was born in 1855 in Aberdeenshire, and that he had a younger wife named Mary (born in Lanarkshire in 1869). In 1891, he was living on Glasgow’s High Street (where I also used to live, but sometime after McIvor!)

However, I can’t find a mention of him in the newspapers, and the censuses are so full of men of his name and approximate age - and married to other women named Mary - that it’s hard to determine who he was, and what he did earlier in his life.

It’s possible that McIvor emigrated to Canada and remained there for the rest of his life, but again, I can’t be sure. It just shows that some private detectives’ lives remained private.

Of course, if you know of John McIvor and can help me learn more about his life, do get in touch!