Hambrick Name Meaning
Respelling of German Hambrecht.

Hambrecht Name Meaning
German: from the Germanic personal name Haginberht, a compound of hagin 'enclosed area' + berht 'bright', 'famous'.

Source: Dictionary of American Family Names ©2013, Oxford University Press

Before Hitler, Germany had a large Jewish population. With three exceptions - "Levi", "Cantor" and "Cohen", all with many spelling variations - there are no "Jewish" surnames.

With some exceptions, there are no "Christian" surnames, either. One exception is "Christian" itself; you may remember Fletcher Christian from the Mutiny of the Bounty. Others are "St. John", "St. Paul", "St. Hilarion" and any other surname that starts with "Saint". Some other occupation name that is also a Christian job - "Pope" and "Priest", for instance - point to a Christian family. (Someone named "Pope" wasn't necessarily the result of His Holiness trifling with a cleaning maid; he may have worked for the Pope as a gardener or carpenter.)

Every other European surname could be Jewish, Christian - or Druid, for that matter.

Given the number of Jews vs. the number of Christians in Germany, pre-Hitler, chances are over 90% that someone with a German last name is Christian.

You are right about one thing Gideon is of Jewish origin.

Gideon Name Meaning
Jewish: from the Biblical name meaning 'one who cuts down' in Hebrew. It was borne by an Israelite leader appointed to deliver his people from the Midianites (Judges 6:14).

"Giddens" isn't, though;

Giddens Name Meaning
English: variant of Giddings.

Giddings Name Meaning
English: habitational name from a group of villages near Huntingdon, called Great, Little, and Steeple Gidding, named from Old English Gyddingas 'people of Gydda', a personal name of uncertain origin.

Source for all: Dictionary of American Family Names ©2013, Oxford University Press

And, you may not know this, but the first part of the Christian Bible, the Old testament, came from the Jews. Lots and lots of Christians, especially before 1900, saddled their children with named from the old testament; Zachariah and Hezekiah, for instance, and, more reasonably, David and Daniel. Some conservative Christians still do.

Davidson, Danielson, Daniels . . . all come from Jews in the Bible. The people who bear those surnames, however, are probably not Jewish.

I'm looking for adoption records of a Rose Mary
She passed a last name down to her son of Hooper but we are not sure if that is her adopted last name or birth last name. The father of her son is Roger E Callender they never married.

She later married a Raymond T. Mathers.

She was born in on Sep 8th, 1919. Her death record says Detroit, Mi although we suspect that it could be wrong as it was her husband who gave this information.

She died in 2011 on Feb. 21 presumably in Coldwater, Branch county, Mi.

We know her mother was blind and so she gave her up for adoption. She met her real parents or relatives of them at some point but she took the secret of who they are to her grave.

I can only find three records I know for sure are her a social security index and two U.S. public record indexes. All three records give the surname Mathers that of her husband.

I know it is probably hopeless but if anyone can help or point me somewhere. I would be greatly appreciative.

If she died more than 3 months ago, she is probably on the Social Security Death Index, which you can access through
https://familysearch.org/search

Wendy is pretty sharp, but she missed her stroke on this one. A death notice is one or two lines, with the name, death date, date, time and place of the funeral, and the name of the funeral home.

An obituary will, usually, be several paragraphs and may tell you the deceased's parents, siblings, children; where they worked, what organizations they belonged to, where they went to church, what they did in the war.

A death certificate is a legal document with name, date and time of death, cause of death, where the person will be buried or cremated, the person's parents ("Unknown" in about 1/3 of them I've seen), name of informant, place of death, usual residence. You can buy a copy if you are the parent, sibling or child of the deceased. I don't know if step-relatives count.

> Do you have to sign legal document with your legal name?
Yes. the last time we refinanced our house I signed "Theodore" so often I temporarily forgot how to write it in cursive.

That doesn't seem to be related to how you find a death notice, but I suppose there is some connection.

"Or" is gold, "Argent" is silver, "Sable" is black.

http://www.apl385.com/gilling/herldref.h...
has a brief description,

http://www.heraldsnet.org/saitou/parker/...
has about a gazillion terms defined. You can work it out.

The supporters are the animals on each side of the arms. The whole thing - motto, crest, arms, supporters - is called a "Full Achievement of Arms".

And, as everyone else said, they are only yours if you are the eldest legitimate son of the eldest legitimate son of the ... back to the man who got them in the first place, in 1506.

If you use Google images and look for "{Surname} coat of arms" you'll probably find it. There will be a winged horse on one side and an antelope on the other.

Here's a picture, with the parts labeled, from the English college of heralds,
http://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/
I outlined the crest in red; about half the people who ask about coats of arms call them a crest..
.
.

Good suggestions from Savvy Shopper and Bernd. You could also post the picture on Twitter. If lots of people share it, maybe the lady or her daughter will see it. Odder things have happened. Like this:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/mjs538/i-followe...