In a 19th-century Welsh immigrant community in York Co., Pennsylvania that I have studied, there were several variants in how nicknames were formed. For example, the storekeeper William Williams was known as "Will Store" and the occupational "surname" extended to the other members of his family, as "Lizzie Store" and "Maggie Store." A different William Williams in the same town went by his first name plus homesite, Will Ty'n y Maes ("house in the field"); the English-only-speaking folks in the town heard the pronunciation and thought the Welsh were calling him Will Tin Mice, so they went ahead and called him that too. And the fellow who grew big cabbages in his garden was known as Cabbage Hughes. Etc. Cheers, Margaret