Annandale Distillery

Researching The Water of Life!

We have assisted in researching the history of countless families over the years, but one research project that sticks in my mind is the Annandale Distillery. Back in 2006 we were asked to research the history of the distillery, which had closed around 90 years earlier.

When we conducted our research the buildings stood empty, lonely, cold and damp, a million miles away from the warmth of a Scottish distillery.

The Re-awakening!

We were told however that the distillery would be re-awakened. Many years of hard work culminated in the reopening last month, and what an awakening it has been!

The cold whitewashed buildings have been brought back to life and the first batch of spirits have now been casked. It will be three years before it can properly be called whisky, meaning the water of life, as it has to mature first. I’m sure it will be well worth the wait!

The Excisemen

Whisky distilling has had a long and colourful history. With few painkillers as we know them today whisky was a medicine of choice for Scots for centuries. It was used for many ailments and was often prescribed by doctors. It is no wonder then, that whisky means ‘the water of life’. Perhaps inevitably this high usage brought it to the attention of successive governments who imposed high taxes. During the 18th and early 19th century whisky distilling was almost entirely an illegal occupation!

Most Scottish distilleries have stories of how their whisky was smuggled across the hills, out of sight of the excise men! Annan is no different, there are accounts of smugglers from the Annan area being caught trying to take whisky across the border to England.

A change came in 1823 when the Excise Act was passed, and once again whisky distilling was brought out into the open. It was shortly after the passing of the Excise Act that we see the first references to the Annandale Distillery, which was operational from around 1830 until just after the First World War, a period of about 90 years.

From Exciseman to Distiller

George Donald, an excise officer, was posted to Annan in 1830. His mother, who was still living in Aberdeen, apparently thought George was being sent to the end of the world! George Donald rented the Warmanbie Home Farm from the
Mackenzie family, and soon after established the Annandale Distillery Company.

To learn more about this wonderful distillery and its history, read the ‘Reconstruction Diary’ or book a tour; you’ll not be disappointed!

Annandale Distillery in the 19th Century

Body Snatching in Kirkintilloch

With the launch of our new website, www.scottishindexes.com, in August we have been starting to index records outside our home area in the Scottish Borders and Dumfries & Galloway. One of these records we indexed recently was Dumbarton Prison Register, 1828 to 1840. An interesting crime that we spotted along the way was ‘Raising and Carrying of the Body of a Woman from the old Burying Ground Kirkintilloch’ and ‘Violating Graves’! Both of these crimes were committed by one Peter Gardner.

Auld Aisle Graveyard Gateway and Watchhouse
Kirkintilloch
© Copyright Martyn Gorman

This seems like a pretty gruesome crime that Peter committed so you may wonder why someone would do this. Until the passing of the Anatomy Act in 1832 it was very difficult for anatomists, surgeons or medical students in the UK to obtain bodies to dissect, which was a vital part of their education. One major reason the public objected to the use of bodies in this way, and therefore a reason for the creation of laws preventing the use of bodies by the medical profession, was that there was a belief that if your body was not buried whole you could not be resurrected on judgement day. This belief was so strong that it was viewed that allowing a body to be dissected was an extra punishment that could be handed out after death. For this reason it was only the corpses of convicted murderers that were given to the medical profession for dissection.

As you may be able to imagine there were simply not enough murderers for the medical profession! The need for corpses was so great that there was a very lucrative trade in dead bodies and in some instances this led to murder!

This is why Peter Gardner was willing to risk imprisonment for his lucrative backstreet profession. The Anatomy Act of 1832 changed everything. It gave legal access, by holders of a licence, to obtain unclaimed corpses. These corpses were often from prisons and workhouses, to be used by medical professionals. It also made provision for a person to donate the corpse of their next of kin to s school of anatomy.

Peter’s occupation, at least the illegal side of it, was now redundant and most of those buried in graves across Scotland would remain there.

Conservation at the National Library of Scotland

When we reach for a book our primary thoughts are likely on the contents. Whether we're reading for pleasure or study, it's probably the title of a book that made us pick it up.

There are groups of people, though, who pick up books with a different perspective. One such group can be found on the fourth floor of the National Library of Scotland (NLS). The conservation department have a mission to preserve and protect the holdings of the NLS and they do so with great diligence.

Their aim is to ensure that items are able to be viewed by the public, and in some cases digitised so that we can all view them online. This brings in a great variety of skills, and their remit is wider than we may at first imagine.

The conservation team are not only responsible for fixing damaged items (and preventing damage) but also caring for items when vital maintenance is taking place on the buildings in which they are stored. We all enjoy the NLS exhibitions, but have you ever considered how long it takes to prepare the items? The items need to be able to be viewed in a display case, but without careful preparation, such a display could cause damage.

Talking to the team yesterday, they told me that one item could take a day to prepare. They may need to wash the paper, conserve damaged areas then design a method of keeping the item stable while on display. It could be a matter of attaching a piece of paper to a board, or designing a made to measure book stand so you can read it easily in a display.

The team are constantly working to improve conservation methods too. For example, a recent project to preserve a vellum book gave the conservation team the opportunity to develop a new method of flattening pages. The traditional method wouldn't work due to the severity of the damage to the book. In the end, they used a wet solution then laid the book on a suction table, gradually increasing the suction to flatten the pages, how ingenious!

This visit will certainly make me think differently the next time I see a library or museum display. I suppose though the question for us is, what can we do to help them, and help preserve books and documents that we consult while tracing our family tree?

There are obvious things, handle with care. Use a cushion or other support for books and don’t open them too far. If you open a book and hear the spine crack that’s the glue and thread ripping apart and YOU are shorting the life of the book.

 © Copyright Kim Traynor

I asked, if there is one thing to remember, what would it be? The answer, use clean hands. How simple, we can all do that, can’t we? When a celebrity goes to an archive on a TV programme they are invariably given white cotton gloves. In reality however we don’t often wear them. While they may stop oils from our skin transferring to the books, they actually increase the possibility of tearing the book or documents, especially if the paper is fragile. If we wash our hands, though, this will also limit the transfer if oils from our hands to the documents.

My tour was part of the conservation workshop. Keep an eye on the National Library of Scotland’s website for future tours: they are free but do need to be booked in advance. If you are part of a group that would like a tour, contact the NLS and they would be happy to arrange one for groups of up to 15 people.

A Hawick Man's Brush with History

Winnie and Bob at home in Hawick

All of our ancestors played a part in history. No matter what they did, where they lived or who else remembers them we want to find out more about them, and the mark they made on their community or the wider world. Sometimes, though, there are certain discoveries that make you stop dead in your tracks.

This happened to me a few days ago. I was researching the Grieve family of Branxholm Braes, near Hawick. If you follow us on Flickr or Facebook you will have seen a lot of photos, postcards and even letters which belonged to this family. I have been going through the family archive and in the process I have come across three identical postcards (see front below) sent by Robert Grieve to his young wife Winnie in 1908. We’ll have to presume that the hotel only had one postcard on offer, either that or our Bob wasn’t very imaginative!

Celerina

These precious postcards are dated January and February 1908 and posted from Celerina (Schlarigna) in Switzerland. Bob writes about curling matches in which he had taken part. On a postcard dated 15 February 1908, he writes ‘We have had a great victory to-day’. This made me curious, what competition was going on?

I headed to the British Newspaper Archive to search their large collection of newspapers. It didn’t take long to locate a reference to the championship. I found in an article in the Dundee Courier of 6 February 1908 (page 3) that our very own R. Grieve was playing in the International Bonspiel. 

There were several other results so I continued my search. Again an article in the Dundee Courier caught my eye, this time it was dated 4 February 1908 (page 6). Entitled ‘Scottish Curlers in Switzerland, Bonspiel at Celerina, Opening Day’s Play’, it begins:

“The great International bonspiel commenced this morning at ten o’clock. His Imperial Highness the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir-apparent to the Austrian throne, threw the first stone amidst the enthusiastic cheering of the curlers. The ice was in excellent condition.”

Another search revealed an article from the Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer dated 4 February 1908 (page 8):

“The fourth annual international curling bonspiel commenced on the Cresta rink here to-day. Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, who is staying the the same hotel with the curlers, consented to throw the first stone, which he did with great accuracy and speed amid cheers from Scotchmen and Engandiners (sic).”

Today of course we are all too familiar with who the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was and the influence his death would have on the world.  Did ‘our’ Bob see him, did he meet him? We may never know, but this simple research shows that by reading family letters and postcards carefully and comparing these to other sources, such as the newspaper, you can build up a far more exciting picture of your family tree. 

He didn’t win by the way!

Researching Historic Mental Health Records in Scotland

Elmhill House, Royal Cornhill Hospital Aberdeen

Our health is perhaps one of the most precious things we have. Sadly, there are still too many people who suffer without treatment, without understanding and without hope. How did our ancestors, and their families, cope with life-changing health problems?

If an ancestor had a farming accident, for example, you may find a newspaper report. In such cases you may very quickly be able to gain some understanding of what the individual and their loved ones may have experienced.

Mental health, though, is very different. Sometimes, all we know comes from that final column in the census: ‘Lunatic’! Alternatively, we may have searched the census for a missing family member, only for them to turn up in a ‘Lunatic Asylum’. It can be a shocking discovery, and cause us to ask many questions.

This doesn’t have to be the end of the story, though, as you can find out a lot more about mental health problems and their treatment in the past. Some of the stories you may have heard may even be myths. Researching the original records may actually give you answers, and therefore peace.

For example, I had always had the idea that in the Victorian era thousands of people were locked up, and then they threw away the key! From our research here in Scotland we have found this was not always the case. Yes, there were some long term patients, but there also seems to have been many thousands who were in an institution for a short time only, and do not seem to have been re-admitted.

How can you dig deeper? One place to start is at the National Records of Scotland (NRS). There is a particularly useful set of records held there concerning those admitted to mental health institutions throughout Scotland from 1858 onwards.

The first of these is a national register detailing the patient’s name, the institution they were committed to, the date of their admission and the date of their release or transfer. This register even records those already in institutions in Scotland on 1 January 1858. The NRS references this register as MC7. They have kindly granted permission for me to share some example images with you taken from the ‘National Register’: click on the image to enlarge it and you should be able to read the entries on the page clearly. This page is taken from the volume MC7/1.

Secondly, there are individual patient admission forms, giving much more detail on the individual patient and their situation. In almost all cases you should be able to find a patient admission form corresponding to each entry in the ‘National Register’ just described. These admission forms are bound into volumes, one volume for each month from January 1858 onwards. The NRS references this series of volumes as MC2. The best way to understand these records is probably to read an example case for yourself, again click on the image to see a larger version. This example case is taken from volume MC2/47.

This set of records is excellent because it should contain everyone in a mental health institution in Scotland from 1858 onwards. It is possible, though, to dig even deeper and look at locally held records. Highland Archives in Inverness, for example, hold records relating to their area and you can consult these in their search room. Once you know which institution your ancestor was sent to, and the date of admission (information which is always given in the national record sets I referred to above), then you can start with the local archive and ask if they have the records of that particular institution, or know where they are held.

The Scottish Archive Network catalogue can also be used to search a number of archives throughout Scotland. Unfortunately, though, not all archives yet have a comprehensive catalogue available online, and in many cases there is no substitute for contacting the archivist directly.

I would urge you not to hide your ancestor’s mental health issues, as some families may have done in times past. Dig deeper into the records and you can come to a deeper understanding of your family’s history.

Search our existing Scottish records for free at www.scottishindexes.com

No Books Were Harmed in the Making of this Index

Day after day people visit archives around the world and look at historic paper records. Sadly each time these items are handled they deteriorate. There is no point, though, in keeping records if nobody can ever access them!

Letter found in Sheriff Court records.
NRS reference number SC62/10/390 Heatlie V Bell 

Back in 1911, when access was requested to the Old Parish Registers of Scotland (OPRs), the then Registrar-General (James Patten McDougall) said “...I am afraid it would open a very wide door and might lead to abuses, e.g. the public would come here without having recourse to the ordinary registers, and their object in coming might be prompted by mere inquisitiveness. Further I am afraid that these old books would not last long if handled by all and sundry.”

I wonder what poor James would make of Scotland’s People? Perhaps he would be delighted as it means that we do not have to handle the original volumes any more. While we might find his words amusing, we also must acknowledge the point: the more often books are handled the more quickly they will wear out!

Whilst the OPRs, census returns, valuation rolls, birth, marriage and death records have now been digitised this is a drop in the ocean of what exists in the National Records of Scotland.

Mental Health Records.
NRS reference number MC7/1

The documents Graham and I are indexing for scottishindexes.com have not been digitised, meaning that we are making use of the original records. As such, we have a responsibility to look after the records we access and avoid damaging them for future generations.

On occasion, we find that cannot read a record in entirety, often because a volume has been bound tightly and some of what is written is obscured by the binding.

When this happens, it may mean that a record, or index entry cannot be completed. In such cases, we insert in square brackets what we believe will complete the record, or indicate that something is missing.

When searching scottishindexes.com and you see square brackets you’ll now know what they mean, and you can rest assured that no books were harmed in the making of the index!

A visit to the Stewartry Museum in Kirkcudbright

The Stewartry Museum in Kirkcudbright is perhaps one of my favourite museums. It is a quirky place that can really help you understand the history of the area and the lives of everyday people.

On our most recent visit I was drawn to a number of items in the cabinets. The first was the ‘knapping stone’. This particular stone was found in a garden in Bourtree Park, Kirkcudbright in the 1960s.

Other local items include the hat worn by the Provost of Kirkcudbright from the 19th century to 1934, a policeman’s lamp and a night watchman's rattle.

Together with each item is a brief description of  who donated the artefact. This could be especially interesting if your family is from the area. Could you find the wooden butter pats your great-grandmother used?

As well as their regular displays they have exhibitions that change. At the moment there is an excellent display of Jessie M. King items.

From the 22nd of November 2014 to 31 January 2015 there will be an exhibition intriguingly entitled ‘Unusual, Eccentric and Wacky Everyday Inventions, Contraptions and Thingamajigs’: I wouldn’t miss it for the world!!

Visit their website for more information

Using www.scottishindexes.com to the full

As well as searching www.scottishindexes.com by name you can also search by keyword alone. This means it’s good for one place studies, but also for searching for different types of people. Let’s take an example: bondagers and hinds.

There was a practice amongst agricultural communities, mainly in the south-east of Scotland and north east of England where a man employed on a farm as hind would supply a young woman to work on the fields; she was known as a bondager.

When a man was newly married, his wife might work as a bondager. Once they had children and the married woman could no longer work in the fields, another relative, perhaps her sister would fulfil this role, until eventually a daughter was old enough to provide the labour. If there was no female relative to take the job, it was common for a woman from outside the family to become the bondager.

The hind would generally be a ploughman, having the important responsibility of looking after the horses, an integral part of any farm. The bondager would work in the fields, particularly during the harvest season.

The hind would often be ‘paid in kind’, often grain and a little land to cultivate. Any surplus could be sold at the market. The bondager could be paid in cash, or her wages might be the house in which they would all live.

You  can see an example of this situation in our 1841 census record.

As the 19th century progressed, the custom gradually began to die out. If we follow the same family we saw in the 1841 census to 1851 we see John now described as an ‘Ag. Lab’. Another young woman is with the family, this time being described as a Farm Servant.

Exactly what arrangement was made is difficult to know, it could be a that Margaret was a bondager but not recorded that way in the census. We know however that the practice was dying out so perhaps the arrangements had changed.

To learn more about hinds and bondagers I would recommend www.thebondagers.com and www.foodheritage-berwick.org.uk.

50 Years of the Forth Road Bridge

#ThrowBackThursday

Today marks 50 years since the Queen opened the Forth Road Bridge. I’m pleased to say that I’m far too young to remember that day. What I do remember, though, is being taken over the bridge as as a young child, not because we needed to get to the other side but just as a fun thing to do! We drove over and then headed back into Edinburgh again. Of course there was a toll to pay in those days too. Don’t tell anybody this, but as a child I thought it was called the ‘fourth’ road bridge!

© Copyright Anthony Foster

© Copyright Andrew Smith 

In practical terms though it was, and still is, a major advantage. The journey from South Queensferry to North Queensferry now takes just a few minutes. Before the bridge was built you would need to take a ferry or face a time-consuming drive to cross farther up the estuary at the Kincardine Bridge.

The Scottish Screen Archive has some fascinating films featuring the Forth Road Bridge. Here is a film showing cars queuing for the ferry not long after the bridge was opened (you can see the new bridge in the background).

The bridge was built high above the Firth to allow great industrial ships to pass underneath. The bridge is 2,512 metres in length, around 1.5 miles. At the time it was built it had the longest span for a suspension bridge outside the USA; it is easy to understand why it was such an attraction!

This film from 1968 looks at the ‘development of sources of power, the industries, and new towns along the borders of the River Forth’.

New Resource for the Family Historian

As you may have noticed, we love photos! We’re proud of our 1,399 mainly historical photos that we have put on flickr. I’m pleased to say though, that the Internet Archive has put 619,833 photos on flickr and they all appear to be copyright free!

Each photo is well referenced, giving the title of the book, year of publication, authors, subjects and publisher. You can click through to their website to read the entire book. There is also some text from the book on each flickr, helping you understand the context the image was used in.

If you are a professional or an amateur family historian this will be a great resource for illustrating reports and websites to help tell your family story.

Included are photos of places and people (including Scotland) but also machinery from around the world, maps, graphs and much, much more.

The Internet Archive on flickr

A lament for the letter

‘When you go will you send back a letter from America?’

Thus begins ‘Letter From America’, a classic song from Scottish pop duo The Proclaimers. It reflects a long history of Scottish people emigrating to seek better lives overseas, many leaving behind family members on their native shores. Back then, letters from America or Canada would take weeks or months to arrive back home – if they arrived at all. We can scarcely conceive of how precious such an epistle would be to those who received it.

Today, the letter has been largely rendered obsolete, replaced in written form by email, texts, Facebook messages, tweets, WhatsApps or the multitude of alternative telephone or online messaging systems. We can communicate instantaneously – speak across continents, hear the voices and even see the faces of our loved ones. Technology is astounding, and what would have been thought of decades ago as unthinkable, centuries ago as magical, has fast become the norm. As with progress in most areas, we gain much, and forget what we are leaving behind.

Genealogists do not forget the letter. How could we? Letters are our pathways to pasts unknown to us, our windows into the lives our ancestors lived. From the mundane to the dramatic, the terse to the loquacious, letters possess a peculiar charm to the descendants left behind. We peer intently at the rushed lines of a holiday postcard, struggle to decipher the scrawls of a soldier’s letter home. It’s a fascinating way to get to know your forebears – through their own words. The words were not intended for you – not the friendly enquiries towards a new mother, nor the sympathetic tones for the bereaved. Time passes, and what was a moment full of raw joy or staggering sorrow becomes removed from us. Yet we remember it. These letters open up to us a different world.

We’ve been looking recently at the court records and supporting documents of paternity cases. The love letters we read have a painful edge in retrospect – the promises of eternal adoration belied by the sombre purpose the letters are used for: evidence that the wayward father was once in an intimate relationship with the unmarried mother, now seeking financial support. They are fascinating as evidence and as a glimpse into a society both similar and different to our own. Today, text messages and screenshots might be used to prove past affection in court – but love letters cached in shoeboxes are few and far between. The great-grandchildren of my generation will have no photo albums or physical letters to hold in their hands, but may trawl what remains of us in cyberspace – a modern legacy.

Genealogists will remember the letter. 

Who Do You Think You Are? Live (this weekend!)

We’re looking forward to Who Do You Think You Are? Live in Glasgow this weekend, where we’ll be enjoying the displays, the talks and the hubbub of excitement when a group of genealogists get together. (How’s the research going? – It’s all relative).

For those not familiar with the television show, Who Do You Think You Are? researches the lineage of celebrities and documents their journey as they uncover secrets and truths about their ancestors. WDYTYA is enormously popular around the world, and the spectacle and scale of the live event is breath-taking. Hundreds of genealogy experts and thousands of enthusiasts gather together to learn from one another, discover some more about the past and to take in the buzz. We’ll be joining them, wearing our Scottish Genealogy Network badges with pride (stop us if you see us, we’d love to answer your questions).

Badges © Scottish Genealogy Network 

On Saturday morning, Graham will be giving a (free!) talk about tracing illegitimate ancestors. While such individuals can provide fascinating and sometimes touching stories, they are also notorious roadblocks in progressing your family tree. In the 1850s, around 9% of births in Scotland were illegitimate, so a number of genealogists will probably have discovered illegitimacy in their family line. Fortunately for posterity, mothers often took the fathers of illegitimate children to court to prove their identities and seek financial support. We still have records of these cases, providing details and facts which are absent from other records. Graham’s talk will explain how both amateur and professional genealogists can use these records to discover paternal lines and progress family trees.

We’re gearing up for the weekend – hopefully see you there! 

#DGHour hints and tips for Ancestral Tourism in Dumfries and Galloway

According to Tourism Intelligence, ‘10 million people with Scottish roots are interested in finding out more about their ancestry. It is estimated that 4.3 million people could be encouraged to visit.’

This blog post has been specifically created following the #DGHour we had on Twitter in August 2014 and is designed to help those in the tourism industry help people trace their family tree. I hope however that it will also help individuals tracing their Scottish family tree.

Heritage Tourism or Ancestral Tourism

One thing to mention at the outset is that there is a difference between what we might call ‘heritage tourism’’ and ‘ancestral tourism’’. As an example, some people with the Maxwell surname may choose to visit Caerlaverock Castle, because (I quote from the Historic Scotland website) ‘around 1220, Alexander II of Scotland, needing trusted men to secure the Scottish West March, granted the estate to his chamberlain, Sir John de Maccuswell (Maxwell). Sir John built the ‘old’ castle. Within 50 years, his nephew, Sir Herbert, had moved to a new castle just 200m away to the north. There the Maxwell lords remained for the next 400 years.’ The reality is however, that many people with the Maxwell surname are not directly descended from these Maxwells.

One dictionary definition of genealogy is ‘A line of descent traced continuously from an ancestor’.

Your first mission, therefore, is to find out what type of experience your visitors want. Do they want to visit a castle once owned by someone of the same surname, or do they want to trace their own direct ancestors one by one as far back as they can?

If they want to trace their own genealogy, here are some resources and tips so that you can be better placed to help them:

Accommodation - What to offer the Ancestral Tourist

A good internet connection - A lot of family history research is done online these days. Many people will have their family tree online on websites like ancestry.com. This means a good internet connection is essential to family history research. If you can offer this as part as your accommodation package the ancestral tourist will likely find your accommodation a more appealing choice.

Reference books - For south west Scotland, I would recommend the guide produced by the Dumfries and Galloway Council, ‘Researching Local History - A Guide’ (available at £5.99 from most D&G libraries). I would also recommend the book ‘Tracing your Scottish Ancestors’ published by the National Records of Scotland. Other books such as ‘The Surnames of Scotland: Their Origin, Meaning and History’ by George Black may also be useful to visitors. If you want to have an even larger library for your visitors I would also recommend the books by Chris Paton.

Visit Scotland’s Ancestral Welcome Scheme - Participation in the Ancestral Welcome Scheme gives you the opportunity to publicise your knowledge and commitment to meeting the needs of the ancestral visitor. For more details see the Visit Scotland website.

Scotland’s People - www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk is the foremost website used in researching Scottish Ancestors online. They give access to the key building blocks of a family tree: Birth, Marriage, Death, Census and Parish Records as well as wills and some other key resources. The website is a ‘pay-per-view’ site (not a subscription website). Scottish libraries sell half price starter cards, giving 60 credits which can be used on the site for just £7 (the standard price is 30 credits for £7).

Once your visitors arrive

Maps - People visit the area where their ancestors lived is to visit the homes they once occupied and visit their graves. If you are able to offer help by supplying maps this would really help your visitors. The National Library of Scotland has a fantastic collection of historic maps (many of which can be overlaid on modern maps for comparison) which could help them work out where a long demolished house once stood.

Archives - At the time of writing (August 2014) the main archive for Dumfries and Galloway is within the Ewart Library (Catherine Street, Dumfries, DG1 1JB). Access is free and you can use your digital camera to photograph many records (permission needed). Here are the opening times:

Archive Search Room Opening Times

Monday- CLOSED

Tuesday - 10.00 - 13.00, 14.00 - 17.00

Wednesday - 10.00 - 13.00, 14.00 - 19.00

Thursday - 10.00 - 13.00, 14.00 - 17.00

Friday - 10.00 - 13.00, 14.00 - 17.00

Saturday - 10.00 - 13.00, 14.00 - 16.00 (First Saturday in month only)

Important - Most archive material is stored off-site, you need to contact the archive a day or two in advance so that they can make sure the items you need are brought in for you.

The archive at Dumfries has records such as school log books, poor relief applications and minutes, valuation rolls and newspapers throughout D&G. They also have copies of the census for D&G on microfilm and also local pre-1855 parish records (OPRs). As well as providing access to these key resources they also have a genealogist who can help searchers; there is a fee for this service and booking is essential.

Dumfries Archive in the Ewart Library

Other archives and museums - Whilst the Ewart Library is the main repository, local museums and libraries throughout D&G can also be useful. They sometimes have original records, and in many cases have key resources in the form of printed transcripts and microform. Most importantly, though, they can provide local knowledge!  This map can help you find archives across Scotland. The guide book published by D&G council that I have already mentioned (Researching Local History - A Guide) includes a comprehensive list with contact details.

Online Indexes

Friends of the Archives of Dumfries and Galloway - A lot of work has been done by the Friends of the Archives of Dumfries and Galloway group to index historical records. These indexes include the 1851 Census, Dumfries Jail books, various Kirk Session Minutes, Poor Board Minutes and much more. All indexes are free to access from the archive’s website.

Scottish Indexes - Our own website www.scottishindexes.com has census indexes, prison indexes, patenity indexes, mental health indexes, as well as birth, marriage and death indexes.

Gravestones - The website www.kirkyards.co.uk has free online access to gravestones or Monumental Inscriptions for a number of churchyards in the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright. Its sister site www.kirkcudbright.co has an historical index of the people and places of the Stewartry of Kirkcubright and other useful local resources.

Family History Societies and Researchers

Dumfries and Galloway Family History Society - The society is run by volunteers and has its premises in Glasgow Street, Dumfries. The opening times vary between summer and winter so it’s best to look at their website for details. As well as being able to visit the research centre and use their resources you can also buy their publications.

Dumfriesshire and Galloway Natural History and Antiquarian Society - This society is perhaps more immediately thought of by the historian than the genealogist but as they are so closely connected I have included them in this list. Their website has an index to their transactions and many volumes are online.

Scottish Indexes - Most people these days are able to trace their own family tree, sometimes however they need some help. As well as providing indexes we also have a research service. Feel free however to give us a quick ring if you have people coming to stay and you need some advice on how to help them.

Scottish Genealogy Network - This is a group of professional genealogists working across Scotland. For more information see their blog.

If you have any questions please post a comment below and I’ll do my best to answer it.