More old McWilliam photos

Thanks again to Helen Bennett I have managed to lay my hands on some more very old photos from the McWilliam archive – which Helen received from her mother, Margaret McWilliam. The photos seem to date mostly from the early 1870s, and there are several factors which give this away – for instance, my grandfather, Rob (born 1873) features as a very young baby, with his parents and alongside his two elder brothers.

The photos, as was normal for the time, are all posed in studio settings, usually with the photographer details on the back of the pictures. The sitters are sometimes easily identifiable, but some of them we are not so sure of. Many are from studios in Dufftown, Keith, Huntly or Elgin. Others are from Glasgow, Edinburgh or even London – and these tend to be the ones we can’t readily identify. The furthest flung of those identifiable, though, is from Chicago, and we are confident that this is of John McWilliam (1826 – 1884) and his son Edward (1865 – 1924).

I will start with a photo which we believe to be of my gg-grandfather, James McWilliam (1804 – 1872) – who features in his own earlier blog entry here. This is the first time I have seen a photo of him and I doubt very much whether we will ever come across any more! The photo was taken in Dufftown by Wood and Henry photographers.

James McWilliam

If we guess him to be about aged 66 in the photo, this means it was taken around 1870.

And here is a photo of his gravestone on which his daughter Margaret (who predeceased him when she was just 20) is also remembered, but before the addition of the name of his wife Margaret (who died just a year after him in 1873) or of his sons who are also now remembered there. I now have a photo of the updated stone (after James's death) which I will post in my separate entry for him.

Next we have a photo of my g-grandparents, Robert McWilliam (1844 – 1915) and Elizabeth Green (1849 – 1934), a head and shoulders of Robert on his own, and one of Robert and Elizabeth with their three eldest sons (James, Alex and Rob). And one of James and Alex on their own.

Robert and Elizabeth McWilliam (née Green)

c

d

b

These next photos, taken in Huntly, we believe to be of Ann Spence (1815 - 1895, wife of Alexander Green 1801 - 1890) and three of her daughters (probably Ann b.1847, Elizabeth b.1848, Jane b.1854) and taken about 1868. Elizabeth married Robert McWilliam. They were my great-grandparents and are featured as a couple above. And of course Ann Spence and Alexander Green were gg-grandparents.

Now here is the Chicago photo, which we believe to be of John McWilliam (1826 – 1884) and his young son Edward (1865 – 1924) at the age of about 3 or 4. John emigrated to Illinois in the 1850s – after his father James had spent many years in New York State before returning to Smithston. John was the oldest brother of my g-grandfather Robert. I suppose that makes him my gg-uncle. And more importantly he is the gg-grandfather of Lucy, Mark, Chalmer, Glenn and Stuart.

And finally, I am going to include some of the unidentified photos, in the hope that we may one day get around to knowing more about the people here.  

unknown - taken Dunedin, New Zealand

unknown - taken in Aberdeen

unknown - taken in Edinburgh

unknown - taken in Keith

unknown - taken in Glasgow - look like a music-hall act!

Unknown - taken in Elgin

Unknown - taken in Elgin

Unknown - taken in Elgin

Unknown - taken in Edinburgh

Unknown - taken in Keith

Unknown - taken in  London

Unknown - person and source

Unknown - person and source

McWilliam cousin reunion. Elgin, June 2012

The Laichmoray gathering, June 2012

A couple of weeks ago we managed a small gathering of McWilliam cousins. 16 of us met for drinks and dinner at the Laichmoray Hotel in Elgin, with most folks staying in the hotel for the night, and a few of us heading for Dufftown and Glencorrie the following day. I certainly place value on staying in touch with the extended family, and I think it is fair to say that we all enjoyed the occasion. Sadly we have lost two cousins, Elizabeth and George,  since the last gathering two years ago, and our good wishes go out especially to those who couldn’t make it this time due to ill health!

The Glencorrie team

And here's a reminder of the larger gathering in Edinburgh a couple of years ago!

Edinburgh gathering, May 2010

Visit to Inveravon, Glencorrie and Mortlach church

When I was up north a couple of weeks ago I travelled past Inveravon church, and through Glenlivet and Tomintoul to Aberdeen. Two days later I was accompanied by cousin Kathleen and Dad’s cousin Helen on a trip through the Cabrach to Glencorrie and Dufftown.

At Inveravon churchyard I wanted to see the gravestone that HDM referred to – that of William McWillie (who died in 1685) and his wife Katherine Gordon. The one that goes " Heir lyes ane honest man called William McWillie, who livid in the Cories, who departed the 10 of June, 1685 ; and Ketren Gordene, his  spouse." I was disappointed that I couldn’t find it, but very interested to meet a lady called Tricia Lawson who has lived close by the church for some 40 years. She knows a lot about the history of the church and the area, and told me that she also had heard of this very stone (from a former minister there) but did not know where it is - or was. She also had heard that the stone had been carried there by the McWilliams. She pointed out that the present church building dates from about 1806 and that it is positioned directly over part of the original graveyard. Tricia has said she will get in touch if she ever finds out any more about the story of this stone. 

Here is a photo of the church as it is today. 

By the way Tricia pointed out the location of Delgarvan to me (where it seems that our Lewis McWilliam originated) – on a bend in the Spey about a mile or so north of the church, but she was able to tell me that there is nothing much left there now after the remains of the buildings were flattened for road-building in the 1960s.

From the church I drove up through Glenlivet to Tomnavoulin (near the Corries farm once inhabited by McWillie alias McWilliam families) before heading on to Aberdeen for Laura’s birthday meal. I didn’t have time to linger long, but stopped to take these photos of the old packhorse bridge at Bridgend and of this fine bull guarding the road up to Easter Corrie.

We had a fine day for our journey through the Cabrach to Dufftown on the Sunday – myself + Helen and Kathleen, and Kathleen’s husband Eddie. Helen was a Dufftown quine and knew Glencorrie in her youth – the home of her mother and various uncles, aunts and cousins. We drove up to the farm and took a short wander round the house, the two cottages and various outbuildings. It is still very much a working farm, but the present occupants seem also to run a business contracting out farm equipment – such as two big combine harvesters.

We didn’t meet the occupants, but we took a couple of pictures – the farmhouse, and the two cottages – one of which would have been the boyhood home of my father.

Helen remembered that they used to have music and dancing in the loft of one of the barns. I can picture the scene in my mind, but the building is stripped to a functional minimum these days.

After a light lunch in a Dufftown cafe, we had a wander round the graveyard at Mortlach church - a fine old and historic place.

There are at least three generations of our ancestors there (in fact four generations in my case), and I attach here photos of the gravestones.

Finally there is another stone here which took our interest. It isn’t in memory of a McWilliam, but a Moir. I was really quite surprised to see wording which was very similar to that on the stone that HDM described at Inveravon – and of course it is of a very similar age. Here is a photo and a transcription.

“Heir lyes ane honest man called John Moir Husband to Elspet Reid who was killed in the defence of his own property at Walk Miln of Bolvenie the 13 day of October 1660.  Memento Mori”

I conclude from this, and a few other such inscriptions I have come across in recent weeks that this form of wording seems to have been quite common in the  17^th century.

And as a footnote, here is me with the statue of an Aberdeen Angus bull – on the outskirts of Alford on the return journey to Aberdeen.

McWilliam and McPherson

The Braes of Glenlivet

Some years ago I came across an interesting document in the archives of Aberdeen University library. It is titled “Notes respecting the Family of McPherson or McWilliam of Corries of Glenlivet in the County of Banff”, and was written by H. (Hugh) Duff MacWilliam of Hawthorn, Buckingham Road, Harrow View, Middlesex. I referred to some of his other work in a previous post, and I will refer to him again as HDM. The document is dated 1903. I don’t know much about HDM’s life, but he was born in Archiestown in 1859 – the son of Alexander McWilliam (of the Corries, Glenlivet family) and Jessie Ann McQueen, and he was a cousin of John Alexander MacWilliam (physiology professor also referred to in previous post).

This is a seven page hand-written document, presenting information extracts from a number of sources regarding people of the name McWilliam (or variations such as McKullie, McCullie, McVillie, Macwillie) and McPherson who lived in the Corries in Glenlivet. Glenlivet is in Inveravon parish, and HDM’s sources include parish registers from there, Banff Sasine Register, Elgin Commissary records, tombstone(s) at Inveravon Parish Church, the Inventory of Charters at Gordon Castle. The Sasine Register is an old form of register of feudal property title. The references are all from the years 1637 to 1750.

I am including reference to this here because I believe there is a link between the Inveravon McWilliam folks and my own well-established line at Glencorrie in Mortlach – and some onward links to branches of the family in Cabrach parish. I discussed my evidence for this in my last post.

The HDM document is mainly in tabular format, which is difficult to transcribe here. I attach a scanned copy (below) of the whole thing. Here, though, is a transcription of the long note at the end of the document, in which HDM makes some interesting observations.

“As illustrating that the name was formerly McPherson, there is a tradition that a certain John McWilliam (said to be a brother of Alexander and William first, of the family in Delgarvan) quitted Glenlivet and settled in Bracklach in the Parish of Cabrach some years prior to 1745 and that at the ’45 he paid a substitute to take part in the rising and dressed him in the MacPherson tartan.

The late Mr William McWilliam of Culmill, Beauly and formerly of Delgarvan stated in reply to an enquiry in the year 1884 that he had always heard that his family belonged to the Clan McPherson. It is also said that when George Macpherson Esq. Of Invereshie succeeded to the Ballindalloch Estate in 1806 he was desirous that all the McWilliams, McWillies or McCullies should if possible adopt the name Macpherson.  The Abbe (Paul) Macpherson (1756 – 1846), a native of Glenlivet states in his M.S. Memoirs that his ancestor was a certain John of the family of Macpherson of Phoness in Badenoch who removed to Glenlivet in the 16^th Century. Mr James Macpherson of Edinburgh, a scientist in Macpherson genealogy, expressed the view that probably from this John all the Macphersons in Glenlivet were descended.”

Some of HDM’s comments here suggest links between McPherson and McWilliam (or variations of the spellings, McVillie, McKullie etc), e.g. because of the fairly common occurrence of aliases (McPherson alias McVillie). I am particularly intrigued by the John McWilliam in the Cabrach who is reputed to have paid a substitute to take his part in the 1745 rising (and presumably fairly likely death), dressed in the MacPherson tartan!  

MacPherson is a historic Scottish clan, with an active clan association. I have checked with one of their vice-presidents (Alan G. MacP) and he tells me that he is aware of some of these uses of “aliases” and that this was all fairly common practice. “ Variations in Highland surnames were generally a means of distinguishing individuals by use of a patronymic that with usage transforms into a true surname.”

The bottom line for me is that I am not sure yet what to make of these MacPherson links. McWilliam is not a clan (or at least hasn’t been since the 13^th century or so), and maybe there were some attempts to encompass them within the MacPherson clan, or perhaps the Clan Chattan, which was/is an association of clans – including MacPherson, MacIntosh, Davidson and others, but not McWilliam. If you want a tartan we probably have more right to Gordon than any of these.

Back to the 1600s in Inveravon. McWilliam ancestry ..and the original William and Kate!

Digging around various sources, I reckon I can go back a few generations before Lewis McW appeared in 1760. None of this is 100% solid certain just yet, but at least I find it interesting to look at the possibilities.

As I said in an earlier post, it is highly likely that Lewis was the elder brother of John McWilliam. John (b. 1765) married Helen Black and farmed first in Mortlach and later in Cabrach parish. I now believe that Lewis was in fact the father of Margaret McWilliam who was born around 1784 to an unknown mother. This comes from documents which I have filed in my McWhistory tree at ancestry.com. Margaret married John Garden in July 1804, and they lived also at Smithston farm. Lewis was a witness to the baptism of several of the children of both couples – and John witnessed the baptism of many of Lewis’s children.

We know that John was baptised at Dellagarrowan (spelling varies), Inveravon Parish in December 1765 and that his parents were William McWilliam and Anne Cruickshank. Inveravon Parish records also show that a Lewis McWilliam and Margaret McAdam were married in Inveravon parish church in 1738 – and I am speculating that these were the parents of William, and therefore the grandparents of Lewis, John and Margaret – and also of Alexander McWilliam. Spelling seems to have been a fairly inconsistent matter back then, and what was once noted as Dellagarrowan was more often written in several variations, the most common being Delgarvan.

The River Spey near Delgarvan

I have some notes made by Hugh Duff McWilliam (HDM) in 1903, which suggest a clear link between the Delgarvan McWilliam family and the family at Corries of Glenlivet (another Inveravon parish fairm toon). This family seem to have sometimes used the surname McWillie, but they are recorded sometimes as McWilliam and sometimes as a spelling variation, e.g. as McCullie, McKullie, or with a single letter L. I guess that spelling consistency was not a matter of great importance.  This Corries family of McWillie or McWilliam seems to have been large, and well established there. Some of their descendants stayed on there, some moved to Delgarvan, and some moved on to Mortlach or the Cabrach.  HDM also suggests that prior to their arrival at Corries, they were in Botriphnie parish (to the north, but still in Banffshire).

Alexander McWilliam (of  Delgarvan) was, I believe, the youngest brother of our Lewis. It may be that he married twice and had a total of 17 children, or it may be that there was a cousin Alexander of a slightly younger age. But we do know that they were all at Delgarvan! I will assume that there were two Alexanders there – unless there was some marriage “overlap”. 

We know that, with his wife Janet Black, Alexander had 6 children – William (b. 1800), Elizabeth (b. 1802), Elspet (b. 1804), Isobel (b. 1805 - probably an infant death), Isabel (b. 1806), Anne (b. 1810). The “other” Alexander McWilliam at Delgarvan (b. 1768) married Elspet Gordon in 1809 and this couple had 11 children. 

Their second child was William (b. 1813 ) who married Isabella Cumming and moved in the 1820s to Culmill farm near Beauly in Inverness-shire. They had three children, one of whom (John Alexander MacWilliam: 1857 - 1937) went on to become a distinguished physiologist, and was Professor of Physiology at Aberdeen University – appointed at the age of just 29 and remaining there until he retired at age 70. Google him for some interesting stuff. He did much work on the function of the heart, and laid groundwork which eventually led to the invention of the pacemaker. Here is a picture of him, and I have to note that I recognise that nose - but maybe not the hairline!  

The 10th child of Alexander and Elspet was Alexander (b. 1828), who married Jessie Ann McQueen and moved to her home town of Archiestown. They had three children, the youngest being our Hugh Duff McWilliam (b. 1859) –who documented some McWilliam history back in 1903.

The other children of Alexander and Elspet were Betty (1810), John (1815), Elspet (1817), Janet (1820), Isabel (1822), George (1823), James (1825),  Mary (1830), Ann (date uncertain). No doubt this lot will have been responsible for another several score of distant cousins by now.

HDM’s McWilliam research in 1903 documents some deeper background on the McWilliam families at Delgarvan and at the Corries of Glenlivet – taking us back to a William McWilliam of the Corries, and his wife Katherine Gordon. Again the name is sometimes given as McWillie or variation.

Here is an exact extract from one of HDM’s contributions to a book entitled “Scottish notes and Queries” compiled by John Bulloch and published in 1903 by A. Brown & Co. of Aberdeen.

There is a flat stone (the oldest) in Inveravon Churchyard,

inscribed : — •

'Heir lyes ane honest man called William McWillie, who livid in the Cories, who departed the 10 of June, 1685 ;

and Ketren Gordene, his spouse."

Tradition says that the gravestone was carried to Inveravon from Glenlivet by eight of the MacWilliams. It is thought likely that Katherine Gordon was of the family of Minmore, as Alexander Gordon is one of the witnesses to the baptism of their first-born child, who was named Alexander, probably after him. There were McWillies in the Corries in 1750.

The family of MacWilliams, who have been resident at Delgarvan, on the Ballindalloch estate, at least since 1763, are believed to have removed there from the Corries.

The members of the Delgarvan family are interred under the flat stone above mentioned, and also in a grave by the side of it.

There is a tradition that the MacWilliams came to Inveravon from the Parish of Botriphnie.

Are these our long-distant ancestors?

Inveravon records show that William and Katherine married in June 1643 and that they had two children: Alexander (1644) and Isobell (1645).  There is every chance that there were further children, but the relevant parish records are very incomplete around these times.

Enough for now. I will come back with a bit more on this Inveravon background, gleaned partly from some further work by HDM.

And next time I am passing Inveravon I will aim to get a picture of that stone!

McWilliam(s) around the world

I can’t easily count the number of ggg or even gggg  or ggggg grandchildren who are descended from Lewis McWilliam and Anne Munro. I guess that there are probably about 70 or 80 of us alive today, and we are fairly well spread around the world. I have to say that the maternal lines seem stronger than the male – in that the women have gone on to have larger families. So many of these offspring are not named McWilliam. Around Scotland and England we have Ramsay, McDonald, Taylor, Wood, Sutherland, Thorpe, Mill, Hendry, Edward, Fraser, Bennett, Baxter, Laing, Wilcox, Nevada – and of course Chisholm and no doubt many more surnames by now. I know many of you personally and some I have never met.

We have Jill Stewart in France, Derek McWilliam and Bob Ramsay’s family in Australia (after South Africa), Jill (Fraser) Yang in Hong Kong and a fair contingent in North America.

In Canada we have Ronnie Fraser (son of William Fraser and Margaret McWilliam) and his own dynasty based in Calgary. In British Columbia we have the descendants of Robert Mair and Helen (Nellie) McWilliam, and also of Peter Ramsay (son of Peter Ramsay and Mary McWilliam).

The California line, thanks to Chal (all now with the surname McWilliams) consists of  Lucy (b. 1953), Mark (b. 1955) daughter and son of Peter, and Chalmer III (b. 1963), Glenn (b. 1964) and Stuart (b. 1966) the sons of Chalmer II – and no doubt some further offspring from these folks.

I believe that some of this family have now spread to other states, including Texas.

   

In New York, Bob McW (b. 1918) had 5 children. I don’t know their names or have birth years, but they are quite likely grandparents themselves by now.

I have no contact with any of these North American teams, but of course I would be very pleased to – particularly if they have an interest in their ancestry, and also in case they have something they can add to make this picture more complete!

And of course if I ever get to take the line firmly back from our Lewis, perhaps another two generations as seems just possible, we could have an even bigger crowd to contemplate.

Maternal lines

I am pleased to show that I am not only interested in paternal ancestry, and can offer the following for now. I hope eventually to be able to show this in a chart and also to be able to include some more photographs.

My grandfather Robert McWilliam married Janet (known as Jessie) Pirrie in 1905 – and they had 10 children. Jessie was born in Inveravon parish in 1882. Here again is the only picture I have of a young Jessie - aged 16 in 1898. (Thanks to cousin Susan.)

                                                                     

Inveravon is a rural parish, south of Dufftown and stretching from Chapeltown through Tomnavoulin, Auchbreck and Glenlivit across to Ballindalloch on Speyside. Excellent whisky country these days, but otherwise mostly pretty difficult hill farming! The parish includes most of Ben Rinnes – one of my favourite hills. It borders Mortlach and Cabrach parishes to the north-east.

Jessie was the 9^th child in a family of 13. Her parents were George Pirrie (1848 – 1920) and Jane Stuart (1848 – 1914). George Pirrie was the eldest of 5 born to John Pirie (1816 - ?) and his wife Margaret Anderson (1817? - ?). John Pirie was a cooper by trade, i.e. he made wooden barrels – no doubt for the whisky industry, which began to grow significantly (and legally) after the excise act of 1823. Please note that the variation in the spelling of the Pirrie/Pirie surname is an accurate reflection of the records! Jane Stuart was the youngest in a family of 3 born to her parents James Stuart (1806 – 1877) and his second wife Ann Sharp (? - ?). James Stuart also had 3 children with his first wife Mary Grant (1817 - ?).

And James Stuart (1806 – 1877) was the youngest of 3 children of William Stuart (1770 – 1845) and Jean Riach (dates?). James and William Stuart were both shoemakers by trade.

So for those of you who are my first cousins, William Stuart and Jean Riach are great great great grandparents. John Pirie and Margaret Anderson are great great grandparents.

And thank you to cousin Diana for much of the above!

Grandfather Robert McWilliam’s parents were Robert McWilliam (1844 – 1915) and Elizabeth Green (1848 – 1934). Elizabeth was the daughter of Alexander Green (1801 – 1890) a crofter at Sandyhillock, Glack of Pitglassie, and his wife Ann Spence (1815 – 1895) who was born in Drumachter (presumably an old spelling of Drumochter).

Alexander Green’s parents were Robert Green and Elizabeth Donald. Ann Spence was the daughter of John Spence and Janet McWilliam.

Great grandfather Robert McW was the son of great great grandfather James McWilliam (1804 – 1872) and Margaret Shearer (1802 – 1873), who was born at the Raws (another Mortlach farm). Margaret’s parents were Alexander Shearer and Isabella Donald.

I have no dates or further information on these six who were great great great grandparents to me and my cousins, but I will try to look into this. They must have been roughly contemporaries of Lewis McWilliam (1760 – 1840).

So, just to repeat some of that, 8 of our great great great grandparents were Lewis McWilliam and Anne Munro, Alexander Shearer and Isabella Donald, Robert Green and Elizabeth Donald, John Spence and Janet McWilliam. Farming or crofting stock all the way, with a couple of minor variations in whisky and in shoe-making! Who needs anything else?

Thanks to Helen Bennett for this information.

Letter from America: 1918

Here is the text of Willie's letter to his brother James, dated  6th February 1918. He refers to his brother John (known as Jack) who died just 3 years later, aged only 36, and also to his new-born baby boy Robbie (later known as Bob). Some interesting references to the way things were then.

                                                                                                                     311 E. 65th Street

                                                                                                                      New York City    

                                                                                                                       Feb. 6^th 1918                                                                                           

Dear Brother

I have been intending to write you for sometime past, but as usual I always put it off. How are things going with you all? I hope you are not having a severe winter. We have had a severe cold winter here. Coal you can’t buy it is so scarce. It has not bothered us so bad as we cook and heat the house by gas,  but the gas gave out twice this winter when the temperature got down to zero. Sugar is also hard to get and quite a few more things are also scarce. The cost of everything  has advanced about 100% as well.

Maggie wrote us about the New Year time and she said you had bought a pony. I had a letter from Craig as I have no doubt you know, and Jack and I signed same and returned it over a month ago.

Jack has been living with us here since the New Year. He is doing a job in the City here, same boss. He is leaving in a few weeks to be a Foreman for another firm on a government job down in Virginia. He is getting more money and of course that is an attraction, and he likes the country I think. He is still a British Subject but I hardly think they will call any(one) here meantime over the draft age 21 to 31 years. The building line is very slow here just now outside the government work that is going on. We have been rather slow the last three months.

Isn’t it too bad about poor Davie Grierson. I am to act as executor on his estate, but have not got the proper power of attorney from his people yet. Of course I have been communicating with them. I think altogether there ought to be about $2,300 got to people. Roughly about £465 after deducting the death duties etc. It will take over six months before they can get any of it. The City Administrator will not pay anything sooner. I turned the whole thing over to them of course and they took charge of his Bank Book, Insurance Policy etc. His clothes and tools are still left with us.

Bye the bye I have been talking to Jack lately about Father’s gravestone. I think I wrote you once before asking you about it but I don’t think you said much about it. Now I expect you paid for the stone yourself Jamie. Maggie told me one time that the price was £31.0.0 if I remember right. Now Jack and I wish to give our fair share towards that, and as our share of Father’s estate is £25.14.0 each we will leave the £5.14.0 each. That will make 1/3 the cost of the stone.

I have just seen in an Elgin paper that Nicoll the baker is dead. We have not heard from ??? for quite some time now, but I expect they are all well out there. Things are in a bad way all over Canada I believe. If this awful carnage in Europe was only finished, but peace just looks about as far away as ever. I see they have decided to take lots of the young men from the munitions and put them in the fighting line. How is Peter going to fare in this. I expect he is still in Sheffield.

May and Robbie are both in fairly good health. The little fellow is hardy and strong. He is just about able to walk himself now. Jack and him are great friends. I expect Mary is still in Glenrinnes. Maggie says she likesTuriff (?) very well. She won’t manage to get home so often now.

Well I think I have given you about all my news meantime. I hope mother is keeping well and is not bothered with rheumatism. How is everyone else at home? In good health I hope. Trusting to hear from you with all the home news. With best love to all from Jack, May and I.

I remain your loving Bro.

Willie

Robert McWilliam 1844 – 1915 and Elizabeth Green 1849 - 1934

Robert and Elizabeth McWilliam in 1893

Robert was the youngest son of James McWilliam and his wife Margaret Shearer. He had an older sister, Margaret, who died aged just 20 in 1850, and two older brothers (John and Alex) who both emigrated to the USA around 1860. James spent several years in the USA both before and after the birth of Robert. We don’t know exactly how long these absences were, but they must have been fairly substantial, and therefore must have made things quite difficult for his wife and family back home in Smithston. There were other families at Smithston though (particularly the Garden family), so at least I guess Robert wasn’t left to be an all-round farmer while still a teenager. But farming was certainly to be his career – first at Smithston and then moving in 1887 to nearby Glencorrie. He and Elizabeth Green had 12 (or 13?) children, starting (?) with James in 1869. I have a copy of young James’ birth certificate which shows that he was born out of wedlock. The certificate has an endorsement which says that the birth was legitimised by subsequent marriage, but this is dated 1892. In fact I now understand that the marriage took place on 26 June 1869. The 1871 census shows Robert (27), Elizabeth (22) to be married and living with son James (1) in Fife Street, Dufftown, and with a daughter Robina (3) in Speymouth.

Robina was in fact the illegitimate daughter of Robert McWilliam and Marjory (May) Black. I believe that May grew up in Knockando and was working as a cook in the Fochabers area. I don’t know the story of Robina’s earliest years, but she was eventually brought up as Robina McWilliam with the rest of the McWilliam family at Glencorrie.

When his father James died in 1872 Robert was just 28 years old, and the father of two boys - as well as of Robina, and it seems that he got stuck in to being a successful farmer and family man. In 1887 the family made the move from Smithson to nearby Glencorrie, thus taking on a slightly larger farm – with its bigger responsibilities and better housing. The farms were rented (from the Duke of Gordon’s estates - partly in Glenfiddich and partly in Glenrinnes estates), but this move was a small step up in the world. Robert and Elizabeth continued to have a growing family, with a new baby born every two, or sometimes three, years. These included my own grandfather, Rob, in 1873.

Here again is the 1893 photo of the whole family, including baby Mary who was born that year.

And an extract from the family tree. See an earlier post for who's who in the photo.

When Robert died in 1915, farming at Glencorrie was continued by James, with Rob as 2^nd in command and Jean (known as Jane) as housekeeper. Robert’s wife Elizabeth lived till age of 85 in 1934, and I understand that she was a very strong character who remained in full charge of her faculties, and she was probably the real boss at the farm, as well as an important influence in the lives of her grandchildren.

James remained single all his life. Rob and his wife Janet (or Jessie) Pirrie had a family of 10 including my father George. Alex married Helen Ramsay and farmed at Clunymore, raising a family of 8. Elizabeth (Bessie-Ann) and her husband Willie McDonald lived in Dufftown and had a family of 10.

Janet married Alex Taylor, a farmer from Skene, and they raised a family of 9. The youngest was Isabella (Tibby) who still lives there.  Margaret married Willie Fraser of Dufftown (a distillery manager), and they raised a family of 4 – the eldest being Helen Bennett (who has helped considerably in filling me in with much of this information). She and her two sisters live in the Aberdeen area of Scotland, while brother Ronnie is a retired Doctor in Calgary, Canada.

Mary married Peter Ramsay, and the family moved to Glasgow where Peter initially worked on the trams – and they had a family of 3 boys. Peter, the middle son, moved to British Colombia in the late 1940s?

Hellen (Nellie) married Robert Mair and the family emigrated to Canada (BC) in approx. 1912. Their first three children were born in Scotland, and the youngest (Gladi) was born in Canada.

Willie and John left for the USA when they were young men (somewhere between 1905 and 1910), and Peter followed them later, maybe about 1920. They all settled in the New York area. John died there very young in 1921 (of an infection). Willie and Peter each died in 1958. The only offspring was Robert (Bob) – son of Willie and his wife May Younie (originally from Elgin). Helen Bennett visited Bob in NY in 1956, and she tells me that he and his wife (name?) had five children.

I have a copy of a letter that Willie wrote to James in 1918, with his news from New York, and referring to the financial settlement for their father Robert's gravestone. I can't lay my hands on the photo I have of the stone, but I will try to come back here with that when I track it down. In the meantime here is the text.

In loving memory of

Robert McWilliam, farmer, who died at Glencorrie 23.1.1915, aged 70 years.

Also his son John who died at Pennsylvania, USA 23.1.1921, aged 36 years.

Elizabeth Green, wife of the above Robert McWilliam who died at Glencorrie 21.1.1934, aged 85 years.

Their daughter Jane who died at Glencorrie 7.11.1939 aged 61 years.

Their son James who died at Glencorrie 29.11.1939, aged 70 years.

And I will include Willie's letter as a separate item, because I find it an interesting reflection of the way things were.