BNFT December 2008 Section A - Electric Scotland · well: Bicket (the ﬁnew kid), Peggie Hairy and Sylvester. Sylvester now weighs in at about 20 pounds. If I hold him and let him

December 2008 Section A Beth�s Newfangled Family Tree Page 1

Vol. II No. 7 Beth’s Newfangled Family Tree Section A December 2008

Clan Macfie welcomes a new ClanCommander, Iain Morris McFie, Esq.

The Lord Lyon King of Arms, the HonorableDavid Sellar, has appointed Iain Morris McFie,

Esq. of Coulintyre,K i n c r a i g ,Kingussie, Scotlandas Ceann-Cath(Commander) ofClan Macfie.

The appoint-ment follows Com-mander SandyMcPhie’s decisionto step down fromthe office so as anew leader canbring in new ideas.

In March, Lord Lyon gave permission for ClanMacfie to convene an ad hoc derbhfine to select asuitable candidate for nomination to him by peti-tion for appointment as the post. The ad hocderbhfine in this instance consists of theArmigerous men and women of the Clan.

The Clan Armigers were canvassed to ascer-tain if any of them to be willing to be consideredfor nomination for appointment. Iain Morris McFiefrom Scotland, asked to be considered and Sandyasked the ad hoc derbhfine to support his cadency.

In just the last little while, Sandy receivedadvice from the Lyon Clerk that the Lord Lyon has,

indeed, appointed Iain Morris McFie of Scotlandas the new Commander.

Should you wish to send along your wellwishes to the new Clan Commander, [email protected]

Iain and his wife, Fiona, are well known tomany Clan members through their dedication since1993 as coordinators for the quadrennial Clan In-ternational Gatherings and Clan Parliament inScotland. Iain, a former President of the ClanMacfie Society in Scotland, received a Grant ofArms in March of 1998. He was appointed Com-missioner for Clan Macfie in Scotland by the ClanCommander in July of last hear. He has also beenthe Keeper of The Clan Macfie Records for manyyears.

Gloriousfallcolor inSCpages24-25

Nothing is impossible for a man who doesn’t have to do it himself. ---A.H. Weller

Page 2 Beth�s Newfangled Family Tree Section A December 2008

Editor, photographer, etc.Beth Gay, LOK, FSA Scot

<[email protected]>347 Rocky Knoll Rd.Walhalla, SC 29691

WebmasterAlastair McIntyre, KTJ, FSA Scot

<http://www.electricscotland.com>

Masthead DesignerTom Freeman, KR, FSA Scot

<[email protected]>

Please tell everyone about

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Miss Narra is ready for the holidays!Narra The Wonder Cat is ready for all of the holidays!

She’s bundled up against the possibility of snow - which canhappen in South Carolina - but was something that a smallFlorida born and bred half Siamese and half Maine Coon hadnever even thought about until just a few years ago.

At the moment, she is asleep at my right elbow,curled into her “snail” ball and gently snoring! (Whenshe was little, she would curl up and look exactly like agigantic striped snail!) Nowadays, at almost 14, she isno longer “Narrow” (from whence cometh her name)but very wide (Come to think of it, so am I!)

She still assists with every publication and hastaken on the added responsibility of helping me enjoymy lunch each day as I sit at the island in the kitchen.She likes to have a little taste of everything - whichisn’t such a wonderful thing for her as my lunches tendto be bologna sandwiches. On the days when there is a“Whopper Junior” on the menu, she politely waits forsome of the burger!

She joins Sylvester, Peggie Hairy, Bicket and RubyLou...and, of course, sweet Tom and me in wishing eachand every one of our readers the most wonderful holi-day season ever! We all wish you love and friendshipand happiness.


A letter from your editorA letter from your editorA letter from your editorA letter from your editorA letter from your editorChristmas is

here onceagain....

Christmas letters are a wonderful way to keepin touch with friends you don’t get to see very often.

I thought it might be fun to just write minehere - since I consider each and every reader ofBeth’s Newfangled Family Tree to be a friend...andI surely don’t get to see many of you all that often.

Tom and I are wonderful. I say sometimesthat it’s like everybody in the world knew thesecret...but me. The secret? That life could behappy and filled with joy and love, companion-ship and friendship and contentment. If youhaven’t met sweet Tom, maybe we’ll see you at aScottish Games next season. I hope so. You’lllove him too!

Tom was featured in the November issue ofScots Heritage magazine. The article is about hisheraldic art and is a wonderful piece that will in-troduce you to the wonderful person in my life. Ifyou go to Scottish games, you’ve seen heraldicbanners designed by his magical hands and heart.

Narra The Wonder Cat has taken to using thefirst floor of her apartment that sits next to my rightelbow in my office. It’s a little chilly in here...so,she has gone “downstairs” to the snugly bed offleece and enclosed “room” that she loves. Sum-mertime, she ensconces herself on the “penthouse”of the wicker cat-apartment. She has a leopardprint pillow, soft, woolen blanket and snacksnearby in the upstairs unit. She is fine...but I sud-denly realized not long ago that she will be 14 thismonth.

The others in my cat-family are also doingwell: Bicket (the “new kid), Peggie Hairy andSylvester. Sylvester now weighs in at about 20pounds. If I hold him and let him “stretch out” hegoes from my neck to my knees! He is a big boy!

Ruby Lou Begonia is fine. She is still withmy good friend, Jeff, as his fence is much betterthan mine. She has grown her curly hair for thecoming winter. I wish my hair would curl like that!Ruby Lou is a chestnut - red hair, red mane andtail...and in the winter, she has hair that is about 3inches thick!

Our lives have been just sort of busy andfun...with not much fancy included. We love topack a lunch and go somewhere beautiful for apicnic. Because we live in the foothills of the BlueRidge Mountains, there are always new gorgeousplaces to go with our little lunch.

I did get go travel to Flagstaff, Arizona andVentura, California this year - the trips sponsoredby Nancy and Ludlow Porch and AirTran Airlinesand by my “twin” brother, Jim Walters of theCaledonian Kitchen. Nobody threw anything atme during my speeches and it was wonderful tovisit with friends I don’t often get to see.

My hip is doing so good! I’ve started walk-ing and geezette loping at least a mile each day.Before the hip went wonky, I could lope six milesand more without taking a deep breath...now it’sall I can do to do one mile. Tom says I’ll get betteras I haven’t been able to do this for maybe 2 years.Tom’s house is just across from a wonderful parkhere in Walhalla where there is a luxurious walk-

Continued on page 12


CLAN DAVIDSONSOCIETY, USA

Michael W. Davidson,President

235 Fairmont DriveNorth Wilkesboro, NC 28659

Phone: 336-838-3850Email: [email protected]

Macfie Clan Society wins bigParticipation Award at 2008 StoneMountain Highland Games!

With eleven particpants in the Clan ChallengeKilted Mile, the Macfie Clan Society won the 2008Clan Participation award. Thanks largely to theefforts of John McAfee of Baxter, Tennessee, adultsand children participated in this big event.

The Stone Mountain Highland Games werealso the Macfie Annual Meeting and 25th Anni-versary Celebration. After the games, the groupmet at the Emery University Conference Centerfor a meal and the meeting.

Chloe McAfee performed a Highland Dance.She is five years old and a primary dance studentand the daughter of Keith and Holly McAfee ofChattanooga.

After dinner, the meeting was called to order.Jim McAfee was elected president, Amy Fee

was elected vice president and Ginger McAfee was

elected treasurer.Continued on page 16


Read Pat Long’s columnmost every month

in Beth’sNewfangled Family Tree

See it all...

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CLAN KEITH SOCIETY USA,INC. Cordially invites membershipinquiries from all descendants ofthe Keiths and Clan Septs: Aus-tin, Dickson, Falconer, Hackson,Harvey, Haxton, Hervey, Hurry,Keith, Kite, Lumgair, Mackeith,Marshall, Urie, Urry, etc. (manyspelling variations)

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Dear Genealogy Friends:Re: Scotish immigrants:The Parrish family has this dilemma. There appears to be a

Richard parrish who came into the Virginia Colony. Most ofthe Parrishes are from England who came from France 1200-1600

I don’t know what to make of what John Conley Parrishwrote about Missouri history. What puzzles me is the refer-ence to Richard Parrish coming from Scotland. How can thatbe? Dan mentioned that there’s a reference in the Scott LeeBoyd book “The Parrish Family” to Richard going to Scot-land (and then coming back, of course), but the Missouri his-tory appears to suggest that Scotland is where he came from,which is news not only to me, but also news to other descen-dants of Richard Parrish in our research group.

One correction, my reference to Scotland from Boyd’s wasfrom the early introduction of the Parrish family. In that intro-duction there is a mention of a knight who went to Scotland tofight for the English King. I suggested that could be a sourceof Parrishes in Scotland, especially if the knight was awardedland in the low country of Scotland.

On p. 60-62 There is this Richard Parrish in Scotland 1600-1700s

Do you have any insight about any Scotish Parrish/Parishpeople coming into this country in the Virginia area in the1600-late 1700s.

Respectfully,James Thomas Rosenbaum310 Melvin Street

Is there someone who can help?


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Sword ban is unkindest cut forHighland dancers - but currenttempest may just be in the teapotFrom The Scotsman

For almost a thousand years, it has been ademonstration of courage and dexterity, the suc-cessful completion of which heralded victory inbattle.

But the Ghillie Callum, or Sword Dance, asit is better known, has nowbeen defeated by red tape, ac-cording to dance judges whohave cancelled its perfor-mance at a Highland games,claiming a license is now re-quired to “transport a danger-ous weapon.”

Organizers of theBalquhidder andLochearnhead HighlandGames have been forced tostrike the sword dance offtheir Highland dance compe-tition after the judges, who inprevious years, brought theirown swords, said this was no longer possible forfear of breaching new legislation designed to con-trol the carrying of knives.

Kenny McCallam, a member of the organiz-ing committee of the Balquhidder, Lochearnheadand Strathyre Highland Games, said yesterday thatthe sword dance has been cut after the two judgesrefused to transport their official weapons to thegames.

In the past, competitors danced around twohandmade “swords,” made from blunt steel withan improvised hilt. But the organizers were in-formed a few years ago that “official” swordsshould be used and these would be provided bythe judges...until now.

“I think it is a terrible shame,” said Mr.McCallam. “The sword dance has been on the goat the games for decades, but given the events that

have taken place and the problems of terrorism,people are clamping down on all sides. The judgessaid they had been advised not to carry the, that alicense may not be required and we don’t have timeto apply for one.

However, it would appearthat the judges, who did notwish to be named or quoted, aremistaken. The Scottish Gov-ernment, under the CustodialSentences and Weapons (Scot-land) Act 2007, plans to estab-lish a scheme for the licensingof knife dealers with a view torestricting the sale, hire, lend-ing or giving of swords andbladed weapons.

But the act is not yet inforce and will have specific ca-veats to protect the use ofswords for religious or cultural

reasons. A Scottish Government spokesman said:“When we do bring forward restrictions on swords,the legislation allows defences for religious, cul-tural and sporting purposes among others.

Documentation with the bill added: “In addi-tion, the bill allows defences for other purposes tobe specified by Order, and ministers will use thispower to provide exceptions to the ban on sale forspecified purposes, including Highland games.

Last night, Helen Ford, the director of admin-istration at the Scottish Official Board of High-land Dancing, insisted there was no restriction onthe transportation of swords for dancing. “Thescheme is not yet in force and we have been toldwe will not be affected and the dance will con-tinue.”

Wi t h m a n y t h a n k s t o P a t r i c i aTennyson Bell from Pasadena, California.


You’re invited to theSGES Christmas

ing trail - so, I don’t have to worry about cars ordogs or anything. (Dogs never scare me anyway...)My hip had its first birthday October 26, so I guessI’m doing OK.

I had a lovely surprise not long ago. A previ-ously unknown cousin on my father’s side of thefamily emailed me. What a delight! She is thedaughter of my father’s brother. We got to go overto Highlands, NC where she and her husband hadrented a house for a week and meet them. I don’tknow how to explain how great it is to actuallyhave some family.

We are hoping to get started on our housesoon. I’ll have to write a letter to everyone whenthat gets going as it is a wonderful story. Rightnow, we’re working on house plans and think wehave found our bit of land. I’ll tell you more aboutall that later.

Tom’s mother just celebrated her 94th birth-day. She is fine and still lives upstairs in her ownhouse. She was a nurse for over 60 years and hasbeen retired for a long time. We both enjoy her somuch.

You know that I wish each and every one ofyou a wonderful Christmas and holiday season -and that you all have love and happiness and goodhealth and joy not only at this time of year, but allyear long.

Love, beth

Social in Jax, Florida“Christmas in the Appalachians” is the theme

of the Christmas social for The SouthernGenealogist’s Exchange Society.

Background traditional Christmas songs withthe sounds of the mountain strings of banjo, mando-lin, dulcimer. Talent by society members and friends.

Dress for men is jeans or overalls. Ladies wear jeansor jean skirt with a “Christmas blouse, sweater or vest.

Event will be held Saturday, December 6th,2008 at 11:00 AM, Mandarin Regional Library,3330 Kori Road in Mandarin.

Everyone brings a covered dish to share.Call to sign up for talent, and/or covered dish

and to receive more information. (904) 778-1000or 262-1948 Open to the public. Make this the yearyou find out more about your family.

Beth and Tom at Charleston 2008.

Christmas letter, continued from page 3


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Alastair McIntyre on Scotland Alastair McIntyre, electricscotland.com

If you haven’t visited Alastair McIntyre’sElectricScotland.com, you have missed a treat.Here is just a sampling of what you’ll find. (beth)

The Scottish Tradition in Canada Edited byW. Stanford Reid and The Auld Alliance in NewFrance by Henry B. M. Best

Here is how the first chapter starts...Scots haveplayed an important part in the development ofCanada, as the subsequent chapters in this book willshow, but in order to understand why this has beenthe case we must look beyondCanada to Scotland itself. Thetraits of character, the ways ofthinking, the prejudices andthe biases with which the Scot-tish immigrants came to thiscountry and which they passedon to their descendants even tothe third and fourth genera-tions, found their origins in thehomeland which they had left.It is therefore necessary that weshould commence our surveyof the Scottish tradition inCanada by looking at the Scot-tish background in order togain some comprehension ofthe place which the Scot hasmade for himself in Canada.

Two basic forces whichhave made the Scot what heis are Scotland’s geography and Scotland’s history.The physical character of the land itself has wieldeda powerful influence on Scottish development; alongwith that has gone the influence of its geographicposition in the world. At the same time, historywhich includes the human development in this en-vironment has played an even more important rolein shaping the Scottish character. We must, there-fore, take both these factors into account when weattempt to understand the Scot and his contributionsto the New World.

Scotland, like Caesar’s Gaul, is divided intothree geographical areas: the far north, includingCaithness, Sutherland and the Orkneys, which areflat, windblown and not very fertile; the middleportion, containing the Highlands lying north ofthe Firth of Forth-Firth of Clyde line, which aremountainous, rugged and on the west coast comedown to the sea’s edge with cliffs sometimes overtwo hundred feet high, with long coastal indenta-tions or sea-lochs, deep valleys and poor soil; the

southern area or Lowlandswith a broad belt of fertileland running betweenEdinburgh and Glasgow,and the more southerly por-tion having low hills or up-lands and relatively goodsoil. The Lowland area hasalways been the wealthiestpart of the country, andsince the eighteenth centuryand the beginning of the In-dustrial Revolution it hastended to dominate Scot-land, drawing off much ofthe population from thenorthern areas to its facto-ries and workshops. It hasalso had a further advantagein that it has the best portson both the east (Aberdeen,

Dundee, Perth, Leith) and west (Ayr, Ardrossan,Glasgow) coasts, and is closer to England than theother regions, which means that its opportunitiesfor commerce are considerably greater.

You can read the rest of this chapter at http://www.electricscotland.com/history/canada/tradi-tion/tradition3.htm

You can read the other chapters at http://www. e l e c t r i c s c o t l a n d . c o m / h i s t o r y /c a n a d a / t r a d i t i o n / i n d e x . h t m


Spring Seminar set in Jacksonville,FL February 29

H.R. Scot McPhee and his wife Marvene wererecipients of a plaque honoring Mr. McPhee asfounder of the Clan Society. Marvene was given alovely Austrian crystal pendant carved with theClan Crest in appreciation of her work as societytreasure and newsletter editor.

After the meeting, the evening continued witha ceilidh.

If you would like more information on TheMacfie Clan Society of America, contact Dr. JimMcAfee, president at 420 Ash Dr., Baxter, TN38544.

Macfie Clan Society, continued from page 4

There is no December meeting of theJacksonville Genealogical Society. How-ever, February 29, 2009, the society willhold a Spring Seminar, from 9-4, registra-tion beginning at 8:30 a.m., at the CrownPoint Baptist Church in Mandarin, 10153Old St. Augustine Road, Jacksonville, Fl.Printable forms, with additional seminarinformation can be found on our website:http://jaxgen.home.comcast.net

We are fortunate to have as ourspeaker this year, Genealogist Amy LarnerGiroux, CG, CGL. Mark your calendersnow for plans to attend.

Jacksonville Beach at sunsettaken last February.

Haunted cemetery with lots of Skeens interredfound near Franklin, Kentucky. Oooooooooo!

The Clan Skene Association newsletter reportsthat at the Grandfather Mountain Games, a ladynamed Elizabeth Gillespie from Franklin, Kentucky,came to the Clan Skene tent. She is not a Skene,but near her property is a Skeen graveyard, she says.

Ms. Gillespie says the graveyard is hauntedand dates back to the late 1700s.

She said the area is very dark and scary. Whenyou walk through it, you have to be careful where youplace your feet because you start sinking into the ground.

The graveyard has been abandoned, but any-one who goes there will never go back in again.

Her daughter-in-law once wanted to dig upsome flowers from the edge of the grounds, whenshe heard a woman’s voice amongst the gravescalling her to “come on over here.”

Needless to say, the daughter-in-law was ter-rified and ran away.

These are some of the names on the grave-stones: K.T. Skeen, 26 November 1809 - 4 No-vember 1969; Pamela A. R. Skeen 8 July 1811 - 8April 1863; Infant son of Pamela and K.T. Skeenborn and died 6 April 1848; J. N. Skeen 4 June1939 - 24 December 1878; Robert C. Skeen 21January 1843-10 November 1844 and ThurstonSkeene 1816-1880.

If you would like more information about theClan Skene, please contact The Clan Skene Asso-ciation, Inc., 5116 Ridgeway, Orlando, Florida.


Robin R. Farquhar, 59, Artistic and Execu-tive Director of Flat Rock Playhouse passed awayMonday evening Nov. 3, 2008.

A native of Flat Rock, NC, Robin was theson of Robroy and Leona Farquhar, founders ofFlat Rock Playhouse.

He is survived by his sister, Keets Taylor, herhusband Richard H., their son Bryan and daughterHolly McDonald with her husband David.

Robin returned to the Playhouse in 1980 af-ter a brief time in Atlanta, GA, to assist his ailingfather with the management of the State Theatre.Upon his father’s passing in 1983, Robin acceptedthe position of Artisticand Executive Direc-tor and remained inthe leadership role tothe present.

Robin Farquhartouched the lives ofhundreds of theatreartists around the na-tion. Having producedover 300 professionalproductions at thePlayhouse, he willlong be rememberedas one of thesoutheast’s most prolific and successful theatrevisionaries.

Over the 29 years of his tenure, Robin cre-ated a new vision for the Playhouse. The organiza-tion grew from a 10 week summer stock companyto a year-round professional regional theatre andschool advancing the dual mission of quality per-formance and arts education. The performing se-ries now spans nine-months and entertains over95,000 theatergoers while the educational compo-nent, YouTheatre, instructs up to 1,000 studentseach year. Seasonal artists and college studentsnumber more than 100.

Flowers of the ForestFlowers of the ForestFlowers of the ForestFlowers of the ForestFlowers of the ForestOn Sunday, November 2 the organization

dedicated The Robin R. Farquhar Education Cen-ter. Constructed in 2007 at the Playhouse site, thestate of the art facility is the centerpiece of an edu-cational mission fulfilling both his and his father’slong-term goals for the Vagabond School of theDrama, Inc.

In lieu of flowers, memorial contributionsmay be made to the Robin R. Farquhar EducationCenter, P. O. Box 310, Flat Rock, NC 28731 At-tention: Dale Bartlett—Development Director.

Ellouise Sharman MacKinnon, died earlyin 2008 in Jackson-ville, Florida. Shewas the mother ofClan MacKinnon So-ciety of NorthAmerica founder, N.Joann MacKinnonOsborne, who passedaway in 2006. Shewas also the mother offormer Representa-tive of the Chief,Clinton E.MacKinnon, Sr.,along with daughters

Sally Rorer and Alexandria Pratt.Mrs. MacKinnon was a lifelong resident of

Jacksonville, Florida. She graduated from RobertE. Lee High School and shortly after, married herhigh school sweetheart, Clarence EmoryMacKinnon., Sr. She was a charter member of theClan MacKinnon Society and held the office ofTreasurer for many years.

Sgt. Dustin J. Perrott, aged 23, fromFredricksburg, VA, USA, died 21 June fromwounds when a makeshift bomb exploded near hisvehicle in Miri, Afghanistan.


When I was born I was so surprised that I didn’t talkfor a year and a half! Gracie Allen (1906-1964)


?Only great minds can read this........

This is weird, but interesting! fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too!!

Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was

rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to arscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaetr in waht oerdrthe ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit andlsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and youcan sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mniddeos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmighuh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

Our friend, Jay Brown, sent this to us. It’s a hoot - especially for an editor who is sometimeshighly criticized for ONE typo out of 100,000 words! Thanks, Jay!

Is this fella one of your missing kin?Born in Hamburg, Aiken County, South Caro-

lina on 27 October 1828, but raised in Dayton, Ohio,Marcus Junius Parrott, whose views on the issuesof child slavery were undoubtedly influenced by hisQuaker father, was educated at Dickinson Collegein Carlisle, Pennsylvania where he graduated in1849. He subsequently studied law at CambridgeUniversity, Massachusetts, completed his degree andreturned to Dayton where he was admitted to thebar and started a legal practice.

In 1853 and 1854 he served as a representa-tive in the Ohio State Legislature.

Parrot moved in 1855 to Leavonworth, Kan-sas Territory, practiced law there and became a po-litical activist. In that year, he was appointed courtreporter for the first session of the Territorial Su-preme Court and in the following September servedas defense attorney for Charles Robinson and sev-eral other free state partisans who were under in-dictment for treason and in the custody of the pro-slavery government of Lecompton.

A Democrat when he first arrived in the Ter-ritory, he soon became active in the Free State Party(later the Republican Party) and was a delegate tothe Topeka Constitutional Convention on 23 Oc-

tober 1855. In 1857 he was nominated as a del-egate to Congress under the Topeka Convention.He was subsequently elected with over 7,000 votesand served Kansas in that capacity for nearly fouryears.

Parrott was in Washington, DC when the Kan-sas Bill finally passed in January 1861 and he trans-mitted the news to Leavonworth.

He ran a very close third to James H. Laneand Samuel C. Pomeroy in the balloting for theUS Senate and unsuccessfully sought election toCongress in 1862 and 1874.

Parrott then left politics and turned his atten-tion to agricultural pursuits on his farm nearLeavonworth. A few years later, after experienc-ing failing health for several months, he movedback to Dayton, Ohio, to be close to his brother.

He died there on 4 October, 1879.Do you have this man in your family tree? If

so, please contact John Perrott, 5 Shepherds Rise,Vernham Dean, Andover SP11 OHD England,United Kingdom.

John Perrott visited me in Georgia manyyears ago! It’s wonderful to know that he is stillworking with his beloved P*RR*TT Society!



Clan Colquhoun Society Of NAClan Colquhoun Society Of NAClan Colquhoun Society Of NAClan Colquhoun Society Of NAClan Colquhoun Society Of NA

Colquhoun/Calhoun, Cowan, MacClintock,MacManus. Applications available online at

2984 Mike Drive

You�re invited to visit The Clan Colquhoun �Blogspot� at:http://clancolquhoun.blogspot.com/

http://www.geocities.com/clancolquhoun_na/home.html

Looking west across the Stenness Loch on Orkney. This photo of swans in the thin ice was sent byfriend Pat Long of Orkney whose article you will see elsewhere in this issue of BNFT. Pat says, “Ilive about half a mile to the left of where I took the photograph. The swans had made trails in thevery thin ice on the loch. The loch only freezes on a handful of days each year.”

Marietta, GA 30064

[email protected]

Membership is invited for all spellings of


Family History onFamily History onFamily History onFamily History onFamily History onthe Internetthe Internetthe Internetthe Internetthe Internet

Whydid they die?

Family Notes

http://www.antiquusmorbus.com/English/EnglishA.htm

With many thanks to

The P*RR*TT Society

(http://www.p-rr-t.org.uk)

I am frequently nonplussed when I see deathcertificates, or, more precisely, the causes of deathquoted on some of them. Donald Williams has onhis family tree a child, Minnie Perrett who died inColchester in 1881 at the age of 6 months. Thecause of her death: “Marasmus.” Whatever wasthat?

If you too would like to have this and othermysterious sounding causes of death explained,may I recommend Rudy’s List of Archaic MedicalTerms whose (free) website details are given at thetop of this article. It consists of alphabetically listedmedical conditions, and how they have been de-fined through the years. On the title page are afew of the odder sounding conditions -Winterbottom’s sign; Erbs paralysis; and BlueDevils are amongst them. Clicking on the nameswill take you directly to a description of these ill-nesses, but a more methodical way to use the site

is to click on the initial letter of the disease on theleft hand side of the page.

Doing this on the letter “M” leads us to “Mar-asmus,” mentioned above. So what was it? I findit described in 1829 as “A wasting away of fleshwithout fever or apparent disease,” and in 1988 as“a condition of chronic undernourishment occur-ring especially in children and usually caused by adiet deficient in calories and proteins but some-times by disease ( as congenital syphilis) or para-sitic infection, called also athrepsia. So, poor 6month old Minnie died primarily because she wasundernourished. Life can be very sad.

Several of my ancestors died of “phthisis.”The website deals succinctly with this one: “Ph-thisis” is an archaic name for tuberculosis.

This website can become addictive! When afemale relative of Dr. Chris Bell died, a contribu-



tory cause of death was “Cachexia,” which in 1829was described vaguely as “A bad habit of body,known by a depraved or vitiated state of the solidsand fluids.” By the middle of the 20th century, theexplanation was more understandable: “Any gen-eral reduction in vitality and strength of body andmind resulting from a debilitating chronic disease.”This makes sense when we find that the other causeof the lady’s death was cancer.

William Perrott, a currier aged 72, died inBristol in 1872 and the cause was given as “Apo-plexy.” A conventional dictionary defines this asa “malady arresting the powers of sense and mo-tion,” but the website quotes a modern source thus:“The word ‘apoplexy’ comes from the Greek‘apoplexia’ meaning a seizure, in the sense of be-ing struck down. In Greek “;exe” is “a stroke.”The ancients believed that some-one suffer- ing a stroke (or anysudden inca- pacity) had beenstruck down by the gods. In otherwords, Will- iam died from whatwe now call a stroke.

T h e longest explanationI have found was for the untimelydeath of cab drive AnthonyParrott in 1848: “Inflammation of the brain from ascalp wound. Run over by a cab, from the box ofwhich he was pulled by his coat being trapped inthe wheel when reaching for the reins which hehad dropped.”

Why did they die? Continued from page 22

Famous Orcadians in American History... Washington Irving

Pat Long - [email protected]


Famous men andwomen are often re-membered for just oneachievement or event

and many of them would be shocked to find howthey have gone down in posterity – Benjamin

Franklin flying a kite in a thunderstorm and IsaacNewton being hit on the head by an apple.

It is a well known fact in Orkney that Wash-ington Irving’s fathercame from the island ofShapinsay and he isknown here, and to mostpeople, as the author ofRip Van Winkle and TheLegend of Sleepy Hollowbut these are two of hislesser claims to fame.

Irving is generally de-scribed as the first Ameri-can author to achieve international fame and the firstwhose writing lived on after him. When the Hall ofFame for Great Americans was established in 1900,97 of the “great and good” of America voted for whichof 294 nominees should be installed as members. Wash-ington Irving came tenth, with 83 votes.

His first success was with a satirical history ofNew York by a fictional author DeidreichKnickerbocker. It was enormously popular in the USAand Britain and introduced the word knickerbocker topopular culture – the New York Nicks andKnickerbocker Glory. The item of clothing got its namefrom its resemblance to the illustrations in the book.

He was also the first writer to give New Yorkthe name Gotham, since given wider prominenceby Batman. There is an old story that the inhabit-ants of Gotham in England pretended to be idiotsby raking a pond for the moon and Irving thoughtthe name was appropriate for a city of ‘wise fools’.

However, Irving’s greatest contribution topopular culture is why I’m writing about him inDecember – our idea of the traditional Christmasis very largely due to him. His first contributionwas in Knickerbocker’s History of New York, in


GloriousGloriousGloriousGloriousGloriousFFFFFallallallallall

in Sin Sin Sin Sin SouthouthouthouthouthCarolina!Carolina!Carolina!Carolina!Carolina!


GloriousGloriousGloriousGloriousGloriousFFFFFallallallallall

in Sin Sin Sin Sin SouthouthouthouthouthCarolina!Carolina!Carolina!Carolina!Carolina!


Robert Burnsevent set forCharlotte, NorthCarolina

You are invited to the 250th Anniversary ofthe birth of Scotland’s Robert Burns. It will beSaturday January 24th from 6 pm until about 10pm at the Charlotte Country Club - The GrandBallroom.

The Immortal Memory will be given by FrankShaw FSA Scot. Poetry, Song , Music and Toastswill be order of the evening.

Tickets are $75 per person which includesdinner and drinks. Tables can be reserved for upto 10 persons per table. Tickets are available now.

Please contact Peter Wilson, President Rob-ert Burns Society of Charlotte at: Tel 704 535 8955.

Frank Shaw to present Immortal Memory

Pat Long - Washington Irving, continued from page 23

which he described St Nicholas as an elfin Dutch burgerwith a clay pipe, who rode over the treetops in a horse-drawn wagon, dropping gifts down the chimneys of hisfavourites, giving rise to our popular image of SantaClaus.

Irving spent some years in England and wroteabout his travels in “The Sketch Book”. His account oftravelling by stagecoach on Christmas Eve and spend-ing Christmas at Braceridge Hall seems to be full ofclichés, because they are the source of our idea of theVictorian Christmas.

Charles Dickens was a friend of Irving and a greatadmirer of his work. He made no secret of having usedIrving’s descriptions in A Christmas Carol and PickwickPapers.

“Perhaps the impending holiday might have givena more than usual commotion to the country, for it seemedto me as if everybody was in good looks and good spir-its. Game, poultry, and other luxuries of butchers’ andfruiterers’ shops were thronged with customers. Thehousewives were stirring briskly about putting their dwell-ings in order; and the glossy branches of holly with theirbright red berries, began to appear at the windows.

The scene brought to mind an old writer’s accountof Christmas preparations. “Now capons and hens, be-sides turkeys, geese, and ducks, with beef and mutton –must all die, for in twelve days a multitude of peoplewill not be fed with a little. Now plums and spice, sugarand honey, square it among pies and broth. Now or nevermust music be in tune, for the youth must dance andsing to get them a heat, while the aged sit by the fire.”

“As we approached the house, we heard the soundof music, and now and then a burst of laughter, fromone end of the building. This, Braceridge said, mustproceed from the servants’ hall, where a great deal ofrevelry was permitted, and even encouraged, by theSquire, throughout the twelve days of Christmas, pro-vided everything was done conformably to ancient us-age. Here were kept up the old games of hoodman blind,shoe the wild mare, hot cockles, steal the white loaf,bob-apple, and snap-dragon; the Yule log and Christ-mas candle were regularly burned, and the mistletoe,with its white berries, hung up, to the imminent peril ofall the pretty house-maids.”

Best wishes from Orkney for a good, old-fash-ioned Christmas.


Clan MacLellan Historian Gene McClellan, 09/25/16 – 09/07/08, passed away on September 7,2008 in Clifton Springs, NY. His failing health overthe past few years has prevented active participa-tion in meetings of the Board of Directors and tent-ing at Scottish games, but he was always availablefor consultation, encouragement, and sharing ideasfor ways to improve communication among mem-bers of Clan MacLellan. While he is not listed as a“founder” of Clan MacLellan, he certainly was keyin the progress made throughout the years as hejoined his brother, Hugh, and friend CrawfordMcLellan contact McClellans throughout the U.S.and Canada in an effort to share genealogy researchand incorporate the organization. Joining on No-vember 1, 1981 he was member number 1! Hiscontributions to the development of a successfulorganization are too numerous to list here, but asignificant result was the first Officers’ Manual

which he wrote. It was used by leaders formany years and he assisted with the updat-ing and revisions made in 2006. In additionto serving as President, he served as Direc-tor of the West Region for many years. In thepast year he was working on preparing a his-tory of Clan MacLellan and we hope that hisdraft can be retrieved from his computer byhis family.

Flowers of the FFlowers of the FFlowers of the FFlowers of the FFlowers of the Forestorestorestorestorest

Contributions to the Scholarship Fund and the Ar-chives Fund have been received in Gene’s memory.His genealogy is recorded in the publicationby Lois M Patrie and Gene, “Descendants ofMichael and Jane (Henry) McClellen of Cotrain,MA,” a copy of which can be found in the ClanMacLellan archives housed at Odom GenealogicalLibrary in Moultrie, GA. Our sincere sympathy isextended not only to his immediate family, butto all the clan cousins who cherished his friendship.


Another beautiful Scotland photo from [email protected] who sent this of the Firth of FourthBridge. He says he went to the Black Watch reunion in Perth this past summer (He was in the bandfrom 1955-1967) and took the photo we see here. Thanks, RWeebobbi!

Eric Marland - with ClanSkene connections - places13th in this year’s Grizzly

Eric Marland, the son-in-law of the late Edna Clark (a long-time Clan Skene member) placed 13th in this years Grizzly atGrandfather Mountain.

The Grizzly is a Metric Century bike ride of approximately65 miles with 7000 feet of climbing. The ride includes a climbover Beech Mountain where Lance Armstrong trained for hiscomeback into cycling after his successful fight with cancer.

The Grizzly begins and ends on the track at Grandfather Mountain.Riders cycle through Avery County, North Carolina, including 2 miles of dirt road up the back

side of Beech Mountain.Congratulations, Eric!

A Grizzly competitor 2007


Genealogy and Self:A Search for Roots and how itRelates to the Appreciation of the Pastin Ourselvesby Joanne Crawford, Ph.D. Kevan Crawford, Ph.D.

“In all of us there is a hunger, marrow-deep, to know our heritage - to know who we areand where we have come from. Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollowyearning. No matter what our attainments in life, there is still a vacuum, an emptiness andthe most disquieting loneliness.”— Alex Haley

This presentation applies our professional andpersonal perspectives to an understanding of thecurrent interest in genealogical studies, especiallywith regards to the US, butprobably in many ways uni-versally relevant. AsCrawfords, we will use ourown experiences as gene-alogist and DNA surnameproject coordinator for ourClan Crawford Association,when providing some of theconcrete examples for theideas we discuss here.

We will focus on twoaspects. The first is ananalysis of what motivatespeople to research their ori-gins. The second addressesthe role of DNA studies inthe search for one’s ancestry. In this second sec-tion, we discuss some of the issues that haveemerged from the Crawford Surname YDNAProject.

Motivation to Research Family OriginsOur perspective is based on the supposition

that the ballooning interest in genealogy may wellrespond to a need for connecting to an idealizedcommunity. The often depersonalized society wehave become tends to estrange people from theirfamily of origin. People seek a sense of commu-nity and a desire for ties that define their identity.

This, we think, plays an important role in fuelingthe current surge of popularity in the study of fam-ily genealogy. 1

We now live in anurbanized, often imper-sonal world, character-ized in many ways byanomie. We move out ofour home still in our ado-lescence to go away tocollege. When we in theUS take a job, it is aslikely to be on the oppo-site coast, or midwayacross, as it is to be inour own home state —much less our home-town. In too many cases,our children grow upbarely knowing their

grandparents. This culture of mobility, in the USat least, is a continuation of the pattern of immi-gration that so marked the development of thiscountry.

As Crawfords, we have found interestinglearning about the immigration patterns of our Scotand Scots-Irish ancestors. The Crawford family hasprobably a couple hundred thousand descendantsaround the world. In the US, their numbers havebeen estimated at over 100,000. We don’t knowwhether our families are representative, but there


Joanne Crawford, Ph. D,at Loudoun Castle, Ayrshire


are several thousand people descended from the earli-est identified ancestors of both of us, Edward and Jo-seph Crawford (born eight generations back in the late1700s). Their descendants are widely distributedaround the country, resident in at least half of the 50states.

American frontier families were large with adozen children not uncommon. Thus, there probablyare over 40 million American descendants of Scot-tish origin, which is some fifteen percent of the USpopulation. This makes us by far the largest ethnicgroup in America, today seconded only by African-Americans! Though Hispanics are catching up fast.Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africaalso have significant population of Scottish descent.Thus, the number of descendants of Scottish émigrésaround the world is many times larger than the popu-lation of Scotland today (about 5 1/2 million).

Scots, and especially the Scots-Irish, haveactually defined in many ways what America is.They constitute a majority ethnic group in the US,both in terms of cultural norms and in numbers.They pretty much originated American Protestant-ism based on Scottish Presbyterianism and haveimposed a code of ethics that came out of the hard-ships of life in Scotland, Northern Ireland and fron-tier America. Their survival has come from theirstrength as a community. We think loosing thatnexus, within the context of the alienation of mod-ern American life — where people move acrosscountry for schooling and jobs, where grandpar-ents have ceased to be functional contributors inthe growing family’s life — foments feelings ofpersonal insecurity. All this would propel peopleto search for influences that might provide a senseof stability and reconnection with a family andcommunity context that in the past had been ex-tremely important for a sense of identity. Evidenceof this is that the number of books published onthe Scots and Scots-Irish has proliferated over thelast five years, Scottish Games in the U. S. are quite

massively attended, and Ancestry.com and its sib-ling companies have become a major industry.

In America, Crawford families and their rela-tives have been moving west for generations. Theytended to stay together and migrate (withinAmerica) together as groups of families (often re-lated by marriage), following the path of newlyopened lands as European America extended west-ward. There appears to have been an actual pre-dominant pattern of migration, at least by the 2Scots-Irish, whereby they arrived on the East Coast,typically to Delaware Bay, first settling in Penn-sylvania (1720-1740). The second generationmoved south into the Shenandoah Valley of Vir-ginia (1750-1760). They next moved into the Caro-linas (1760-1770). Others went into Kentucky(1770-1790), and then on to Tennessee (1790-1810) as new lands became available and old landsbecame depleted or shared by many offspring. Arelatively more permanent move was into Mid-western states like Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Missouri,and Texas (1820-1840). The final move, often sev-eral generations later, was to the far West (Cali-fornia, Oregon, Washington, and the Mountain andSouthwest states) (1860-1870). This migration re-intensified during different decades of the 20thcentury. It had been mobilized by social events thatincluded the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, theGreat Depression, progressive industrialization,and the two great Wars.

Historical recollection reminds us that descen-dants of Scots and the Scots-Irish propelled de-mocracy in the US. It was the Scot tradition ofindependence, and probably especially the idealof such, that provided important impetus to thebreak away from Britain by the American Colo-nies. The Declaration of Arbroath (1320), a letterby Scottish nobles to the Pope, declared that —“Itis in truth, not for glory, not honor that we are fight-ing, but for freedom —for that alone which nohonest man gives up but with life itself.”

A Search for Roots, continued from page 29

This article to be continued in Section B of this issue

Joanne Crawford, Ph.D presented this paper at theXXVIII International Congress of Genealogical and Heraldic Sciences

in St. Andrews, Scotland in August of 2006.

Documents

BNFT December 2008 Section A - Electric Scotland · well: Bicket (the ﬁnew kid), Peggie Hairy and Sylvester. Sylvester now weighs in at about 20 pounds. If I hold him and let him