Why did I want to do this? Well, I was born in 1955 and only knew one of my natural grandparents, the others having died between 1918 and 1928. My own parents died in 1973 and 1985 and I regret not asking all those family related questions while they were still alive.
With that in mind, I set out in February 2009 to investigate and document my own family tree (Clelland / Mauchline) with limited objectives of establishing where my direct ancestors came from and to learn something about their lifestyles in those times.
Over the next three months I achieved my initial aims and extended the tree to cover my wife Sandra's family (Inglis / McCallum). My sister, Rita, then asked that I research her husband, John's family (Davie / Farmer).
The bulk of the investigations were completed making extensive use of the Scotlandspeople website (www.Scotlandspeople.org) and making several visits to Register House in Edinburgh. It was fortunate that these resources were readily available to me, living as I do in Edinburgh itself.
What did I learn? I found that my Clelland line originated in Ayrshire working mainly as weavers and farm workers in the late 1700s and early 1800s before progressing towards the mining industry and migrating to Lanarkshire in the 1880s and Fife after WW2. Other family members also emigrated to the USA in the second half of the 19th Century, working initially as miners in Alabama and spreading northwards to Illinois. The Ayrshire link was a surprise to me as I had always believed that the family had always originated from Lanarkshire. The mining connection is a strong one with my father, many uncles and various grandparents all being involved for much of their working lives.
The mining story is often a harrowing one and is well documented in the Scottish Mining website (www.scottishmining.co.uk). The tragedy of whole families working down the pits, including women and children, is one that resonates with myself, as early census records show that my one of my great-grandfathers was working down a pit at 10 years old. I was already aware that one of my grandfathers had also died in a pit accident.
The other branches of the family have all had working class backgrounds again as weavers and miners or are of farming stock.
I don’t anticipate making too many more changes to the tree as it stands as I have achieved what I set out to do. I am satisfied with the accuracy of the information gathered and more importantly content in my knowledge that all parts of my family were hard working individuals and were wholly committed to doing their best for their respective families.
Regards
Eric Clelland