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Border Reiver Families

I was surprised there was not discussion group here for the families of the Border Clans like the Scotts, Douglases, Moffats, Grahams, Elliotts etc. There have been some good books written about the Borders, probably the most famous is Steel Bonnets. There is also a group called the Borders Family History Society (http://www.bordersfhs.org.uk/Index.asp ), which provides links to several other groups interested in the Borders families.

If you are interested in Borders DNA research, here is a useful site: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~gallgaedhil/

I am descended through one the septs of Clan Scott--the Laidlaws. My family comes from the area around Hounam and Hawick. I have made several trips to the area over the years, and anybody who is of the Borders owes it themselves to visit the area.

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Permalink Reply by Craig Humes on March 3, 2010 at 12:45pm

Hi- Thank you for the information on Border Clans. I will have to check into these sites. -Craig Humes

Permalink Reply by William Douglas on March 3, 2010 at 1:14pm

There is certainly a Douglas Genealogy Group!

Happy to be a reiver too!

Permalink Reply by Kurt Laidlaw on March 3, 2010 at 1:30pm

True, but there is no place for all the reivers to get together and plan cattle raids against the English to our south!

Permalink Reply by William Douglas on March 3, 2010 at 1:41pm

Ah, but there is now!

When do we start?

Permalink Reply by Kurt Laidlaw on March 3, 2010 at 3:26pm

At the next full moon (hopefully it will be more than you and me). So where do your Douglases hail from?

Permalink Reply by William Douglas on March 4, 2010 at 12:03pm

Now! That's a good question!
I think we were Gypsies, but not of the Romany type.

I am currently researching, with others, the Douglases of Bonjedward. Now, that was reiver country, I think?

Permalink Reply by Kurt Laidlaw on March 4, 2010 at 2:21pm

If you find them in Yetholm, they could be of the Romany type.

Permalink Reply by Jeannette Scott on March 25, 2010 at 3:11pm

My Scotts hailed from the Lilliesleaf Roxburgh area.My GGGreat-Grandfather left there & was in Eddlestone by 1841 to marry Helen Veitch there before moving to Glencorse.Midlothian.He was a Ploughman.
My Grandpa always told my Dad that we were "sheep thieves & Border Reivers".
He also told my Dad we were related to Walter Scott which we are just not Sir Walter Scott-his Great-Uncle was Walter & his Great-Aunt Sarah.Not sure of parents name but probably John Scott/Margaret Aitchinson.

Permalink Reply by Kurt Laidlaw on March 26, 2010 at 10:14am

Lilliesleaf is just down the road from Hownam and Morebattle, where my immigrant ancestors lived. My immigrant and his father were both hinds. Alexander Laidlaw left Scotland when his wife died in 1831, probably part of the cholera epidemic that swept through the Borders that year, and settled in what was known as the "Scotch Settlement" in Rossie, New York.

Border Reiver Families

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