Skip to main content

2026 Week 25 : The Ancestor Who Stays With Me #52Ancestorsin52Weeks

 Living in Scotland as I do, there is one ancestor who stays with me, in the sense of it's hard to get away from him.  I am one of the thousands upon thousands of people descended from Robert I, King of Scotland, otherwise known as Robert the Bruce!

Statue of Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland at Stirling Castle

I tend to take this lightheartedly. He is my 21 x great grandfather. Who know how many illegitimacies there can have been on the long descent from him to me, but following a paper trail I believe I can claim him, though claiming descendancy from royalty was not something I had intended to find myself doing.

My immediate ancestry is very working class - miners, labourers, metalworkers, farmers etc. What I have noticed in my research is that is is usually a daughter of a church minister who can act as a 'gateway' ancestor to the gentry and nobility, as many a minister's daughter was married to the younger sons of land owning gentry.  It was only when I followed my paternal grandmother's Walker line back to the 17th century that I came across one such minister's daughter  - my 7 x great grandmother, Helen Galbraith, daughter of John Galbraith, Minister in Balfron, then later Bothkennar in Stirlingshire (before being deposed for 'tippling and other faults' in 1662 !!) Helen was married off to Alexander Callander of Bothkennar in 1650. Alexander was the eldest son and heir of Alexander Callander the 2nd of Westertoun and Bothkennar.

Source: The Baronetage of England, Or the History of the English Baronets ..., Volume 4  By William Betham

Tracing this Callander line further back, I came to my 10 x great grandmother Katherine Elphinstone, daughter of Alexander, 1st Lord Elphinstone, who herself held a charter to the lands of Airth in Stirlingshire. His wife, my 15 x great grandmother was Elizabeth Barlow, who was at the court of King James IV of Scotland, being a courtier to his wife Margaret Tudor.

I am not going to go into detail about the generations between this couple and Robert the Bruce. Suffice it to say I can trace a line up through Elphinstones and Oliphants to reach Elizabeth de Brus, Robert's daughter with Elizabeth de Burgh, his second wife. Now, as I said previously, this is a line which disregards any possibility of illegitimacy. Some historians have even questioned if Elizabeth herself was illegitimate. However, it is through her, that I am 'laying claim' to one of Scotland's most famous heroes, Robert the Bruce.

Robert the Bruce is regarded as a hero for freeing Scotland from English oppression, winning the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 and getting the English to agree to full independence for Scotland in 1328. When he died a year later he was interred at Dunfermline Abbey, with his heart being removed and buried at Melrose Abbey. He is revered throughout Scotland, especially today among Scottish Nationalists and his victory at Bannockburn is alluded to in the lyrics of 'Flower of Scotland' ,  Scotland's 'national anthem'. His statue is in the forecourt of Stirling Castle, not far from the site of his famous victory.

Robert the Bruce is an ancestor who stays with me as he is still a part of Scottish culture today - whether his statue is being photographed by tourists or his victory against the English being sung about at the World Cup. A hero to the Scots, but to me he is my 'Grandpa Bob'.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2024 Week 19: Preserve #52Ancestorsin52Weeks

 A few years ago, I came into the possession of a family bible. It was the family bible of my paternal grandparents, John McAra and Christina Walker. Until her death in 2018, the bible had been in the hands of my Aunt Inez, widow of my Uncle Will McAra. When I started enquiring as to its whereabouts, I found that it was her grandson, John, who now had it. John himself had no real interest in it at all, so he was quite happy to hand it over to me. However, it was, to say the least, in a bit of a state. The front cover was completely detached and there were many loose pages as the spine of the book was also damaged and detached. I had no choice but to take it to a book repairer in Glasgow, where it was repaired as best it could be. The bible itself had been originally published in Glasgow in the late 19th century. In Victorian times it was common for Christian families to have such a large bible in which they could record events such as births, marriages and deaths. The one I have al...
1 comment
Read more

2025 Week 26 : Favourite name #52Ancestorsin52Weeks

 As well as researching my own family, one of the other trees I have spent a lot of time on is that of my daughter-in-law, Lucy. Whereas my heritage is Scots and Irish, Lucy's is English and therefore some of the names I came across were quite different to those found in my own tree. One of my first favourites was a Francis Badger who appeared in the 1851 census for England! He wasn't actually a relative, but an apprentice to Lucy's 3 x great grandfather and who also lodged with the family.  I did wonder how that  surname came about - did the original Badger have  a funnily shaped face? or perhaps a white streak through his hair?? Or was he just an annoying person?? I'll never know, but it was fun to find him! Francis Badger's entry at the bottom in the 1851 census for England. Source: Ancestry.co.uk However, my all time favourite name - and character - from Lucy's tree is a man named Golden Bridge ! He is Lucy's 5x great grandfather and he was born in Essex...
Post a Comment
Read more

2026 Week 2: A record which adds colour #52Ancestorsin52Weeks

My husband's paternal grandmother, Janina Ciupka, was born in 1902 in a small town, Nieszawa, north of Warsaw, Poland, on the banks of the River Vistula. She was the youngest of 12 children, only 8 of whom survived to adulthood. At this time Poland had been occupied by their three neighbours, Germany, Russia and Austria and Warsaw was under Russian control.  Her family were very wealthy, owning granaries, bakeries, brick factories and carriage factories and they also bred white horses for the Russian Tzars. As with her elder siblings, Janina was taught by a private governess and the family had many servants, including cooks and cleaners. She obviously was leading a very privileged life. There was little known about the  period of her life from about 1909-1919, The family had moved south eastwards to Haczow around 1909. The reasons for the move seems to have been a combination of business and politics, as Haczow was under Austrian rule, considered more liberal than that of the ...
Post a Comment
Read more