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Your Heritage


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Your quick google search should have shown you that there are different origins of the porter surname!!! Scottish,irish,english and french

Yes the search did say that. But it still says the name originated in England. The earliest recording of it is in Winchester.

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Mum - both sides are from Angus/Perth/Dundee area. Mostly fermers who travelled about working for their paymasters. Most of the family are in that area with the odd rogue being able to immigrant to Canada or Glesgae/Edinburgh. Although the old second uncles think we have French or Spanish relatives to 'explain the dark hair' in some. ;)

Dad - his faither died when he was 10, but seems to be no interest in either side from either. Granda was either from Islay/Jura or Barra, but 'spoke the Gaelic' moved to Glasgow and worked on the buses. Gran's side are from Donegal yet she doesn't know if her faither or grandfaither was Irish.

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My family name first appeared in Scotland during the wars of independence. Came over to Britain with the norman invasion. One of them signed the declaration of Arbroath. I have no proof he is an ancestor, but there aren't many of us about up here.

Over past 150 odd years paternal side all from west of Scotland, maternal side all from Edinburgh/east, that I have traced

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I was knitted.

Know what rips ma knitting? Whenever one of my wee ones jumps in from of my mother in law she always exclaims "Ooooh who knitted you? You're such a good jumper". I'm the most laid back, easy going chap you'll ever meet, but by does that make me want to stab her in the eyes with knitting needles.

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There was a TV documentary a wee while ago about DNA and they found two guys on Skye( not directly related) who had almost the same DNA as the first settlers, it concluded that these guys ancestors and familly had been on North Skye for around 2000+ years.

They were and remain farmers.

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There was a TV documentary a wee while ago about DNA and they found two guys on Skye( not directly related) who had almost the same DNA as the first settlers, it concluded that these guys ancestors and familly had been on North Skye for around 2000+ years.

They were and remain farmers.

If they have almost the same DNA then they will be directly related - albeit going back many generations - that's how it works.

I'm assuming that it was DNA on the Y-chromosome that is passed from father to son and remains pretty consistent throughout the generations. In this case it's not the DNA match that's unusual it's that they've been in the same location for 2000 years.

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Through that line, it looks like I'm descended from this guy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fergus_of_Galloway

Its a charter from David I in 1136 that gives Aberdeen Harbour its place in the Guinness Book of Records as the UKs oldest business...

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Only recently took an interest in this, I think it happens when you get older and realise you have more dead family than living.

In the summer I went to Bragar cemetery on the west coast of Lewis, just to be close to my grandparents unmarked grave. No idea where their remains lie, but wanted to visit the spot as I'd never been. Found a grave with a Donald Maciver and Margaret Maclean, no biggie, there are plenty Macivers there, and its a sizable grave yard. Got back and checked the genealogy notes my father passed on to me and discovered Donald and Margaret were my great grand parents. That freaked me out, in a nice way, to have found myself drawn to a single grave stone out of hundreds and hundreds...

I also know the family croft was 21 Arnol, and found an archeological study online of the black houses of the whole township with detailed notes of every croft. There is also a published booklet I've got my hands on listing all the families in every croft in Arnol and North/South Bragar from around mid 18th C to present day. There is a wealth of family information in there that shows how many many families were inter-related.

On a side note: there were about 40-45 crofts in Arnol at the time of the first world war. 21 of their sons did not come home.

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Only recently took an interest in this, I think it happens when you get older and realise you have more dead family than living.

In the summer I went to Bragar cemetery on the west coast of Lewis, just to be close to my grandparents unmarked grave. No idea where their remains lie, but wanted to visit the spot as I'd never been. Found a grave with a Donald Maciver and Margaret Maclean, no biggie, there are plenty Macivers there, and its a sizable grave yard. Got back and checked the genealogy notes my father passed on to me and discovered Donald and Margaret were my great grand parents. That freaked me out, in a nice way, to have found myself drawn to a single grave stone out of hundreds and hundreds...

Interesting that you found that grave but a pity you didn't know it was your great-grandparents grave when you were there. Still you can always go back.

In 2005 I did a road trip from Washington DC down through the Appalachians to Nashville. Its only in the last year that I've discovered that there is a McDowell family cemetery in Virginia where a lot of my ancestors are buried and I drove right past it - well within about 5 miles - without knowing. These would not be direct ancestors as my line ended up in Maryhill but interesting all the same.

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Interesting that you found that grave but a pity you didn't know it was your great-grandparents grave when you were there. Still you can always go back.

In 2005 I did a road trip from Washington DC down through the Appalachians to Nashville. Its only in the last year that I've discovered that there is a McDowell family cemetery in Virginia where a lot of my ancestors are buried and I drove right past it - well within about 5 miles - without knowing. These would not be direct ancestors as my line ended up in Maryhill but interesting all the same.

We were on holiday there and the notes were in the hotel. I went straight back the next day!! But I think I know how you must have felt when you learned about the graveyard in Virginia. I hope you get the chance to go back one day. I find this stuff fascinating.

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This is well worth a read, it changed my perspective a little bit on "who I think I am". It puts your genes in perspective by stating the bleedin obvious, but its framed in a way I hadn't actually properly considered.

http://qz.com/557639/everyone-on-earth-is-actually-your-cousin/

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We were on holiday there and the notes were in the hotel. I went straight back the next day!! But I think I know how you must have felt when you learned about the graveyard in Virginia. I hope you get the chance to go back one day. I find this stuff fascinating.

Worse than that, after the game in Jacksonville I ended up in Asheville NC and met with Tartan Teddy to see the Asheville Tourists and while that's a bit further away I could have easily have done it in the car, in fact I went a similar distance just to visit the graves of A.P. and Sara Carter - of the Carter Family.

I did a city tour of Asheville and one of the historic buildings is called the Smith-McDowell house. Guess what - another ancestor I didn't know about at the time.

Still its a beautiful part of the world and I'm sure I'll be back there one day - maybe this gives me the excuse.

Thing is, when I was in the Appalachians, I knew obviously that it was heavily settled by Scots and at the time I thought that I could understand why Scots had settled there, lots of mountains at around 3-5000 ft, heavily forested, which would have been the case with the highlands before they were deforested. A lot hotter in the summer of course. Funny thing is, of course my lot were all from Galloway by way of Antrim, neither of which were anything like that.

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