I’m aiming to write and post a little bit each day about the family history research I’m doing, and what I find, during a week staying in Edinburgh. But for personal privacy, the posting of these travels on AFamilyHistoryBlog will be delayed by a few days, and will not necessarily be in day by day order! Some of these posts may be given later tweaks, with added photos, etc.
(Note; Sorry! This post was drafted at the time, but was not properly scheduled for posting like the previous posts. And when I got home I got busy catching up with many other things. So this slipped! Hence the big delay in posting!)
Update; You can now see all the posts from my May 2017 Scotland trip, here;
Day 1 – day 2 – day 3 – day 4 – day 5 – day 6 – day 7 – & day 8 & the big family gathering.
I had a final half day in Edinburgh, so I went back to the National Archives of Scotland, at the General Register House. Security had been visibly stepped up since my previous visit to the archives, due to the terrorist attack in Manchester. So there were now bag checks at the front entrance of the General Register House.
I spent a couple of hours in the search room using the archive’s “virtual vault”. It took a while just to work out the system. Then I used the virtual vault to look up old maps of the Carlowrie estate, at Kirkliston, West Lothian; which includes Puncheonlaw, where the WALKER family are first recorded to have lived. I did my best to draw my own copy of the plan.
At lunchtime I was picked up from the flat where I had been staying, by an uncle and aunt who had been staying in Edinburgh for a couple of days, and headed for our big HUTCHISON family gathering in South Ayrshire.
We all had a fun week together. During the week the family group included;
- my gran,
- her 5 children & 4 spouses,
- 8 (out of 10) grandchildren (including me), & 4 (of 6) spouses/partners, and
- 9 (out of 14) of my gran’s Great-grandchildren.
We spent time together around the site (which was nice, and worked well for the group of us that was there, but might have been a squeeze if the whole family had been able to come!), and on trips out around Ayrshire. On the first whole day there, 9 of us (half of the adults there at the time) climbed up the hill (283 meters high) just behind the site. Here we are at the top (I’m behind the camera!).
On the last full day of the holiday we had a “Circus” themed party, and I got a fun photo of my gran and all 5 of her children standing together, all dressed up.
A Family History Blog 
May I ask who everyone is (from left to right) in the photograph? Izzy Hutchison
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Ok. Of the Hutchison siblings they are; Tim, Ali, Priscilla (their mum), Jean, John, and Paul. And in the hilltop photo there is; Eli, John, Ali, Ruth, Sarah-Jane, Anna, James, and Ellen.
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Superb, i’m a hutchison from
Kinglassie fife, would love to trace mines back
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Hello Gary.
How far back can you already go? Generally its easy to trace back to the mid-1800. Civil registration began in 1855 in Scotland (1837 in England), and the censuses will tell you a bit about people living in 1841, 1851, etc. All are indexed on ScotlandsPeople.gov.uk (which is best for Scottish records) and/or sites like Ancestry or FindMyPast, for elsewhere in the UK. Before 1855 (in Scotland) look for parish records (christenings, marriages & burials); again indexed on ScotlandsPeople, or the “IGI” on familysearch.org. Locally you might also be able to view microfilms of parish registers in local libraries, etc.
There were a lot of Hutchisons around the Kirkcaldy area, who may or may not be related to each other! There are certainly other Hutchison families from the Kirkcaldy area who, as far as can currently be traced, don’t share a known common Hutchison ancestor with my Hutchison family line.
Consider also that before the mid 1800’s, surname spellings were not standardised! So variations might include Hutcheson, Hutcheon, & Hutchinson (among others). The same person might have their name spelt in a number of different ways, in records at different dates!
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