Hi Nancy and welcome to the Douglas Archives.

I note that you are interested in the Douglas/Drysdale 1503 connection and have included some info for you below.

May I ask who is your earliest known Drysdale ancestor?

Dryfesdale Ingebald Drysdale Douglas Annandale Timeline drawing

Critique of the Drysdales of Dollar & the 1503 Douglas-Drysdale...

See also "The Drysdales of Dollar" on this site
https://douglashistory.ning.com/group/drysdale-a-douglas-sept/forum...

On the Familysearch website two distinct Drysdale branches and family lines have been set up in their global family tree:

Douglas Drysdale Dollar branch:
Thomas Douglas Male 1448–Deceased • MP4C-15Y

Ingebald Dryfesdale Drysdale branch:
Ingebald Male about 1140 – Deceased • GK18-ZL4

Note The 1503 Drysdale Douglas story is genealogically controversial, its veracity is doubtful and it has been investigated by many researchers in the past.

Best regards

Hi again Nancy,

I've managed to locate some records on the Familysearch website for your relatives, I think your x5 grandfather was called James Drysdale from Alloa, also married to someone from the Walker family (Helen) in Clackmannanshire & with brothers Alexander and John, he may have moved to Dunbar & Innerwick later but he definitely originates from Alloa.

There were quite a few records (on Scotlandspeople etc) for Drysdale families in the Dunbar/Innerwick area in the 1700s but none that I found matched up in any respect from the point of view of dates or family ties.

So if you have been able to satisfactorily document your relatives right back to William Drysdale b. 1748, then the tree on Family search now takes your
Drysdale family line right back to Ingebald in the mid 1100s!

I tidied up the family line on familysearch to reflect this info.

Note: The Reid/Drysdale family marriages in late 1500s early 1600s (Nance Reid & Helen Reid to Symon Dryisdaill) could also give a possible link to the Drysdale/ Douglas line - relationships in that period, unless very well documented are sometimes a best guess! 

Footnote -  the nearest match on the Scotlands People website for Drysdales in the Dunbar/Innerwick area, is for a William Drysdale b.1750 - but his mother (Alison Mather) seems to have been having children with both a Robert & a William Drysdale (from different Drysdale families!) and there were no corresponding brothers.

Best regards

Missed out a bit of text in the first para  "..........called James Drysdale from Alloa, also married to someone from the Walker family (Helen) in Clackmannanshire & [they had William in 1748] with brothers Alexander and John, [William] may have moved........."

Sorry about that

Hi again Nancy,

As far as I can tell, William Drysdale was married circa 5 December 1778 to Barabara Walker in either Kelso or Eccles (Roxburgh or Berwickshire) - probably banns read in both places.

There is a birth record for a Barbara Walker in Yetholm in 1760 - Yetholm is 7 miles from Kelso and 9 Miles from Eccles.

Unfortunately there are two birth records for William Drysdale around the same date also in Berwickeshire (Note the mother on one record is called Agnes Oliver)

and this leads us to another birth record, in 1750, for a different William Drysdale but in Dunbar this time - of note here is the fact that one of the witnesses is called A. Oliver! 

A bit of a conundrum - choosing the right william obviously depends on which of the bits of information that you hold (dates or places) is given precedence. 

Best regards

Hi Nancy, 

Sorry for the confusion.

I've tidied up the Familysearch tree a bit so we now have a clear run from Margaret Drysdale (Beech) b. 1828 in Rothbury Northumberland (nice place) through to Ingebald in the mid 1100s.

I'll have another look at those Roxboroughshire/Berwickeshire Drysdales and see if that gives any more relevant information.

Best regards

I notice the Drysdale - Carmichael links.

I should have perhaps paid more attention to the Carmichaels as they are a sept of Clan Douglas and the Balmedie family did indeed inter-marry with the Douglases.

https://www.douglashistory.co.uk/history/Septs/Carmichael.htm

Something else for my To Do list.

William

Hi Nancy,

I've been slowly assigning records to people (Drysdales) on the familysearch website for the past day or so - in the Berwickshire, Roxboroughshire and Haddingtonshire areas (more than 100 individual Drysdale records in these areas were not indexed), I'm also checking Scotlandspeople records to see if Familysearch has missed any.

Note it is not specifically for your ancestor that I am doing this - I have done a lot of work in on early Drysdales in the Familysearch tree over the past few years - but your ancestor just pointed me into an area where there were lots of Drysdales but very few indexed records.

After finishing that, the intention is to follow the clues given in the 1778 wedding record (see below) to see if I can find a different and possibly more logical path to the very early Drysdales for your William and Barbara.

James from Alloa is still a contender but it's quite a big leap from 'cosmopolitan' Clackmannanshire to the wilds of Eccles in Berwickshire. Family ties are often a driver for migration and this could be the case here, but Eccles 250 years ago must have been pretty bleak. Even today it's still very, very small and rural.

The tombstone memorial for William in Rothbury (Northumberland) gives a fairly good indication of his birth date (1748+/- 1 year) - he was 67 years old when he died in 1815:

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/193233960/william-drysdale

Marriage 6-12-1778 of William Drysdale of Eccles & Barbara Walker of Kelso Witnesses Adam Walker & George Wood 

I'll let you know about progress - one way or the other.

Best regards

Looking at the marriage record again , it seems as if William & Barbara were well thought of in the Parish, they were the only couple on that page of the Parish record who were given the titles - Mr & Miss!

William was possibly a local land-owner.

Best regards