Douglas of Mains

[William Douglas]

I received this interesting response to a question about Archibald Douglas, who changed his name to Campbell.

There are three Colins in the family tree at that time, according to "A Short History of Mains" which I happen to have left in my briefcase and can refer to right now.The first Colin was Laird of Mains and died in 1801, marked in the Wikipedia article as 15th. His brother Robert assumes the title on his death and has issue, firstly John who dies in 1803 (a year before his father but is still marked as Laird?) and secondly to the second Colin, who dies in 1820. The second Colin has issue, firstly the Archibald (the subject of my query), and secondly to the third Colin. Henrietta Dunlop was the sister-in-law of the first Colin, marrying his eldest brother. However, this is where the sources differ, because this source indicates that the oldest brother's name was not Andrew, but James. James is marked in the Mains article as 15th Laird. A special search on Google (books only) for "Landed Gentry Blythswood" took me to Burke's "A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain (etc), Volume 1" (1871) which confirms James as the eldest brother's name, succeeding to the old feudal title of Blysthwood on the death of his father's cousin (also James). So, in my opinion, the parliamentary source is likely to be the erroneous one.This family's history is quite a nightmare to follow due to the changing titles and associated surnames. It wouldn't surprise me if they used to confuse themselves!