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Author Topic: Origins of the Gilchrist/Giltroch name  (Read 284 times)
art.birchell
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Origins of the Gilchrist/Giltroch name
« on: Tuesday 16 May 06 15:21 BST (UK) »
Hello to one and all.
JILTROCH,JILROCK, JIBLOCK, McGILTROCK, McKILROCK MacQUILTROCH, GILCHRIST.

I was asked elsewhere on the origins of a name that is fairly common these days in and around Kirkcudbright and Galloway. That of the name GILCHRIST and it's older spelling of GILTROCH. As Rootschat is fast becoming a very popular place to research  I thought I would share with the Kirkbrightshire Board this information provided by Bill Copeland

He wrote:
" According to Dr Robert de Bruce Trotter, in his Kirkcudbrightshire volume of 'Galloway Gossip', the old Galloway name of MacJiltroch probably derived from an ancient Celtic Saint called Jiltroch, and was adopted by his followers.  Trotter came from the Glenkens and said the name was was only found there.

He noted that it was traditionally written as McJiltroch but pronounced Majiltroch. As was common in Galloway when addressing or referring to some one familiarly the Mc was dropped and the name became Jiltroch. (This is a major pitfall of Galloway research as names will appear as McGowan/Gowan,McNish/Nish, McKissock/Kissock, McCandlish/candlish etc etc.)

Around about 1800 in Galloway there was a strange period when many upwardly mobile owners of traditional Galloway names such as Lynas, McColm, Scamble,McCutcheon, Milvean etc bastardised them into something more mainstream (but NOT Gallovidian) such as Lennox, Malcolm, Campbell, Hutchison or Melville.

Trotter refers to this as a process of Gentrification. He notes that most
bearers of the name McJiltroch changed it to Giltroch and then to Gilchrist, and in his book he specifically refers to a Baillie Gilchrist of Dalbeattie who was originally a McGiltroch of the Glenkens.

In my own family tree I have a collateral branch which descends from a
Glenkens shoemaker called William Gilchrist and his wife Margaret Hunter.(Gravestone at Dalry) The birth / christening / marriage records of several of his children appear in the Kells OPR as variants of McGiltroch. Most of his descendants emigrated to the community of Emden, in Illinois, USA..."
Bill Copland

DUMFRIES-GALLOWAY

Hope this excellent piece by Mister Copeland is of help to folk in the research

Best Regards
Art Birchell
Logged
England -(Wilt Chute) Jennings (Cam) Howard Hart (Sur) Ede
(Dev) Selley (Lon) Burgess (Lincs) Freeman Kingswood
Scotland Renfrew-Haggarty Berwickshire-Graden
Ayrshire-Johnstone McConnell Jennings
Kirkcudbright- Good Gray Gilchrist
Ireland -Johnston Robertson McConnell Birchell
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