Hello,
I'm looking for some help or even to be pointed in the direction of where I may go next in my Gillan research. I have been searching for the Irish origins of my Gillan ancestors for a while and recently made a breakthrough in discovering by chance that they came from County Cavan. My great-grandfather was John Gillan 1888-1976 of Garscadden and Duntocher, Dunbartonshire, Scotland. His grandfather was Patrick Gillan c1831-1877 and who came to Dunbartonshire from County Cavan. There were, an still are, a concentration of Gillans in Duntocher, where they originally worked in the flax industry and coal/ironstone mining. I can go one generation back to Patrick's parents Thomas Gillan (born c1808 - a farmer) and Catherine Duffy. Thomas had siblings John b1805 and Mary b1823, all born in Ireland, presumably County Cavan also. The names Patrick, Thomas, Edward and John seem to recur frequently in my branch of the family. I have been unable to link back to any Gillans in Ireland so far. I realise that there are many different spellings (Gillen, Gillon, Gillin, McGillan, Gallen etc.) and the lack of a village name also makes the task even more difficult. My next task is to study the poor law records in Scotland and see if I can come up with a village of origin but as I live in the Isle of Skye I'm quite a distance away from where the records are kept in Glasgow and Edinburgh and may not get there for a while. I was just wondering if anyone perhaps knew of any more background on the Gillans in Co. Cavan.
Many thanks indeed,
Greg