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Scotland (Counties as in 1851-1901) => Scotland => Banffshire => Topic started by: RosieThomas on Monday 13 May 13 13:08 BST (UK)
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I have Rev James Walker of Huntly (abt 1761-1842) whose father is referred to in several sources simply as "William Walker of Buckie's Miln". Can anyone advise what that means .. is it a specific place (Mill?) or a general area?
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Hi Rosie
There is a reference to 'Mill of Buckie' such as here www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search_item/index.php?service=RCAHMS&id=133294 Not sure if this is connected.
Monica :)
Added: Shows here on modern maps www.aberdeenshire.gov.uk/smrpub/moray/detail.aspx?tab=maps&refno=NJ46SW0026 My concern with this mention is the timing (late 19th Century from what is showing on the records that I have seen so far).
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Many thanks Monica .. I found that one too .. but it's the only mention, anywhere I could find of 'Buckie's Miln'. Not been able to find any reference to William Walker in connection with this place.
Rosie
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Sure you have this, but might help others with searches. Is this the info you have too:
https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.2.1/3SMS-F5M
Monica
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There is an Extract Testament showing for Rev. James on SP following his death in 1842 (13 pages). Sometimes you can get some clues regarding a person's extended family from these types of documents.
Monica
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Thanks for pointer to info on Family Search .. it's my gedcom file, uploaded from ancestry site.
Also thanks for pointer to Extract Testament .. will follow that up now.
Rosie
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Sorry to be dopey Monica .. what do you mean by extract testament? I have copy of Rev James W's Will .. is this something different? And SP .. Scotland's People?
Rosie
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Hi Rosie
Yes, SP does stand for Scotlands People - sorry for shorthand!
I am not sure how, if any different, what is showing on SP will differ from what you will already have. This is from SP help notes www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/Content/Help/index.aspx?r=554&407
Likely we may be talking about the same document that you already seem to have?
Monica
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I've had a look .. it is same content I think. Thanks for help.
rosie
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Rosie, maybe you just missprinted, but his gravestone says Jamed died 1843
www.books.google.ca/books?id=LFkJAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA400&lpg=PA400&dq=Rev+James+Walker
I see where you found the reference www.books.google.ca/books?id=Ceey5RQHgHoC&pg=PA473&lpg=PA473 Monica's find is fantastic...surely looks to be good
Buckie is referred to in that publication as: Rathven [Buckie] and also Arradoul [Buckie]
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Thanks for digging JJ .. I think David Bertie/Episcopal Clergy book is right with date of death as 1842 because Mr Walker's will was proved in London 20 Jan 1843 .. the memorial tablet must have been a year out and 1843 has been repeated elsewhere.
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further to the other references with Rathven [Buckie] and also Arradoul [Buckie]
Can't pretend to know the area, and I am sure there were many mills in the area...or they may all refer to the same one... There are listings for: The Old Mill Clochan, Buckie...The Old Mill Arradoul , Buckie...Mill of Towie, Buckie, Banffshire
From and 1880 publication http://books.google.ca/books?id=TUULAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA336&lpg=PA336&dq=BUCKIE
Arradoul, By Buckie,still has a real estate listing for "Mill of Buckie Cottages, Buckie, Banffshire"
there are these references to a "Milne of Rathven" http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/sheena_charles/R_BirthsV1_p140.htm and http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/133271/details/mill+of+rathven/ ( see map image)
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Hi JJ - thanks for the references.
Rosie
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Can't pretend to know the area, and I am sure there were many mills in the area...or they may all refer to the same one... There are listings for: The Old Mill Clochan, Buckie...The Old Mill Arradoul , Buckie...Mill of Towie, Buckie, Banffshire
I do know the area, rather well as it happens.
Clochan, Arradoul and Buckie are all places in the parish of Rathven. None of them is in either of the others. Their modern postal addresses all include Buckie, but this should not be taken as any indication of the historical situation.
There are at least two places called Mill of Towie that spring to mind. One is at Towie in the parish of Botriphnie, and can probably be disregarded in this case. The other is near Cullen, but in the parish of Fordyce. Its modern postal address is Mill of Towie, Cullen, Buckie, Banffshire.
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So many mills ... all I have been able to find is references in various places (eg clerical directories and marriage entries) in which Rev Walker gives his father simply as "William Walker, Buckie's Miln".
Rosie
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Hello Forfarian...Hehe my ramblings often bring real help! ;D
Seriously though, that publication which had the reference to "Buckie's miln" made it seem to me as though Arradoul & Rathven were in the parish of Buckie?
worded just like this: "Rathven [Buckie]" and also "Arradoul [Buckie]"
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Seriously though, that publication which had the reference to "Buckie's miln" made it seem to me as though Arradoul & Rathven were in the parish of Buckie?
worded just like this: "Rathven [Buckie]" and also "Arradoul [Buckie]"
In that case, the publication is misleading. Buckie is not and never has been a parish. However it has so far outgrown all the other places in the parish of Rathven that it is not surprising that people tend to think of places in the parish of Rathven in terms of their proximity to Buckie.
David Bertie's book was published in 2000, which is recent enough for confusion to have arisen.
The modern maps show Rathven as a place on the outskirts of Buckie. This is the Kirkton of the parish of Rathven, in other words the place where the parish church is.
See
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4264
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4263
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4060
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4465
all of which are in the parish of Rathven
and
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ5264
in which places on the west of the boundary (shown in black) are in the parish of Deskford and places to the east of the boundary are in the parish of Fordyce.
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Yes I see it here http://www.abdnet.co.uk/genuki/BAN/Rathven/locations.html
Then I would think MonicaL's find should be the correct one, it certainly looks to be a very old building....The 1841 / 1901 census refer to the "Mill of Buckie"
Suggest Rosie contact the site she gave you "Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland" to see if they know more about the era http://www.rcahms.gov.uk/contact-us.html
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I will do that .. thanks all.
Rosie
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The 1841 / 1901 census refer to the "Mill of Buckie"
Mill of Buckie is named on the current maps. See the map at
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4264
to which I have already referred above.
I do have a tiny niggling doubt about assuming that 'Buckie's Mill/Miln' and 'Mill of Buckie' are one and the same.
I have no doubt at all that Mill of Arradoul, Mill of Rathven, Mill of Clochan and Mill of Towie are not the same as Mill of Buckie.
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Just a thought - Bertie says that Rev James Walker studied at the University of Aberdeen. The Roll of Graduates of the University of Aberdeen is widely available and might contain some more details. If not, try asking the University if their archives contain anything more about him.
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Can I take it that you have seen this :-
http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/36600/details/buckie+s+mill/
Regards
Malky
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Yes, Fb9, that was submitted by MonicaL on page one... Rosie of course needs to know where she might find Rev. jame's Walker's father William's birth 1740 to anywhere earlier in the century, as referenced in publications as "Buckie's Miln."
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Agree with you JJ .. not safe to assume Buckie's Miln and Mill of Buckie are one and the same.
Onward ...!
Rosie
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Thanks FB .. yes, I had seen the Scotland's Places entry .. have also ploughed through many of their records but no sign of Mr Walker ... believe me, I had good reason to head up my query "the mysterious ...".
Rosie
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Here is: The mysterious Rev James Walker of Huntly thread
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,647027.msg4957200.html#msg4957200
Rosie, the two locations ( Buckie's Mill/ Mill of buckie) on that map are almost right beside each other...Hopefully you can find out more about the Glenberve/ Aberdeenshire reference by contacting the site
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"Yes, Fb9, that was submitted by MonicaL on page one.."
Different one.
Regards
Malky
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Well. It's a gorgeous evening, so I popped out to Buckie and have just enjoyed a guided tour of the Mill of Buckie, Parish of Rathven, courtesy of the owner, who was very interested and most helpful.
There were two mills at Mill of Buckie, both worked by a lade that was fed by the burn that comes down the west side of the Inchgower Distillery.
The first one was a meal mill, with two wheels. It was mostly built of wood, and had become riddled with dry rot, so it was demolished and the wheels were sold to a mill preservation society and are probably still in use somewhere.
The second one was a threshing mill, and it is still standing, though no longer in use as a mill. I saw the lade coming in at the top, and a steep drop to the Burn of Buckie below the mill. The shape of the wheel is still discernible on the outer wall, and it must have been a very large wheel - we reckoned about 15 feet in diameter.
It was all but impossible to photograph because trees have grown up very close to it, but I had a go, and I'll put the photos on the Geograph web site in due course.
I still wouldn't dismiss the possibility that it's the one in Glenbervie, or even another similarly named mill.
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Yes it is a different one, I just looked at the images and it seemed familiar, Flattybasher9
then saw it was Aberdeenshire and meant to add my apologies on the last post...
was just going to add an apology when you posted...Sorry!!!
I am having problems with modifying/adding posts as it keeps saying there is a new one, but won't ever show it to me until I post...grrr...
Forfarian when looking in the area, was wishing I could go for a drive through it!!!
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Forfarian - you're a star .. how kind to go investigating. Will look forward to the pictures in due course.
Rosie
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The Aberdeenshire one never came up for me, which is sad as the site is a nice one and should be more searchable in the search engines....Mind you, if it came up I may have thought it to be one and the same as I had when Flattybasher 9 pointed it out?
Searches out just fine within the site itself though
http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search/index.php?action=do_search&p_type=free_text_search&p_name=buckie%27s+mill
I suppose this fellow Buckie could have owned many Mills with his name, then? ;D
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Ah ha!
Looking at the farm horse tax roll (1797-8) (free access at Scotland's Places), I see the following entries:
In Rathven, George Taylor, "Mill of Bucky" - two taxed horses.
But ...
In Glenbervie, "William Walker at Buckie's Mill" - one taxed horse.
I rest my case :).
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Ah, well, I enjoyed my pointless trip to Mill of Buckie ;)
Images are now uploaded to http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NJ4264 - will be moderated in a day or so and available to view.
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A descendant of George Taylor will find the photographs and thank you for it :).
The Old Statistical Account (1796) gives the population of Glenbervie as 1307, of which 200 were "Scotch Episcopalians". FamilySearch shows a William Walker having children (not a James) in Glenbervie in the 1760s and 1770s. That is from the Church of Scotland register of course, but sometimes, certainly in the north east, families appear in the registers of both denominations at different times.
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Never mind, someone's been to Buckie's Mill
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NO7883
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This publication 1776 also has a subscriber Will Walker of "Buckies Mill" books.google.ca/books?id=y7pVAAAAcAAJ&pg=PP21&lpg=PP21&dq="Buckies+Mill
There is James birth to a William but 1859, not 1761 https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/XYN4-L48
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Interestingly there is a Buckies Mill in Ireland as well... :P
Other rootschatters with your Walkers perhaps??? Walker milners living at Buckies Mill...Has a William Walker b 1775 Glenbirvie ... Wonder if related to your ancestor?
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,537488.msg3966703.html
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GR2 - thanks so much .. I'll look at the farm horse records. In later census records, Rev James Walker gives birthplace as Aberdeen .. so possibly William moved to Buckie's Miln after his son's birth. James was certainly an episcopalian minister .. one of the Strathbogie dissenters.
Rosie
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Well, it so happens that I had to drive from Stonehaven to Forfar today, and the main road passes through the parish of Glenbervie only two or three miles from Buckie's Mill, and it was a fabulous sunny day so I made a detour and found a helpful gentleman named Mr Smith busy dismantling an old fence between Buckie's Mill and Mill of Buckie.
He explained that there were two separate places, next door to one another. One is Buckie's Mill and the other is Mill of Buckie. He took me down to the bank of the River Carron and showed me the places where there is no trace left of the Mill of Buckie, and he pointed out the house that was the miller's home, where I later had an interesting chat with the present owners.
Mr Smith also pointed out Buckie's Mill. There are two old-looking steadings, but the present house looks too recent to have been there in the 1750s.
Anyway I took some more photos (unfortunately I forgot to take one of the miller's house because I was too busy chatting) and will put them on Geograph later.
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Forfarian .. so grateful to you for all these 'diversions' down country lanes. You've given me plenty of good lines of enquiry to follow up next week.
Rosie
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The Aberdeenshire one never came up for me, which is sad as the site is a nice one and should be more searchable in the search engines....
Trouble is, although it is in what is now called Aberdeenshire (the historical County of Aberdeen minus the City of Aberdeen, plus the whole of the County of Kincardine and about a third of the County of Banff), it is actually in Kincardineshire for all historical periods. The late 20th century reorganisations of local government boundaries are a perfect pest for anyone interested in anything that happened before 1975.
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More photos are now available at
http://www.geograph.org.uk/gridref/NO7883
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So nice of you to do all that legwork Farfarian... The original photos taken by the gal were for someone whose ancestor was born there...
Another reference, from Marischall's College in 1776 has as Jacob or James Walker son of William "Jacobus Walker, f. Gulielmi in Buckie's Miln "
http://archive.org/stream/fastiacademiaema02univuoft#page/348/mode/2up
Yeah, I see now... that is the same original reference to James...For some reason I was thinking 1760s
There are few other references ..says that in an old rhyme it is known as simply "Buckie"...
http://books.google.ca/books?id=op8HAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA265&dq="buckie's+mill"
You can view it on a old may ( $) http://www.scran.ac.uk/database/record.php?usi=000-000-191-134-C
You may want read: History of Glenbervie ( $)
http://books.google.ca/books/about/History_of_Glenbervie.html?id=Hg65SAAACAAJ&redir_esc=y
"Walker, jun., in Buckie's Mill according to a citation given him by order of the Session, an unmarried man aged thirty years and upwards, being purged of envy..."
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Photographs are great .. thanks Forfarian.
Thanks also JJ for all the digging you've been doing. I have seen those various references but no further forward ... yet.
Good wishes/Rosie
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You may want read: History of Glenbervie
http://books.google.ca/books/about/History_of_Glenbervie.html?id=Hg65SAAACAAJ&redir_esc=y
"Walker, jun., in Buckie's Mill according to a citation given him by order of the Session, an unmarried man aged thirty years and upwards, being purged of envy..."
I see that the accompanying blurb attaches importance to the fact that, unusually, the full sederunt was listed. Actually, my experience of Kirk Session records elsewhere is that the full sederunt is almost invariably listed, by which I mean that I have never seen a Kirk Session minute that did not list the names of all the elders who were present at the meeting.
If it was unusual to do so in Glenbervie, then it was Glenbervie that was different. If you see what I mean.
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There is a transcription here, the date was 13th July, 1760, and it seems to be an Alexander Walker, junior giving his account of someone shearing grass...I though at first it was theft but the end and beginning reveal it was desecrating the day of Sabbath...
http://www.ebooksread.com/authors-eng/george-henderson-kinnear/history-of-glenbervie-ala/page-7-history-of-glenbervie-ala.shtml
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Have you contacted the other rootschatter who has Walkers occ. milners etc. you hadn't answered that post I'd l made earlier on in the thread. J.J.
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I have been in contact with Glen Bervie JJ - thanks for suggesting it.
Rosie
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Thanks GR2 .. William Walker did indeed have a horse at Mill of Buckie .. gut feel is that he is Rev James' father.
Glenbervie kirkyard has stone 254: "Erected by William Walker in Buckies Mill in memory of his father Alexander formerly tenant there d 12 Sep 1761 aged 62, his mother Anne Brand d 26 Oct 1740 aged 45. His spouse Mary Scott d 15 Nov 1767 aged 33, their son William d 2 Aug 1795 aged 31. His dau Betty by his 2nd wife Isobel Watson - she lived beloved & d regretted 29 Mar 1794 in 22nd year. Plinth" Falconers Buckiesmill 1903"
Family Search gives a James Walker christened Glenbervie 10 Feb 1759, father William - possibly my mysterious Rev James Walker although 2 years earlier than his birth record at Marischal College.
All this points to Rev James' father being the above William Walker. But if so, who was his mother? In the will of James Paul Smyth (Bond Street perfumer, d 1797 in London) he leaves bequests to "my nephew Rev James Walker of Huntly" and "my sister Jean Walker". If William Walker's wives were Mary Scott and Isobel Watson .... who does Jean fit in? Date-wise, 1st wife Mary Scott would have been James' mother as he was born around 1760.
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His birth wasn't recorded at Marischal College, but I imagine his year of birth would have been on record. They record whatever is given them... I imagine you've seen death docs and census after census with all different dates of birth...
I imagine anyone else searching will appreciate the work done on this thread...
For those who wish to look further for Rosie's Walkers...I'll again post the Walker thread link here:
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,647027.msg4957253.html#msg4957253
Forfarian also had this in a thread...there are many Smiths in this world, but this one lives right beside your place of interest
I made a detour and found a helpful gentleman named Mr Smith busy dismantling an old fence between Buckie's Mill and Mill of Buckie.
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also a reminder that it was pointed out that the Smyth may have been added in order to become an heir. When there were only female children or no offspring only nephews & so on another heir could be named. In this case James Paul Smyth may have been James Paul.
Looby linked to this thread... http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php/topic,551378.0.html
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Hi JJ - re Rev Walker's birth, you're right .. my record of 1761 birth came from David Bertie's book "Scottish Episcopal Clergy". In a couple of censuses Walker enters his DoB as "abt 1766".
Rosie
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Family Search gives a James Walker christened Glenbervie 10 Feb 1759, father William - possibly my mysterious Rev James Walker although 2 years earlier than his birth record at Marischal College.
Get the original baptism from Scotland's People - it just might tell you the place of residence, and if so would clinch things.
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A wee bit of information that I recently picked up about Buckies Mill. I was having a read through the early Kirk Session minute books in Registers House when I came across an a couple of entries in 1728.
Basically the Session are trying to secure a bond or loan from the Laird of Glenbervie. In the minutes they then refer to the laird as the Laird of Buckie or simply Buckie.
I'm not sure if this was the 6th or 7th Laird of Buckie...both seemed to have married Burnets.
Presumably the Mill was built (or owned) by one of these Lairds and became known as Buckies Mill.
http://www.patrickspeople.co.uk/files/2342.htm
I suspect that it must have been the earlier 6th Laird as the "New Mill" was built just downstream and appears on the Roy 1747-52 maps.
Graeme
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Thanks for the info Graeme.