George Moon, Riechappel, Blair Atholl

[Throth]

With the exception of the Moon families associated with the Rev. John Moon of Newtyle (1790-1828) who can be traced back to John Moon in Errol, all of the others in Perthshire and Angus appear to originated from half a dozen families living close to Blair Castle in Blair Atholl parish.

We are in the process of indexing all of the Moons (easy bit) and elucidating their relationships (difficult to say the least).

Here is our 'take' on George Moon in Riechappel of Glen Bruar. Comments and additional information would be appreciated, especially from outside of Scotland.

http://www.borenich.co.uk/Ross_Document/Moon_Gow.html

Places mentioned include: Walter Gadd's Croft; Teanafearn; Ardkincael; Dalnamine; Pitagowan, Bothwell in Lanark; Muirkirk in Ayrshire; Clunes of Glengarry; Warrensburg in New York state; Bennington Co, in Vermont; Colinton in Edinburgh; Inverslainie; Balyoukan; Raondou; Dunkeld; Blackford parish;

Throth (www.borenich.co.uk)

[Geoff]

Throth,
 I was just reading your post on George Moon and I remembered I had some notes on him so I went searching. All I've found so far is this snippet, but when I find the others I will send them on to you.

The record below in "The Church and Social History of Atholl by John Kerr". 1750 Inspection - George Moon, Dyker in Blairuachdar, estimated costs of building a dyke around it 5'3" high, supply stones and cover with feal would be £3 sterling. This quote is in regard to the manse being moved from St Brides.

George Moon and Margaret Stewart are living in Riechappel 1736 -1748, it is the birthplace of 5 of their seven (7) children.

Statistical account of Perthshire Vol XII, North West Perthshire The Highlands of Scotland 1750 (Andrew Lang intro) Living in Atholl 1685-1785 by Leneman Book of Perthshire memorabilia by R Fittis;
Blair Atholl 1791; population consisted of 3120 persons, 1480 males 1640 females 758 under 8 years of age, marriages average 26 yearly, baptisms 94, Duke of Atholl owns at least half the parish. There are 11 owners in all 240 tenants and horses range free in the hills, horse racing is held regularly and the language is gaelic.  Atholl means great pleasantness or pleasantness Oll,*  A great many druid sites in area.  with a Sacrificial cairn near Clunemore. The custom of adding stones to graves was to secure the graves from wolves. Tradesmen of the parish are  Smiths, 6,, Shoemakers 9,, Carpenters 27, Flax dressers 16,, Weavers 38 , Masons 3, Tailors 32, Bred midwives 2
The 4th Duke of Atholl cleared Glen Tilt in 1784 to turn it into a commercial deer farm.


* this should be Off, I think has been miss-transcribed.
With a population of around 3200, is it possible for 32 Tailors to make a living, sounds a bit odd to me.

Cheers
Geoff

[Skoosh]

Throth, the servant of Lord Lovat at Beaufort Castle who attended to the lamps was "Willie the Moon!"

https://www.inverness-courier.co.uk/news/happy-ending-to-rosies-emotional-search-for-family-138375/

Bests,
Skoosh.

PS, Willie Moon features in Iain Thomson's excellent book on the Frasers, "The Long Horizon!"

[Throth]

Thanks Geoff,

A year on and some files which we would like to consult are not available at the moment for obvious reasons, but come the summer ............

We'll up-load the latest version of 'George Moon in Riechappel' tomorrow.

Currently we are working on the Moon lines which finished up in Dundee, pioneering the mass production of flax spinning.

We could put up our 'Moon Index' if there was a call for it, and then tidy up the loose ends when circumstances change.

Throth (www.borenich.co.uk)

[Throth]

We have up-loaded the latest copy of George Moon in Riechappel as promised.

In addition we have up-loaded our Moon Index.... here is the link as it's not in the 'Contents' page yet.

www.borenich.co.uk/Moon_Index.html

This is our best 'take' on the various Perthshire 'Moon' families.  If there are errors or you have additional information, then please contact us.  We hope that our lengthy research will be of benefit to descendants.

We have also noted that the surname of Moon may have been derived from Mein or Mien

"The earliest record of the Moon family found in the parish of Kilspindie  is where the Parish Clerk used the spelling 'Mein' and 'Mien' for the surname. The same spelling was used by the Parish Clerk in Errol up until 1755 but after this date the spelling of 'Moon' was used, presumably by a different Clerk to the Session.

Please remember that there are still a number of loose ends on the web-pages which need to be tidied up.

Throth (www.borenich.co.uk)

[Throth]

Hi Geoff,

We have come across an interesting entry in the Blair Atholl Kirk Session minutes, 30th July 1759.
Basically it says that the Session gave a testificate (a character reference) to Janet Moon, daughter to Duncan Moon, late in Blairuachdar, who left the parish in June 1756.

Although there is no baptismal record for this Janet Moon, her father would appear to be Duncan, the brother of George Moon in Riechappel, who was farming Teanafearn and was married to Janet Robertson. The only baptism we had for the couple was their son George in 1738, so Janet would be the right sort of age to be a sister.

We also know that after Duncan's father died, his mother Janet MackGlashan, left Walter Gadd's Croft and went to live at Blairuachdar, not to live with her son George as we thought, but with her eldest son Duncan, who died by 1759.

We'll make appropriate changes to the web-page in the next day or two, but first we'll have a search to see if Janet Moon returned to Blair Atholl, or married in the Low Country.

Throth