Founded on the Royal Charter to John Carruthers 12th of Holmains, 1755 and his Marriage Contract of 1762, our Society was officially set up in 2017.
Historical and genealogical works on Carruthers had begun in Scotland in the mid to late 1800’s and early 1900’s by both members of the family and others with an interest in the same. These were based on documentations and proofs going back to the 11th century .
These efforts were built on, culminating in a bringing together of likeminded individuals in 2007 to have a Carruthers Chief officially confirmed.
On 19 August 2019, Dr Simon Peter Carruthers of Holmains was confirmed by the Lord Lyon King of Arms, Edinburgh, Scotland as Chief of the Name and Arms of Carruthers
This in turn raised Carruthers to official status rather than remaining armigerous and again allows us to be represented on the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs in Edinburgh
Having succeeded in the legal recognition of a Clan Chief by the Lord Lyon in 2019, we are authorised by the Chief to represent the Carruthers family worldwide.
We hope you will continue to support us in our endeavours to maintain our Carruthers heritage and history with dignity, transparency and honour.
*The Arms above are the recognised Arms of the Chief of the Clan and Family of Carruthers. Scottish arms belong to an individual not a family. They are registered to his name and only he can bear the.The Arms are reproduced here with his kind permission.
*The official Carruthers Tartan was commissioned and registered with the Scottish Register of Tartans by Dr George Carruthers, a clan armiger and Shennachie to the Chief, in 2017. The copyright was gifted to the Chief who accepted it on behalf of the Clan on its adoption as the official clan/family tartan in 2019.
John Ross is my 7x great grandfather.
Amended 🙂
So very interesting! Thank you!
You are welcome
Looking for genealogy for my grandfather’s family who were from a scottish family with creek ties in lower Alabama. McArthur
perhaps not, but there are some undeniable connections, similarities in folklore, culture and a common lived experience of foe and frontier. These elements did cement some connections of understanding between people with similar experience and understanding of living off the land, honouring it and having allegiance to a local head, chief or leader. May I suggest Ebineezer McColl, Friend to the Indians. He reported back to Britain on the conditions in newly created reservations in British North America.
The blood ties are well understood and documented. Additionally, there are similar ‘Clan’ type similarities. However, social anthropology highlights many such similarities. Overly romantic views doesn’t help with the exploration of our blood- line connections,ways of life and thinking.My family married into native/indigenous peoples.
Your last line says it all.Clearly, this was not a philanthropic act. It was containment and control. Cultural erosion and total disrespect for a way of life and thinking. The list goes on and on.I would like to see a list of the positive things immigrants/settlers brought to Native/Indigenos Culture. I can’t think of one!
The domesticated cattle introduced to the Cherokee and subsequent sharing of this knowledge by Nancy Ward of the Cherokee. Buffalo were almost extinct due to white mans greed and the native Americans depended on them for survival. Domestic cattle filled that niche.
The word ‘Reservations’says it all. Sums up the dreadful fate of many indigenous peoples.
You must mention William Weatherford – he was the Creek chief who led the war against the United States by half of the Creek tribes, and when the tribes decided they lost lost, he snuck into the US Army camp to surrender directly to Andrew Jackson. Came right to his tent without being seen. Also escaped one losing battle by jumping a cliff on horseback? Creek name was Red Eagle, but 3/4 Scottish, I think (his mother was a child of a Scottish trader and married a Scottish trader). This also must have been affected by the matrilineal culture in the Creek. In any case, Jackson respected Weatherford enough that even though numerous bad things were forced upon the Creek, Weatherford and Jackson spent time together after, bet on horses and similar pastimes. People like to remember Jackson kind of harshly today because of the Trail of Tears, but I believe the common sentiment was to kill them all instead of relocation. The main battle Weatherford was known for – Fort Mims – was the largest battle at the time, and scalps were taken, including women and children, as was the practice – the US called it Fort Mim’s Massacre.
There is a lot wrong with this article. Romanticised fiction. The bulk of the settlers & frontiersmen trading with the natives in early Colonial America, were Ulster Scots, certainly not Scottish Highlanders.
Ulster Scots were the Low Land Scots Presbyterians who went over to the North of Ireland from 1607, the same time America was being settled. By the start of 18th Century, for a combination of reasons, large intermarried groups of families started to go to America.
They were not forced, no more than they had not been forced from Scotland to Ireland. This perpetual lie they forced is a carry over in American history from after the Revolution. A sort of badge to say they were never really British. One thing its safe to say these Low Land Scots were are Clans. There was no Clan Chiefs of these families. A Laird is not a Chief. Its just someone who owned land. Often they might be head of a particular family but certainly not all of that surname.
The Border Reiver stories are 99% fantasy. Its like saying every American cowboy was a rootin tootin fast draw gunfighter wanted in every State. The Scottish legal papers are there to be read. The one quoted here about the 16 list of Clan names, is always misquoted. It is a list of Clans, then tagged on are a number of Low Land families but the dreamers go ‘oh, heres our proof we are a Clan’. Well Y dna has kicked that well into touch. It can be shown, that names, such as my own were totally unrelated to the Elliott families just 10 miles away. Of the thousands of Elliott’s in the US, the majority are in no way related to each other.
Now regarding the Ulster Scots in America. They were there well before the battle of Culloden. Waves had gone out, 1715, 1730, 1740.
Pennsylvania, Virginia & Maryland being the main locations. But what became Orange/Ulster County NY, was an early settlement too. Around 1720.
Because the Penn family was not keen on having the Ulster Scots in the East of Pennsylvania, he encouraged them with cheap lands on the Western Frontier. This is where many of these Ulster settlers encountered Native Americans. There was continued encroachment by the settlers onto Indian lands.
The Penn family were quite good at discouraging illegal settlers & would get the local magistrates to deal with things quite harshly. Benjamin Franklin & Mathew Dill of Donegal in Ireland, were two of the five Indian commissioners appointed to make treaties.
In Cumberland, later Franklin County, four men of Ulster Scots origin would come to prominence, during the Revolutionary War, fighting for the British.
Mathew Elliott, Simon Girty, Alexander McKee & William Caldwell. These men would lead Shawnee & their allied Warriors in many battles against the Americans. Fighting out of Detroit, through Ohio.
The most famous battle being, Blue Licks 1784, when they defeated America Militia, including a company led by Daniel Boone, in 15 minutes. Boone lost his son Israel in this battle.
Mathew Elliott was a friend of Tecumseh.
He would lead the Shawnee in the 1812 War & had married a Shawnee girl, who bore him two sons.
Simon Girty had been captured by native Americans as a boy & spent many years with them. Though he escaped he appears to have had no ill feeling, unlike a lot off settlers.
These men helped the native Americans for 35 years fighting the US.