Buchannan's

The following in the main is taken from the Book of Buchannan's and internet searches.

Miltoun is located near Loch Ness and close to Invermoriston.

Duncan Buchannan (of Miltoun).  He had a son:

• • Patrick Buchannan (of Miltoun).  (Arms matriculated at the Lyon office in 1672).  Patrick is described in the Lyon Register as son of Duncan (of Miltoun).  He had a son:
    • Norman Buchannan (of Miltoun?).  He had a son:
    • Archibald Buchannan.  Married Katharine daughter of Ranald McDonald of Scalpa.  Left Miltoun and settled at Dunscaith in Skye.  See Buchannan of Auchmar and family letters.  Their children:
      • Norman (“called Tormad mac Gillespie  vick Tormaid”)
      • Malcolm
      • Duncan
      • Peter married Miss Alice Richardson.  Left Skye and settled near Whitby Co: York.  Had children Esther (married William Hawksfield) and John
      • a daughter

The second confirms and begins the family tree with Archibald Buchanan, who is described as "a farmer near Dunscaith Castle" and notes that he was descended from Buchanan of Miltoun.

Archibald Buchannan and Katharine McDonald are described as having three sons, not four:

• Peter, who went to Whitby
• Norman "commonly called Norman Roy Buchanan.  Buried at Kilmore in Skye".  Norman had a son:
  • John, who had a son:
    • Duncan "commonly called Duncan Bane Buchannan".
• Malcolm "buried in Kilmore in Skye".  He had a son:
  • Norman "commonly called Tormad Aumock ie. 'coming in the twilight'.  Norman’s son was:
    • Duncan.

According to notes by George Buchannan, Peter Buchannan was born in 1740 and died in 1803, and was buried at Lythe. A letter from George to his son Archibald states that Peter quarrelled with his father Archibald and left home on that account:

He found his way to this out-of-the-way neighbourhood, probably because there was a trade between Whitby and the Western isles, from which kelp was brought for use in the manufacture of alum, an important industry now extinct here.

Unfortunately, no dates are given on either family tree, but a rough idea of the dates can be gathered from the generations, which are as follows:

• Peter Buchannan later of Whitby (1740-1803) was the brother of Norman Roy Buchanan and Malcolm Buchanan (and possibly Duncan) of Skye
• John, son of Norman Roy Buchanan, and Norman (Tormad Aumock), son of Malcolm Buchanan of Skye – were first cousins to John Buchannan and his sister Esther Hawksfield (born 1784) of Lythe
• Duncan Bane Buchanan, son of John, and Duncan Buchanan, son of Norman (Tormad Aumock) of Skye – were second cousins to John Buchannan (1810-91) of Whitby

As George pointed out, there was a trading route between western Scotland and the Yorkshire coast and there was a thriving industry here in which to find employment. Many Scottish names can be found in the parish registers here – including Buchanans from the early decades of the 18th century. It must be remembered that until the railways came, the sea was the most important means of travel and communication.

In summary

Peter married firstly Sarah Fletcher, on 9 Feb 1768 at Lythe. They had a daughter Sarah, baptised at Lythe on 15 December 1768.

Peter Buchannan remarried on 19 Jan 1774 at Lythe, his second wife being Alice Richardson. They had two children:

• John Buchannan, master mariner, who married Sarah Ayre (Arr/Aar).  Their children were:
  • John Buchannan (1810-91) 
  • Jane Elizabeth Buchannan, born 1812 died in infancy
• Esther Buchannan (1784-1844), who married William Hawksfield.  Their children were:
  • Alice Hawksfield, born 1806
  • William Hawksfield, born 1808
  • John Hawksfield, born 1811
  • Peter Hawksfield, born 1812
  • Matthew Hawksfield, born 1815
  • Mary Hawksfield, born 1818
  • Thomas Hawksfield, born 1821 (Married Elizabeth Hodgson)
  • Margaret Hawksfield, born 1826

Briefly looking at John Buchannan (1810-1891) descendants:

John Buchannan had five children. 
He and his first wife Sarah Margaret Holt (1810-37) had one daughter:

• Sarah Margaret (1837-1925).  Sarah went to boarding school in Chipping Wycombe with three other Whitby girls (see note below).   She lived in Whitby with her father, and later her brother Charles.  She did not marry.

John and his second wife, Anne Langborne (1817-49) had four sons, three of whom survived to adulthood – all three became solicitors.  Miss Jane Weatherill, a relation of the artist George Weatherill, was the boys’ governess – they called her "Ebbie". 

• George Buchannan (1843-1920), solicitor, Baxtergate, Whitby. He married Marianne Croft (d1906) in Richmond, Yorkshire.  John lived with George and his family in Union Place towards the end of his life.  George and Marianne had three children, none of whom married: 
  • Lilias Mary Buchannan (1869-1947)
  • Archibald John Buchannan (1872-1938), solicitor, Whitby
  • Margaret Hilda Buchannan (1874-1940)

• Charles Buchannan (1844-1919), worked on a sheep run in New Zealand, was disabled by an accident while in the Colonial Forces during a war with the Maori, became a solicitor, in Middlesbrough, Guisborough and then in Whitby.  He married the artist Sarah Ellen Weatherill.  They had three sons:
  • Alexander Buchannan (1878-1917), solicitor, Thirsk.  He married Mary Wynyard Haynes, daughter of Lt Col Jonathan W Haynes of Sowerby.  They lived 144 Front Street, Sowerby.  He died in Flanders in 1917, with the 6th Battalion West Yorkshire Regiment.  His name is on the Sowerby War Memorial
  • Malcolm Buchannan (1880-1954), clergyman (see this post)
  • Charles Buchannan (1881-1955), bank manager.  He was commissioned in the West Yorkshire Regiment and was severely wounded in WWI.  He married Florence Barugh at Driffield in July 1918.  Bank manager in Scarborough, then Helmsley.  He died at Gristhorpe near Filey.

• Hugh Cholmley Buchannan (1846-57).  Buried at Lythe.

• Arthur Buchannan (1848-95), solicitor, Guisborough.  With his first wife, Katharine Elizabeth Weatherill, he had three children:
  • Averil Mary Buchannan (1874-1954), married William Richardson
  • Margaret Isobel Buchannan (1876-1958), married Thomas Duncan Henlock Stubbs
  • George Herbert Buchannan (1878-1947) married Lilian Walker

Arthur Buchannan married his wife Kate on 22 April 1874.  The house they built in Albion Terrace, Guisborough was named 'Miltoun House' in honour of Arthur's family origins.  This mock-Tudor house was evidently the product of a great deal of loving attention.  Considerable care and expense went on the design and decoration of such features as the ceilings, the tiling of the chimney breasts and the design of the staircase.  The furniture complemented the internal decoration, so that even their portraits were in frames that echoed the woodwork.  Their years together in the house were few, as Kate died ten years after their marriage.  Their daughter Averil and her husband lived in the house until the 1920s; it is now a care home.

John Buchannan converted to Roman Catholicism on his deathbed.  It is possible that his son George married into Catholicism; he was certainly an ardent convert.  An article in the local press in 1909 on the Silver Jubilee of the Whitby convent ends,

Mr G Buchannan thanked Father McCabe on the part of the Rev Mother, and referred to the good work done by the Sisters during the past twenty-five years.  He was present when the sisters first came to Whitby, and he had watched with pleasure the success of their grand and noble work.  They had reason to be proud of St Hilda's Convent – (hear, hear) – and he hoped that when the next jubilee took place the dear old town of Whitby would be Catholic once more as it was in the time of St Hilda.  (Hear, hear.)

ADD IMAGE

Buchannan family memorial at Lythe

Notes:

Sarah Buchannan at boarding school:
1851 Census: at The Priory, Church Lane, Chipping Wycombe (boarding school run by Miss Maria Stevenson).  Sarah Buchannan aged 14 is one of four Whitby girls (the total number of boarders was 19) at the school.  The other girls were Eleanor Stewart, 16, Mary Taylor, 16, and Elizabeth Frankland, 13.