Hi Victoria, Hope I will get to see you, and many of the list members, at the NC Scottish Heritage Symposium at St. Andrews Presbyterian College in Laurinburg next March. The Scottish Heritage Center in the College Library building is an excellent resource for the history and genealogy of the Scot settlers in the Carolinas. My grandmother, who instilled my interest in genealogy, used to say how if you went back a few generations everybody in the Carolinas with Scotch blood was related, and more so the farther back you went. Currently I am busy converting almost three feet of notes and copied documents on early Scottish McAlisters into digital form with the goal of distinguishing as many familys as possible by computer. My month in Scotland was most enjoyable despite the fact that it was mostly genealogical research spadework in Argyll and the isles including Arran digging up facts on pre-1780 McAlisters. Surviving records are few and far between for that period now and there is no easy way to find ancestors especially since the Scots used so few given names. The National Archives of Scotland in Edinburgh is in a long term project of digitizing their records but this is proving to be expensive to access especially when one wants a copy of a record and it will take many, many years before all the records can be indexed and digitized for pay-per-view Internet access. The LDS Family History Centers are excellent for the post 1825 period and to a limited extent to 1780 in some Scottish Parishes if you can devote time to their Scottish CD, OPRs and IGI plus the hard to read microfilm and microfiche. For serious researchers interested in the pre-1825 Scots , there are two new resources by Scottish researchers that I can recommend. Frank Bigwood has recently produced a CD of excellent abstracts of previously unpublished Argyll Court Records for the early periods. A friend in Idaho who has a British bank account is willing to convert the 15 pounds sterling price to US Dollars ($24.00 currently) for those in America who want his privately produced CD. This CD has a built in Adobe Acrobat reader and search engine. David Dobson has put all 16 of his books on Scottish Immigrants to North America 1600-1800s on CD and this is available for about $40. as Family Tree Maker's Family Archives CD #268. This can be ordered over the internet from FTM or the Learning Channel or Broderbund sites. It can be read by version 3.2 or higher of either Family Archive Viewer or Family Tree Maker for Windows on a PC with CD ROM. My grandfather, John D Murchison, Sr, and his older brother, William who lived all his life in Dillon, were born in Mars Bluff, (now in Florence County) and their parents were Duncan Murchison and Mary Catherine Carmichael. The brothers were orphaned very young and raised by a Mr. McKerral who was a Mayor of Marion and a Carmichael maiden aunt. Duncan had brothers Roderick in Bennettsville and John D. in what is now Catonsville, a suburb west of Baltimore, MD. Their father, Alexander Murchison, came to the Cape Fear with several brothers and others of his family from Scotland shortly after the American Revolution. Alexander along with Roderick , Duncan and others of the family are buried in the Murchison cemetery near Clio just across the Marlboro County line from Dillon County. Best regards, Bill in Baltimore ----- Original Message ----- From: Victoria <vproc@ix.netcom.com> To: <SCMARION-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Sunday, November 04, 2001 10:19 PM Subject: [SCMARION-L] Scots connections - Murchison > Welcome back, Bill ! We're glad to see you back from the wilds of > Scotland. There are more than a few of us on this list who are > descendants of Scots and if you have time, we'd love to hear about > your travels and any research tips, tales or anecdotes you may have. > > Bless your heart! you just provided a wee clue for me with your > post: > << My Grandfather, John Murchison (originally McMurchie from > Kintyre)married their daughter, Mary McAlister Stackhouse & lived in Marion > till about 1919 when they moved to Florence. John Murchison's mother was a > Carmichael from the Little Rock area of Marion County. >> > > I've wondered for ages where the MURCHISON came from as a middle > name among the Proctors out in Little Rock. Who was John Murchison's > mama? > > Cheers, > Victoria > > > ==== SCMARION Mailing List ==== > Marion County SCGenWeb site: > http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/1786/marion.html > >