Many thanks for your call, Barbara. In fact Monymusk is about 15+ miles from Kildrummy so it is unlikely that he would have attended Kildrummy School, but would have attended the school in the Monymusk area. I in fact taught at the present Monymusk School for a short time before my son was born and he was baptised in the beautiful church in Monymusk which has a 12th century tower. What I will do is take your letter to the current head teacher of the school and see if there is any way of tracing your ggg grandfather in the area. We should be able to find them on the Old Parish Records for the beginning of the 19th century. I have access to these at our Family History Society in Aberdeen. I will certainly pass on any information I manage to find. Incidentally, rationalisation of small schools is the authority's way of saying we need to reduce the number of small rural schools and group all the children together in much bigger units (in the words of one officer - this will be done because of the 'educational dubiety' of small schools!!). Our small schools, including Monymusk and Kildrummy, work incredibly hard to ensure that our children are in no way disadvantaged by being in small establishments. In fact it is our small schools which inspectors are highlighting as delivering excellent education. But one has to accept that politics and common sense do not necessarily go together. I will keep in touch and am so grateful that you took the time to write. I promise it is not in vain. Kind regards, Margaret Parfitt