Hello Listers This is a copy of a letter from the Mearns Leader a local paper in the Stonehaven area that may interest anyone researching the surname Ritchie in the North East. Alex. Gray "Mystery Of Former Surname Solved . This may be of interest to readers of the Leader as it probably relates to the ancestry of a large number of local residents. Years ago when 1 started researching my family tree (Ritchie) 1 found it reasonably easy to get back to 1782 which was a marriage in Bervie of an ancestor John Ritchie of Gourdon to lsobal Freeman of Kinneff. I then became stuck in trying to find who this person's parents were. 1 then was informed by Robert Gove in Gourdon of the Ritchies being named Fatt and which 1 thought may have been a nickname common among fishermen. He also said there was strange talk of a murder after which the Fatts changed their name to Ritchie. Mr Gove could throw no further light on the matter other than the story had been passed down through generations in Gourdon. It has taken me a number of years trying to figure this out but thanks to the world wide web l have now got to the bottom of the mystery. Followers the reformed church established in 1550 by John Calvin were known in France as Hugenots and described as heretics by the Roman Catholic Church. A general edict of 1536 encouraged the extermination of Hugenots and 1200 were murdered in Vassy, France in 1562. During the infamous St Bartholomew massacre in 1572, 8000 Hugenots were murdered in Paris. Because of the aforesaid, Iarge numbers of surviving Hugenots fled France prior to 1600. A list of Hugenot surnames has been published and it was there that 1 discovered the name Fatt as being one of the Hugenot surnames and which fitted in with the dates which 1 had of Fatts in the Mearns. The first mention the name Fatt is in the parish of Fetteresso, Stonehaven prior to 1622. Then the name appears in the Kinneff and Bervie Parish records about 1660 and again in Milton, St Cyrus and also in Montrose. The details of marriages and. christenings in Bervie Parish are recorded under the surname Fatt and also Ritchie and by the middle to the end of 1700s the name Fatt had disappeared to be replaced by Ritchie. There are a large number of websites containing Hugenot material and for anyone interested it is all there, along with lists of other Hugenot surnames."