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History of Borenich Burial Ground Strathtummel
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Finding Your Ancestors in Borenich

Re-pointing the walls at Borenich burial ground (July 2009)

Re-pointing the walls at Borenich burial ground (July 2009)

Most of Borenich is within the parish of Blair Atholl, but the easterly portion adjacent to Glen Fincastle comes within the parish of Dull. The Blair Atholl Old Parish records (OPR) for births and marriages are incomplete, and there seem to be no records of deaths or burials.

The most common surname in Borenich is Stewart, so much so that it is not uncommon to have two Stewart couples with identical names living at two different homesteads in Blair Atholl parish. As a consequence, using the International Genealogical Index (IGI) may make it appear that a single couple have an impossible number of children within just a few years. Thus it is essential to know the homestead of the parents.

To overcome this problem an unknown author (initials A.S.) produced "The Stewarts in Blair Athol", which is held by the local history section of the A. K. Bell Public Library in Perth (reference L929-2).

This work is a bound copy of a typed index of Stewart surname entries from the Old Parish Records (OPR) for the parish of Blair Atholl, Perthshire. The extracts cover marriages, legal births and illegitimate births.

All Marriages in the Parish of Blair Atholl

The marriage list is in chronological order and is a good starting point to identify where couples were living. In may cases the bride was living with her parents, however girls were often employed by relatives as house servants. Even so, the bride would give the parental house as her address.

Groom Homestead Bride Homestead Date
John Stewart Balcastle Christian Stewart Bonskeid, Dull 30 Jun 1734
John Stewart Balnald of Borenich Isobel Cattenach Grennich 16 Feb 1744

The following link connects to a list of every marriages appearing in the Blair Atholl OPR. In addition there are some Blair Atholl marriages which do not appear in the Blair Atholl OPR.

Highland crofts at Newtonmore

All Marriages in Blair Atholl parish (1743-1855)

Stewart Births in Borenich

The births are firstly indexed by homestead and then by date, giving the names of both parents and child. As is normal in Scotland, the wife's name is given as her maiden name.

Father Mother Homestead Name of child Date
Donald Stewart Margaret McLachlan Croftcarnish John 14 Oct 1744
Donald Stewart Margaret McLachlan Croftcarnish William 3 May 1747
Donald Stewart Margaret McLachlan Balnald Elspeth 31 Jul 1748
Donald Stewart Margaret McLachlan Uchdnanetaig Alexander 8 Jul 1750

Although this is a wonderful source of information, errors have been found with some of the entries. Likewise, entries may have been omitted by mistake. Thus it would be prudent to compare the relevant entries against the original OPR. In addition please remember that this work only lists OPR entries with a Stewart connection.

Sometimes baptisms for Blair Atholl, which appear in the IGI, appear to be missing from the pages of the OPR, when the pages with the appropriate dates are being searched. The missing entries may be in the appendix of the book for that period. Additionally is should be noted that when the compulsory registration of births was about to take place in 1855, many people had their births and baptisms recorded in the OPR before it was too late. Just before the Appendix to birth (1806 - 1854), there are over thirty pages of previously unrecorded births and baptisms, stretching back over the last fifty years.

It is useful to know where each of the homesteads was located in Strathtummel, as children often lived and worked on the farms of nearby relatives. To assist with locating families, the following link shows a map of all of the known homesteads. The Stewart births for each homestead can be accessed from this map page.

Stewart Births in Borenich

Stewart Births in Borenich

Census Returns for Borenich

The 1841 census (conducted on 6th June) provides the first clear information for the whole community, but is limited in its content. The head of the household is usually listed first, but there is no indication of how the others are related to each other. In most cases, married women are listed under their maiden name, but not always. The ages of children are fairly accurate, but enumerators were instructed to round down the ages of persons 15 years and over to the nearest five years. Hence a given age of 28 was recorded as 25, one of 63 as 60 and so on. If a person lied about their age, this, combined with the rounding down, severely distorts the actual age. Likewise the recorded parish of birth is not always reliable.

Each census has been set up with the homesteads arranged in alphabetical order, and footnotes have been added where additional information has becomes available. At the end of each homestead listing there is the option of jumping to the next (or previous) census. This allows each homestead to be viewed at ten year intervals.

Census Return for 1841 Census Return for 1851 Census Return for 1861 Census Return for 1871 Census Return for 1881 Census Return for 1891 Census Return for 1901 Census Return for 1911

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