Rankin Families of Stirlingshire

[grrankin]

Hello, I am a Rankin from one of the Rankin families of Kilsyth. I know there are a few other Rankin families from Kilsyth that are unrelated to us but would assume that we are all distantly related somehow (correct me if you have info otherwise). It would be the holy grail to find out how! :-)

My long-suffering 2nd cousin has painstakingly traced our line back to about 1700 in the Kilsyth area.  My question is where did we all come from? I note there were a lot of Rankins in Ayrshire prior to 1700 and am wondering if we came from one of those families.

Although the idea that we are related to the Pipers of Duart and the McLean clan, is seductive, I can't find any real linkages to that line other than the name Neil being used several times in our family which is an oddity amongst all the James, Johns and Williams.

If anybody has any knowledge of the Rankin clan history prior to Kilsyth and Stirlingshire, I would love to hear it because it's frustrating not to be able to go back further in my own line.

Sorry if this is way too general question, it was just a question i had that I thought I would pop in here and see what info I got that might help.

Thanks,
Gillian Rankin

[BABs17]

I am related to Peter Rankin

BIRTH 1753 • Berryhill Farm, Kilsyth, Stirlingshire, Scotland
DEATH 9 APR 1842 • West Charlton, Saratoga, NY
5th great-grandfather

[andrea_rankinKilsyth]

Hi Gillian and BABs17. I am researching the Rankins from Kilsyth, and that includes the Rankins from Berryhill. Peter (interchange name Patrick) Rankin married Margaret Grinlay (also spelt Grindlay). Hello Cousin Gillian, am I the 2nd cousin you speak of?  Peter (1753-1842) is my 4th great grand uncle. Peter and Margaret were married 5 July 1783 in Kilsyth and had 11 children with the last of them Jean Rankine born 1808 in Berryhill.  During my 20+yrs of Rankin family research, I came across the 1796 Kilsyth Statistical Account and it mentions that since duty was imposed upon baptisms, a greater number of residents neglected to register their children to evade tax. [I can hear all the family historians slap their forehead].   Also, a publication called “A Detailed List of the Old Parochial Registers” printed in 1872 confirmed incomplete or blank parish records in Kilsyth from May 1625 to June 1631, May 1635 to May 1639, September 1639 to September 1643, September 1668 to August 1672, an imperfect leaf (i.e sheet) at 1660 and 1668, Blank records from December 1721 to January 1723, Marriages without dates after 1778. The Kilsyth Old Parish registers haves surviving pages from the year 1619 but with many missing pieces/gaps in the records mentioned above, it would be very difficult to determine when the Rankins/Rankings arrived in Kilsyth; and if (or how) they connect to each other.   Numerous Ancestry.com DNA matches to my dad have helped determine many distant lines in my Rankin family tree but none that connect to the Rankins on Mull.  I was only just reading Clan Macleans fled Duart Castle in 1691 after successful invasion by the Campbells/Duke of Argyll.  The Macleans initially withdrew to Cairnbulg Castle in Aberdeenshire and later to Kintail in the highlands under the protection of the Earl of Seaforth. So with Rankin/Rankings already in Kilsyth from early to mid 1600s, still begs the question why? Did they go into exile in Stirlingshire with a number of sept families under the protection of the (pro royalist) Livingston family?