| The Kirkconnell Family History According to Watson Kirkconnell who prepared a genealogical sketch, Kirkconnells originate from the south of Scotland near Dumphries. The roots of the name trace back to the former location of a church (kirk) founded by Saint Connell an Irish bishop and missionary saint and a disciple of Saint Columba of Iona, "the apostle to the Picts".. ("Sactus Conallus
Epicopus" Of Conallus, and of the Prophecy of Patrick concerning
him.
The place-name was used as a surname originally in the Stewarty of Kirkcudbright, lying a few miles South Southwest of the town of Dumfries. The Kirkconnell name was found here from the 12th to the 19th centuries. It is from this area that all Kirkconnell's have immigrated from. Early parchment deeds, preserved by the abbey of Holm Cultram , document that the estate was bounded on the east by the estuary of the Nith, and ranged from the Cargen Water on the North to Drum Burn seven miles farther South. It stretched westward about four miles to the line of Glensone Burn and culminated in the southwest in the broadsholdered peak of Criffell (`1867 feet ) These sites have squares drawn around them on the large map. Within the estate are the ruins of Sweetheart Abbey and the hamlet of New Abbey, founded on the tract after 1269, by the Devorgila de Balliol, widow of John Balliol , the founder of Balliol College, Oxford. Also belonging to the Kirkconnell lairds, according to the early charters, were extensive estates of Mabie and Auchenreoch, lying immediately to the west of the Kirkconnell Estate proper. The total area of the family's original holdings are approximately 40 square miles. |
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