Langholm Archive Group - Visit by Beatties

BEATTIE - Archive Centre Visit

On the 6th July 2007 the private volunteer research group, known as the Beatty DNA Group based in the USA, paid a surprise visit to the Langholm Archive Centre.

Tom Hutton told them that this was the biggest heritage group to visit the centre en-masse so far.

There were four male Beatties with various surname spellings, one female Baty, with husband, and one female Beattie and female friend from various states in the USA and one male Beattie from Greater London Kent in the UK. The group were on-tour collecting data from the prospective homeland of this Border clan that research points to an aboriginal tribe dating back to the last Ice Age.

This has been achieved by researching, recording and making comparisons with the typical DNA of the Y-chromosomes of male descendants having the same border clan name. Tom was most helpful in supplying Graveyard Memorial booklets of Langholm parishes, a CD of the outer parishes and downloads from his extensive local record database for the Beatties of Eskdale. Bruce McCartney was gracious in introducing the Beatties to the Archive Centre and for providing introductions to local personalities that would help in the future mapping research of this group.

This DNA group was formed by volunteers in the USA and UK 5 years ago with the object of highlighting lost family lineages due to the lack or destroyed birth, marriage and death records before the mid 19th Century.

Full details of their data may be found on their Website at http://www.beattydna.org.

The group would welcome new members and also are actively collecting DNA samples from long-standing males of the name by the use of a small brushing mouth swab. Kits are obtainable from the USA by post and the group supports a scholarship fund by donation. Contacts and full details and links to the mother BP2000 Project at the Rootsweb Website.