The Nosey Genealogist

On my mother’s side I have some Scottish blood, being descended from a branch of the Hay’s of Hopes. This family line goes back to one Edmond Hay, said to be born before 1636 and who became Laird of Hopes in Haddingtonshire, now in East Lothian.

Since finding his marriage on Scotlandspeople to Isobell Adinstoun on the 4th August 1664 in Cannongate, Edinburgh (within Hollyrood Palace) I have speculated that he may have been the son of the Lord of the neighbouring estate, Yester. This because the Lord of Yester was another “Hay”, John Hay 1st Earl of Tweeddale and Lord of Yester.

I have, however, received emails telling me that John Hay, Earl of Tweeddale had no such son. I have found mention that he was the “natural born” son and elsewhere in my research that he was not related to the neighbouring noble Hay’s of Yester at all!

While I was in London recently I made my first visit to The Society of Genealogists at 14 Charterhouse Buildings, Goswell Road, London EC1M 7BA. I went there with the purpose of looking at the parish records collections to see if I could trace my Devon “Thorn ancestors” back further than the early 1800s. While I found paper transcriptions of records for St. Saviour’s church in Dartmouth and so had some success, I was to be disappointed that the parish records for Dartmouth were not on micro-film, especially when they have such a rich resource of other parish records in their library.

Going up to the top floor of the Library I found a collection of family histories and imagine my delight to find one entitled: A Collection of Notes on the Family of the Hay of Hopes, Haddingtonshire. Begun by Charles Crosland Hay and added to by John Yalden Hay .

My surprise at finding this was compounded as Charles Crosland Hay was my great-great-grandfather.

The book was a mine of information about many of the descendants of Edmond Hay that will keep me occupied for ages, but apart from the reproduction of a portrait of Edmond Hay and another of the First Earl of Tweeddale, the greatest find for me, within its covers, was the transcription of the Sasine of Easthopes from 28th November 1653 (Reg of Sasines, Edin Vol 1 fo 99) that shows that the estate and lands of Easthopes were given to Edmond Hay by the Earl of Tweeddale .

The book seeks to add weight to the belief, in the Hay of Hopes family, that Edmond was acknowledged by his father to be his son. There are examples given, from the Parish Records in Yester, of the Earl’s legitimate children being witness to the christenings of Edmond’s children and of Edmond being witness at the baptism of Jean, daughter of John, Lord Yester, on 9th August 1674.

The weight of evidence is growing in favour of the argument that my mother’s side are descended from the noble line of the Tweeddale Hays, albeit from a possible illegitimate son of the 1st Earl.