The Scotts of Welney and Christchurch

SCOTT is an ethnic name for someone from Scotland, or more commonly, for a gaelic speaker within Scotland.
[Source: "Oxford Dictionary of Surnames"]

The name SCOTT, in my case, originates in the English Fens (North Cambridgeshire) U.K. from the Scottish POW's
- taken at the Battle of Dunbar in 1650 - that were used to dig the huge drainage canals in the 17thC.

The following is an extract from the GenWeb pages for Cambridgeshire referring to Cornelius Vermuyden (1595-1683)
and the Fen Reclamation.

"In 1642, during the English Civil War, Parliament ordered the dykes broken and the land flooded in order to stop a
royalist army advance. In 1649 Vermuyden was commissioned to reclaim the Bedford Level. After the Civil War the work
continued with the actual labour provided by Scottish prisoners of war captured at the Battle of Dunbar in 1650 and
Dutchmen captured at a naval battle two years later. Some 40,000 acres were drained by 1652 and the New Bedford River
cut."

To read the whole item goto: https://sites.rootsweb.com/~engcam/cvermydn.htm

My thanks to Martin Edwards, CambsGenWeb Webmaster, for permission to quote the above extract.

The SCOTT surname can still be found in Welney, Hilgay, Southery, 100ft Bank, 10 Mile Bank - all close to the original digging works -
and further afield now in Christchurch, Upwell, Littleport, Downham Market, etc..

As I have only the Welney Parish Registers to consult, I have no idea, at the moment, where my SCOTTs lived in
Welney; but I do know they were farm workers from the registers. By the time my family reached Christchurch in the early
1800s, they had progressed to being farmers.

The Registers of St. Mary's Church, Welney at held at the C.R.O., Shire Hall, Cambridge:-
Baptisms 1642 - 1904
Marriages 1653 - 1895
Burials 1653 - 1846
Banns 1755 - 1894

They have been transcribed and published by the Cambridgeshire & Huntingdonshire Family History Society
and are available on CD or by download.

The earliest SCOTT marriage recorded is that between Thomas SCOTT & Elizabeth BLOOMFIELD in 1657.

The earliest SCOTT baptism is on 30 Nov 1654 - Elizabeth SCOTT, daughter of Thomas.

The earliest SCOTT burial is on 10 August 1657 - Nicholas SCOTT, son of Thomas - and that's all you get with the older
registers!

St. Mary's Church and other views of Welney can be seen on the Welney website

My grateful thanks to my SCOTT cousins, Lloyd Caddick and John Quest, for information supplied which helped to verify
many facts that I wasn't too sure of. I hope that I have been able to help them in return.

Index to my SCOTT webpages:

John & Elizabeth SCOTT
John SCOTT & Sarah SAVAGE
John SCOTT & Hannah Doncaster
Walter SCOTT & Annie Maria LAVENDER
Grace SCOTT & Walter Russell CAWTHORN - my Grandparents
Eliza SCOTT & Benjamin WHEAT
Jesse SCOTT & Elizabeth DANZEY
Jesse SCOTT's Obituary - 1 September 1916
Emma/Emily SCOTT & James LOWDEN
Reuben SCOTT & Sophia DENT
Rhoda SCOTT & Thomas DUFFIN
George Gabriel SCOTT
Tram accident - 25 April 1914
Ruth & Rebecca SCOTT
Evangeline/Evangelina SCOTT

Even more so as all originals are in my possession - be it book, photo, postcard, etc.

No uploading to another website is permitted without express permission from myself.

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This page created 30 July 2002
and amended/updated 11:36 04/05/2020