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Welcome to the Scotson Family History website!

I do hope that you find that the numerous trees on this website will bring you great pleasure and will be most useful for your family history, whether setting out as a beginner, or as an experienced genealogist. There are over 13,300 names on the website, 1,757 being born with the name Scotson and 29 with Scottson spelling. Other names are their spouses, descendants and those in families linked to the Scotsons by a marriage.

A list of surnames is found by clicking on Statistics under the "Find" menu on the home page.

For photographic material, click on the links in the left-hand menu on the homepage for "Photos" (portraits), "Cemeteries", "Headstones", and "Documents".

If you could contribute further Scotson information, documents, certificates, newspaper articles, obituaries, anecdotes, internet items, just anything relating to the family, it would be warmly appreciated. This will provide additional life to the bones of this research. Photographs of people, headstones, related buildings, and scans of documents are requested in jpeg format in medium resolution.

The website is a means for a Scotson photograph bank, by which similarities and traits can be compared between members of the family in different trees? So please help.

The website also includes information on living Scotsons. If you belong to the Scotson family, then you are welcome to register via the homepage for access. Please let me know how you are related during registration. Any information on living individuals is strictly for personal use, and may not be published in any form.

Registration

The link for "Registration for a New User account" is under the photograph on the homepage.

Please contact me via the website line or at the email address below if I can answer any of your questions or assist you with your Scotson or related research.

The Trees

All the main SCOTSON trees in Lancashire and Yorkshire are available, and constantly updated:

LANCASHIRE AND NORTH WEST ENGLAND

1. COLTON TREE: Although the original Scotsons lived in Lancaster and in Colton in the Furness Fells (near the Lake District) in the 14th century, this is the earliest Scotson tree that can be compiled from church records. Unfortunately known male descendants died out in the 18th centuy, although living descendants through the maternal line are known in Canada. It is highly likely that the Scotsons in southern parts of Lancashire originated from this family, but documentary evidence is still required to prove this.

2. RADCLIFFE TREE: This is the largest Scotson tree, originating in the early 17th-Century via John Scotson and Ann Heywood in Bury. It is thought that their son Edmund Scotson, born in Bamford, Rochdale in 1659, moved to the Radcliffe area, and it is assumed that this family and/or his children would have lived in the 18th century at SCOTSON FOLD FARM, in Radcliffe near Bury. This 16th century farmhouse still survives today. Edmund's descendants moved first to Abram before spreading to localities such as Hindley, Wigan, Lowton, Leigh, Warrington, Prescot, Rochdale and Stretford. Branches of this tree are also found in other parts of the world, such as Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa and Montana in the United States.

3. ATHERTON TREE: These Scotsons are mainly in Atherton and Leigh, and easily confused with those in the Radcilffe tree who also settled in the Leigh area. They are descendants of a William Scotson and Mary Morgan who lived in Liverpool in the late-18th Century.

4. HEAPEY TREE: This Scotson family has origins in the early 18th century in Heapey and Wheelton, near Chorley. It features in the legend of James Scotson who married the blacksmith's daughter, Ellin Miller in 1761. Their seven sons played the violin in Heapey Church. Descendants mainly moved to Standish, Wales and Liverpool. A fairly large branch lives in Australia.

5. CHORLEY TREE. This branch lived in Chorley from the 1780s starting with Samuel Scotson who was born in 1771. He married Mary Parkinson in 1788. These Scotsons mainly lived locally and in nearby Darwen where the Scottson spelling was frequently used.

6. STANDISH TREE: A small family descended from John Scotson and Margaret Wignal who married in St Wilfrid's Church, Standish in 1804. Their descendants mainly lived in the Standish, Upholland, Wigan and Warrington areas. Becuase Standish is situated between Wigan and Chorley, there is a big possibility that there will be a connection with the Heapey and Chorley trees.

7. LIVERPOOL TREE: A small family of Scotsons produced by William and Ann Scotson in the early-seventeenth century in the Kendal area of Westmorland. Their son Isaac married an Ellen Park in Liverpool in 1759. Children were born to Isaac in Liverpool and Radcliffe, but the Scotsons to have died out in 1953 with James Eustace Scotson who was unmarried.

8. CHESHIRE TREE: A family in the closely knit community in Pownall Fee, Styal in Wilmslow. A James Scotson (b.1911) in Liverpool married Mary Bayley (Bailey) of this village in 1833. Although they had eight children, the Scotson name had become extinct there by 1900. However, descendants through the matriarchal lines of HENSHALL and BURGESS survived.

YORKSHIRE AND NORTH EAST ENGLAND

9. COUNTY DURHAM TREE: This is the large of the north-eastern trees. These are descendants of a William and Elizabeth Scotson who had three grandsons in Yarm, Yorkshire between 1777 and 1788. Today we find large pockets of descendants through John (b.1777 in Yarm) in the Stockton-on-Tees and Middlesbrough areas. Other descendants spread to Birmingham, Leicester and Salford.

10. LEEDS TREE: Another tree with its roots in Yarm. The earliest known ancestors, Thomas Scotson, born there in 1785 could well be a brother or cousin of the three mentioned in the Co. Durham tree. This smallish tree was mainly concentrated in the Hunslet and Fewston areas. It seems that all male members of the family had died by the 1890s. Thomas Scotson and Mary Stead did have twelve children between 1853 and 1874, but only Louisa b. 1870 had a child.

11. NORTH YORKSHIRE: The founder of this tree was George Scotson b. 1727 in Danby Wiske, North Yorkshire. His ten children were born in Kirklevington, but the family was mainly found in Hartlepool before the 1850s. A few descendants are known to live in Country Durham and London, but it would appear that the last Scotson male passed away in 1998

12. CARLTON: A very small pocket of Scotsons, descending from George Scotson and Elizabeth Wilson of Bishopton, County Durham. This family mainly lived in Carlton-in-Cleveland until about 1885.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

13. PENNSYLVANIA SCOTTSON TREE:

This family with the Scottson spelling will not be related to the Scotson trees

of England. These are descendants of Carl Skadsen who evidently emigrated from

Norway in the 1880s. The SKADSEN name was changed to SCOTSSON and used by his children

Martha, Anfin, Carl and Harry and their descendants who were all born in

Pennsylvania. Work on this tree is presently in progress.

Accuracy has been sought at all times. Documentary evidence is fundamental, but because sometimes there is the danger of misinterpretation of evidence, typos or transcription errors, mistakes are always likely. Please forward corrections, omissions, extra information of people, places, events and dates via the website link or email address below.

Scotson Surname DNA Project

A DNA project has been set up to focus on the Y-chromosome (carried by male-line descendants). The aim is to be able to identify the family lines, and connect the trees by this means. Please contact Allan Scotson at the email address below for further information.

Information of corrections, omissions, extra information of people, places, events and dates, etc., will be warmly appreciated. Please use the website link or email address below.

wishing you much enjoyment in your moments of research

Allan

Allan Scotson

European Representative of the Guild of One Name Studies, member no. 3869

Scotson Family History

genealogy of the Scotson family

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