Margaret Crichton

Margaret married Peter Hay about 1530. Peter (son of Edmund Hay and Janet Boyd) was born in of Megginch, Perth and Kinross, Scotland; died in 1565. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 1613

Notes:

"[S]ister of the Rev. Edmund Hay, S.J., first rector of the Scots College at Pont-à-Musson, Provincial of the French Jesuits, and Sir James Hay, Controller of Scotland; aunt of Sir George Hay, Ist Earl of Kinnoull, Viscount Dupplin, Lord Hay of Kinfauns, Lord Chancellor and Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland; Sir James Hay, K.G., 1st Earl of Carlisle, Viscount Doncaster, Lord Hay of Sawley, Lord Proprietor of the Caribbee Islands, and Robert Hay, Master of the King's Robes; great-aunt of Margaret Hay, Lady Spynie; great-great aunt of Mary Hay, Countess Marischal, and George Lindsay, 3d Lord Spynie; great-great-great aunt of William Keith, 9th Earl Marischal." [Brice McAdoo Clagett, citation details below]

Family/Spouse: George Drummond. George (son of George Drummond and Janet Haliburton) was born in of Blair, Perthshire, Scotland; died on 4 Jan 1594. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Katherine married Nicholas Campbell before 1563. Nicholas (son of Donald Campbell, Abbot of Coupar Angus and Margaret) was born in 1517; died in 1587; was buried in Bendochy, Perthshire, Scotland. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1572
• Alternate death: Abt 1632

Margaret married Alexander McGruder before 26 May 1605. Alexander was born about 1569 in Craigneich, Muthill Parish, Perthshire, Scotland; died before 1 May 1617. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1610, of Glenartney, Perthshire, Scotland
• Alternate birth: 1610, of Prince George's County, Maryland

Notes:

"[W]as fined with others for illegally carrying arms and shooting deer and wildfowl near Cargill, Cargill, 1622 (Registry of the Privy Council 13:101-03); probably acted as factor or chamberlain for Lord Maderty in Dunblane parish, Strathallan; was probably the "Allastar Mcgruger" who served in Col. Sir Thomas Ruthven's reg. of the Army of the League and Covenant in England, 1645/6; is believed to have been captured serving in the Scottish army in the civil wars, perhaps at the Battle of Worcester, 1651, and to have been sent to America as a prisoner; settler in Md. by 1653; of Turkey Buzzard Island, Calvert Co., and "Anchovie Hills," Calvert Co. (now Prince George's, near the present Baden), Md.; held about 3,750 acres in Prince George's Co. (brother of James McGruder, lord of Cargill, Perthshire, chamberlain to the Earl of Perth, member of a committee appointed by the Scots Parliament to expel Cromwell's army, 1649)." [Brice McAdoo Clagett, citation details below]

Ancestor of Confederate generals James Longstreet, William Beall, John Bankhead Magruder, and Stephen Drane; also of Asa Griggs Chandler, founder of the Coca-Cola company and principal founder of Emery University.

One of JMF's two gateway ancestors, but fittingly, given JMF's delight in ambiguity and historical contingency, his status as a "gateway ancestor" is controversial. In 2015, the lineage society the Order of the Crown of Charlemagne announced that Margaret Campbell was not his mother and therefore his descendants no longer qualified for membership, but (to the best of our knowledge, and that of historian Susan Tichy), no evidence for this was put forth.

It is certainly true that the evidence for the Maryland immigrant being the Alexander who was second son of Alexander McGruder and Margaret Campbell is circumstantial. In our view, it passes the test of being strong enough circumstantial evidence to warrant recording what appears to be the probable line.

From Susan Tichy, "Was Alexander Who We Think He Was?":

But how do we know he was the second son of these parents?

We don’t, not absolutely. We believe it on the basis of two pieces of evidence.

1) In Maryland, Alexander named three of his plantations for Dunblane (a cathedral town in Perthshire), Craigneich (the farm where Alexander Magruder the elder was born), and Inchaffray (an abbey and estate near Maderty, where Alexander the elder was chamberlain--corrupted in Maryland to Anchovie Hills). Craigneich is especially convincing because it was (and is) a private farm, not a large estate. It is unlikely a man without intimate connections there would have bestowed this name on a Maryland farm, and few would have had such connections.

Alexander named no plantations for Balmaclone (or Belliclone) where he is believed to have been born. That was a Drummond farm, to which his mother had a lifetime right as widow of her first husband, Andrew Drummond. Craigneich was a McGruder farm and had been for several generations. Alexander was seven or eight years old when his father died and his mother remarried, at which point he probably would have been sent to live at Craigneich to be raised by his father’s family.

2) The Records of the Privy Council (vol. viii, pp 101-102) show that on 22 November, 1622, one “Alexander McA Growder,” twelve years old, was fined for illegally carrying arms and shooting deer and wildfowl with some other boys at Spittalsfield, Caputh Parish, near Cargill, about six miles from Dunkeld.

This provides a birth date of ~1610, which places him after James, the known eldest son of Alexander Magruder and Margaret Campbell. This family–and James especially–also show strong association with Cargill. Later in his life, James Magruder is identified as being either in Cargill, indicating he lived there, or of Cargill, indicating he owned land there. In one record he is designated Laird of Cargill, which, if accurate, indicates a significant elevation in status.

And that’s it. That’s our positive evidence.

What we might call negative evidence boils down to the simple fact that no other candidate can be found in the records. McGruders / MacGrouthers were few in number, so other choices for where to locate Alexander among known families would be slim. In 1620, John McGrouther (brother of Alexander the elder) purchased land in Meigor, in Glen Artney, thus making the rare step from tenant to landowner. His descendants owned this farm until the 19th century when the line died out. Because of land ownership, there are more records for that family than for any other. Among them there is no Alexander who could be our immigrant, nor is there a Maryland plantation called Meigor.

Don McGruther has found a few McGruthers, MacCrouthers, and other variations of the name, scattered through the southern Highlands, Edinburgh, and as far as Ireland, but it seems far-fetched to imagine that Alexander came from one of those families. His strong attachment to Perthshire, in particular to Inchaffray and Craigneich, establishes his origins in the McGrouther heartland.

From Susan Tichy, "Alexander Magruder, The Immigrant":

[Alexander Magruder] was the first of his name in America. Born about 1610 at the small estate of Belliclone (now Nether Belliclone farm) in Madderty Parish, Perthshire, in Scotland’s Central Highlands, Alexander was the son of Alexander McGruder, the elder, and Margaret Campbell of Keithick. He is believed to have arrived in Maryland in January 1652 as a prisoner of war, having been captured during Cromwell’s invasion of Scotland late in the civil wars that attended the Protestant Reformation. Upon arrival, Alexander was sold into indentured servitude. In the disease-ridden Chesapeake, half of all indentured servants died within a year. Those who survived their term--most commonly five years--received their freedom and a “headright” to 50 acres of unimproved land--which they first had to find, then pay a surveyor and, for a fee, register their ownership. Alexander received his first of two headrights in November 1653, indicating that he served a remarkably short indenture. He went on to be one of the largest landowners among formerly indentured men of his generation. Historian Russell R. Menard, who studied men who arrived as indentured servants from 1648-1652, identifies him as one of only three who owned more than 1,000 acres when they died.

Alexander married Sarah before 1663. Sarah died between 1671 and 1672. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Member of the Maryland assembly. One of the first justices of Prince George's County. One of the first vestrymen of St. Paul parish.

Family/Spouse: Sarah. Sarah died between 16 Jan 1731 and 28 Sep 1734 in of Prince George's County, Maryland. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1688
• Alternate death: 1753, Prince George's County, Maryland

Family/Spouse: Elizabeth Brewer. Elizabeth (daughter of John Brewer and Sarah Ridgely) was born on 25 Oct 1690 in Anne Arundel County, Maryland; died before 1751. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Margaret Jackson. Margaret (daughter of John Jackson and Ruth Beall) was born in 1711; died in 1801. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]