Topics

• About the Mclay One-Name Study
• Variants
• Origin of the surname
• Distribution of the name
• Data
• Contact Details

About the Mclay One-Name Study

My maternal grandfather Walter MCLAY wrote his autobiography taking his family story back to a marriage in Scotland in 1773. Sadly I never asked him about the family but later I read his story, my interest was captured and I began to prove his facts. Very soon I came up against a brick wall at that marriage in 1773 and only now, some 25 years later, do I have any idea of how to break through. Alas I still have no definite proof.

In my search I have amassed a large amount of MCLAY material. I have many separate MCLAY family trees and am continuing to build up this resource. In most cases I cover the years c1700 – 1900, as earlier than that information becomes scarce and the search very difficult.

I registered the name with the Guild of One-Name Studies in 2002.

Variants

My registered names are:- MCLAY, MCLAE, MCLEA, MCCLAE but I have also included MCCLAY, MACLAY, MACLEA, MCCLEA and where it seems to be only a temporary variant - MCLEAY.

Origin of the surname

There are many theories as to the origin of the name, but with so much variation in the early spellings nothing can be certain. MCLEA seems to have been constant in Bute & in Ross & Cromarty but in many other counties & parishes the above names were all interchangeable. Thanks to the whim of the Parish clerk or Minister in recording baptisms, there can sometimes be as many as four different spellings within the same family. For example in St Ninians & Stirling parishes Jean COWSLAN & husband John had children baptised under the names of MCLAY, MCLEA, MCLEAY & MCLAE, this being quite a common occurrence. By the mid 1800s, with the increase in literacy, MCLAY had become the main form of spelling, although a few families kept their original variant, namely MACLAY from the Clackmannan area & MCLEA from Bute The anglicised form of the name is said to be Livingstone.

Distribution of the name

From the OPRs up to 1840, the greatest numbers of births of MCLAY & all variants, occurred in Stirlingshire, Lanarkshire and Ross & Cromarty. In 1841 Census they are still the 3 most populous ‘MCLAY’ counties, but by 1881 the greater numbers are living in Lanarkshire, Stirlingshire and Renfrewshire. MCLAY, MCLEA, MACLEA, MACLAY & MCCLAY are now the only names with a reasonable representation in Scotland. The Highland county ‘MCLAYs’ gradually drifted south and a population there of about 70 in 1841 had dwindled to only 6 by 1881.

Apart from the Scottish ‘MCLAYs’ etc, there were also early branches – mainly MCCLAY – in Ireland, many of whom settled in the western parts of England & Scotland. ‘MCLAYs’ can now be found in many areas of the world as they joined emigrants to the colonies

Data

I have a considerable quantity of ‘MCLAY’ material and if you have any queries I should be pleased to hear from you. This material includes:-

Transcriptions of Parish register indexes for all Scottish counties

Some transcriptions of actual Parish register entries - mainly Lanarkshire and Stirlingshire.

Census: Scotland 1841 – 1901 transcribed England 1851 – 1901 transcribed

BDM indexes for England, Australia and New Zealand and some for Scotland

Many Scottish certificates - 1855-1891 - mainly for MCLAYs born in 18th or early 19th Century

Wills: Scotland. GRO Index and many actual wills or transcripts

Confirmations & Inventories Scotland 1872 – 1900 and a few later ones

Poor Law Indexes & Transcripts Lanarkshire & Dunbartonshire

Cemetery headstones (MIs) for various places

USA: 1880 census, plus some others.

Australia: Some Immigration & Cemetery records

New Zealand: Some Probate, Cemetery & School records

Contact details

For further information, contact:

Mrs Jill Larsen
58 Robinia Way,
Worrigee,
New South Wales
2540
Australia
E-mail:

This page last updated 13 January 2012.

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Profiles of other one-name studies registered with the Guild may be found here.