Redpath/Ridpath/Reidpath Family Newsletter
3Q August 2004
Table of Contents:
Well, we are definitely back on track with this issue - thanks to all the contributors who came through with the interesting material for this issue. And now is the time to start getting your submissions ready for the next issue in November.
David Redpath - Australia v Scotland June 19th 2004
I wrote you a note which you published as an article for the newsletter last year in which I enclosed a photo of the Redpath Coat of Arms and a couple of tartan samples which Redpath's can wear drawn from Lochcarron in Galashiels.
Well I was visiting Scotland shortly after that and went to Gala bought a tie in each of the tartans I mentioned in the article. I can now confirm both the Borderland Scottish and the Tweedside look very smart.
While I was at Lochcarron's ok through their tartan reference books and the Redpath's can also wear the Roxburgh tartan and here it is for anyone interested.
The Duke of Roxbrugh is a very important person around that area and lives at Floors Castle which was used for the filming of Tarzan the legend of Greystoke. The shire of Roxburgh was subsumed into the new local government area of the Borders.
Turning to the real point of writing, I thought your readers may enjoy a little report on our trip to Sydney to see Scotland v the Wallabies. Well we had a Fabbo time over in Sydney .
The airline, Qantas, upgraded us into First Class on the way over and Mrs Redpath was in seventh heaven. Sitting in her "Sky bed" getting a back massage, watching her 18 channel in flight TV and quaffing her complimentary Bailey's Irish cream with ice. I was having a Chivas Regal with ice and watching the new Paul Hogan movie "Strange Bedfellows" which was a hoot.
Stayed at the Castlereagh Inne a magnificent "ye olde worlde" sort of place. You could hold an entire episode of Antiques Roadshow in there. The furniture would be worth squillions to collectors. Beautifully restored and maintained the dining rooms and bar areas are a wonderful step back into the old British Empire colonial upper class snobby gentlemen's club days.
Went shopping on Saturday morning and had a look through the Queen Victoria building. The QVB is a fantastic old piece of architecture. Mrs. Red bought a set of James Sadler ornamental tea pots, marked down to $A35.00 each, less than half price and one them had a picture of Edinburgh Castle on it. Very dear to me as my old home town and the Castle is only a short walk from where I was born.
Down to Circular Quay and on to the Manly ferry. It just has to be the best public transport water cruise anywhere in the world and only $A12.00 return. The Harbour Bridge , the Opera House, Kirribilli, Taronga Park , the botanic gardens, the harbour views, absolutely stunning.
Wander around the street markets in Manly, a beer in the Steyn and fish and chips out on the Corso. The place is gorgeous, beautiful surf beach. The old saying about Manly still holds true, "Seven miles from Sydney - a thousand miles from care."
Whale watching is one of the features of the Manly ferry at this time of year as the whales stop off for a rest in the harbour during their migration. Here is a photo of one frolicking in the harbour with Fort Dennison and the Sydney Harbour Bridge as a backdrop.
Back to the city a quick look round the Rocks and check out the street entertainers, the markets, the Irish pubs and speciality shops. Time to start heading for the game.
Free train rides for those with tickets to the big game and so on out to Strathfield to have dinner with a friend from our Canberra office who was also going to the game with her husband. I can now recommend Chinese in Strathfield, it was great.
Back onto the train and out to Homebush and the Olympic stadium. What a magnificent facility. I hadn't been out to Olympic Park since 1999 and the stadium was still under construction then, but its magnificent. It is so futuristic that it would be the stadium that Captain Jean Luc Picquard would have inside the hollow deck on the star ship Enterprise .
So out came the teams for the National anthems and wearing my Wallabies hat and my Scotland jumper I stood up and sang "Flower of Scotland" followed by "Advance Australia Fair."
Scotland was brave but out gunned. The Wallabies had David Lyons, Lote Tuquiri and Wendell Sailor who were smashing it up all night. For Scotland the front row did well, Tom Smith made mincemeat out of Matt Dunning late in the game and Scott Murray was courageous throughout.
Having been born in Scotland and lived in Australia for 30+ years I think I am one of the few who knows the words to both National Anthems and could cheer both teams whenever they scored, so I had a great night.
Back to Perth Sunday morning, only Business class this time and picked up the car. I'd put it into the valet parking at the airport and they washed cleaned it for me.
Cool trip eh!!
About 18 months ago I started researching my ancestors. After a month or so I
was put in touch with Steven Ridpath. We are related through my paternal
great-grandparents John Ridpath(b.1824) and Mary Ann Grout(b.1829) and have
become firm friends.When I told my older brother what I had been doing he
remarked that my dad's brother had a daughter but had split from her mother
when the girl was about 7 or 8 and had lost contact with her (my uncle died
1945). I mentioned this to Steven and a couple of weeks later he contacted me
with a telephone number that had been given to him by another Ridpath( we
still haven't found a link for him yet) from a women who had been trying to
find relatives of her father for about forty years!I rang the number and she was thrilled to find she had 5 1st cousins who she hadn't met. We have
met up a few times and are now in regular contact and all our families get
on really great. So a big thank you to Cousin Steven without who we would
never have met. Enclosed are some pictures of John and Louisa and one of Loisa
and me taken by none other than Steven Ridpath himself. Hope you can use
this.Brian and Loiusa
Mary Ann and John
Border Reiver DNA Project - by James V. Elliott
If you are an adult male paternally descended from the Anglo-Scottish Border family Redpath, and have ever considered getting your Y chromosome tested, you may do so at a substantial discount by joining the Border Reiver DNA Project at Family Tree DNA.
The Border Reiver DNA Project is a serious genetic and genealogical study started this March by two customers of Family Tree DNA, James V. Elliott and David B. Strong. Although it began as a study of the Elliott Border Reiver family, it has since expanded to include members of other Border Reiver families, including a direct descendant of the legendary Border Reiver, Johnnie Armstrong, a senior officer of the Clan Hall Society, Dixons, Irvings, Kerrs, Littles, Taylors, Carruthers, Davisons, Ogles, Hunters and others. Members of all Border Reiver families are welcome now, and we emphatically encourage your participation.
The home page for our study, which includes many links to other web pages about the Scots, the Britons, the Border Reivers and their ancestors, may be accessed at the URL below:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gallgaedhil/elliott_border_reivers_dna.htm
We are conducting our study of the Border Reiver families using Y chromosome DNA markers, because the Y chromosome is passed, just like a surname, from father to son with very few changes over many generations. That makes these DNA markers an ideal tool for tracing paternal descent and, by extension, the history of families.
The goals of the Border Reiver DNA Project are as follows:
1) James Leyburn, in his excellent book "The Scotch-Irish: A Social History", characterized the ancestry of the Anglo-Scottish Border people as a diverse mixture of Picts, Brythonic Celts, Scotti, Irish Gaels, both Danish and Norwegian Vikings, Angles and Saxons, troops and settlers from all over the Roman Empire - as well as Normans, Flemish and many others. We intend to use Y chromosome analysis to explore the ancestral origin of Border Reiver descendants, both individually (if we can) and as a group. We have already done substantial reading about both the history of Europe and the latest developments in population genetics, and have compiled a database of more than 350 likely Border Reiver descendants obtained from public databases at Family Tree DNA and elsewhere.
The URL below will give you some idea of the extent of our ongoing study:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gallgaedhil/dna_by_haplogroup.htm
2) The Border Reivers rode during a period of extreme chaos in the history of the Anglo-Scottish Border. Many young mothers were widowed, and many children were orphaned. The social customs of the Reivers, affected by a need for self-reliance and the shifting circumstances of the era, favored trial marriages, and allowed even married women to keep their surnames. The larger Border Reiver clans themselves were like tribes or military units as much as families, and many born with different surnames joined these clans for protection, eventually assuming the clan surname as their own. As a consequence of all these factors, Border Reiver descendants are to this day closely interrelated. Many with different surnames share the same ancestors, and many with the same surname are descended from genetically distinct paternal lines. Our DNA Project seeks to determine the relationships among these descendants, both on an individual and a family level.
The URL below will give you some idea of the families already included in our study:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gallgaedhil/dna_by_surname.htm
The group rate for joining the Border Reiver DNA Project is 99 USD for a 12 marker Y chromosome test, or 169 USD for a 25 marker test. The 12 marker test easily suffices to determine your "deep ancestry", and can provide enough data to suggest a shared paternal ancestry within the last 14 or 15 generations. The 25 marker test, more favored by DNA genealogists, can identify a shared paternal ancestry within the last 7 generations.
These group rates represent a substantial savings over the cost of joining Family Tree alone. For instance, the cost of getting the 12 marker test is nearly 40 percent less than what I paid for the same test last summer. Once you join our group, you will have full privileges as a Family Tree DNA customer. Family Tree DNA will store your genetic material with absolute privacy and security for twenty years, and will publish information about your Y chromosome markers, their likely ethnic origin, and the e-mail addresses of exact matches, on your own personal, password-protected web page. In addition, all other DNA tests you wish to order will be available to you at a considerable discount.
Despite the foregoing discussion of cost, this is a serious study, not a commercial venture. If you are interested in joining us, or would simply like more info, please contact James V. Elliott at jvance@tiac.net.
Sincerely,
James V. Elliott
Group Administrator
Elliott (And Border Reivers) DNA Project
Pronunciation submitted by Robert Redpath
I like your newsletter and well done to all contributors who put in such a
lot of work!This is the first time I ever knew of the name Rippith or Rippeth actually
being used as a formal version of the surname. I can confirm that this is
the local pronounciation of the name to this day. I was not aware though
that the pronounciation had actually survived as a version of the name.
The village of Redpath is also known as Rippith by locals. The village
and farm are right next to one another, the farm being at the east end of
the village. The village itself is a collection of houses along a cull-de-
sac. Very picturesque and quite well hidden actually!
I live in Edinburgh now but was born and raised in the border region of
Scotland, where there are many Redpaths, but as far as I know, with
the 'tradionally' spelt version only.
Brian Cooper
About 18 months ago I started researching my ancestors. After a month or so I
was put in touch with Steven Ridpath. We are related through my paternal
great-grandparents John Ridpath(b.1824) and Mary Ann Grout(b.1829) and have
become firm friends.When I told my older brother what I had been doing he
remarked that my dad's brother had a daughter but had split from her mother
when the girl was about 7 or 8 and had lost contact with her (my uncle died
1945). I mentioned this to Steven and a couple of weeks later he contacted me
with a telephone number that had been given to him by another Ridpath( we
still haven't found a link for him yet) from a women who had been trying to
find relatives of her father for about forty years!I rang the number and she was thrilled to find she had 5 1st cousins who she hadn't met. We have
met up a few times and are now in regular contact and all our families get
on really great. So a big thank you to Cousin Steven without who we would
never have met. Enclosed are some pictures of John and Louisa and one of Loisa
and me taken by none other than Steven Ridpath himself. Hope you can use
this.
Redpath Queries - submitted by Cathy Lampshire
Here is a little something for the next newsletter. These are two stray
marriages which may be of help to one of our Redpath/Ridpath
researchers.1) Robert REDPATH and Sarah G. Delosh - married 22 Oct 1878 in Sutter Creek, Amador Co, California
2) James J. Cathcart and Bernice REDPATH - married 30 Oct 1929 in Caldwell, Canyon Co, Idaho
Both marriages were found on: http://www.abish.byui.edu/specialCollections
Thank you, Cathy Lampshire California, USA email: clampshire@fullerton.edu
Other Submissions
Native Spirit submitted by Sherry Haskett
I'm stuck between two worlds
and neither of them wants me.
I'm ever so confused
and I'm never sure quite who to be.I can't be white,
They all directly push me out of sight.
I can't be Indian,
no one understands.There are no people to talk to,
no on to confide in...
so I'll put my heart away,
in a little metal tin.I want to show you who I am,
but your ignorance gets in the way.
What am I supposed to do?
What more is there to say?I can say this:
Its hard to be an Indian,
when no one understands.
But I can't hide it, I'm Indian...
And THAT is who I am.Sarah Haskett
10/31/2003