Lawrie Genealogy

Many years ago, I asked myself who were the Lawries? I had spent my early years in Manchester before my mother took us back to her home in Inverness for Secondary schooling. Were the Lawrie kindred of Scottish or English origin? Where could I find the earliest trace of them?

I started with published works on names in Scotland and England. How did the name come about? There may be various possibilities, perhaps a relationship name from the Scottish personal name Laurie, or a diminutive of Laur (a pet form of Laurence or Lawrence). Compare with Laurison and the English surname Lawry.

Dictionary of names and IGI
The Oxford Dictionary of names: lists variants: Lawrie, Lowrie, Laurie, Lowry, Lourie with frequencies: in GB 3979, and in Ireland 24
In 1881, the dictionary gave the GB frequency as: 2812 occurences with the greatest GB locations in Midlothian and Lanarkshire:

Early bearers of variants of the name in Scotland:
Gilbert Lowrie of Coldingham, 1497 in Black ;
David Lowry, a kings officer, of Edinburgh in 1529 found in Irvine Muniments (Irvine, Lanarkshire);
James Lowrey, appointed a burgess and freeman of the City of Glasgow in 1600,

IGI: Margaret Lourie, 1564 in IGI (Dunfermline, Fife);
Robert Lawrie, 1604; Lowrie, 1648; Issobill Lourie, 1649 in IGI (Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire);
Robert Lowrie , 1613, James Laurie , 1628 in IGI (Glasgow, Lanarkshire);
Johne Lourie , 1619 in IGI (Leith, Midlothian);
Agnis Laurie , 1654 in IGI (Dalkeith, Midlothian);
Robert Lourie , 1689 in IGI (Corstorphine, Midlothian).

In England: Laury , a pet form of Laurence or Lawrence.
Early bearers: England: Simon filius Lari, 1197 in Feet of Fines (Lincs);
William Larie, 1279 in Hundred Rolls (Bucks);
Robert Lowri, dated 1332, in the "Subsidy Rolls of Land Tenure of Cumberland";
John Laury, 1459 in Cornish Lands (Saint Ervan, Cornwall);
Richard Loury, 1499 in Cornish Lands (Saint Breock, Cornwall);
Grace Lawrye, 1572, Margaretta Lawrie , 1586 in IGI (Saint Mellion, Cornwall);
Mary Laury, 1600 in IGI (Saint Germans, Cornwall);
John Lowry, 1619 in IGI ... Joseph Lourie , 1789 in IGI (Newburn, Northumberland).
Gavin Laurie was an early governor of the colony of New Jersey, in 1757.

The apparently earlier origin of the name in England is due to the earlier use of surnames in England and better survival of records rather than any migration of Lawrie ancestors North of the border! The common factor is likely to be church dedications to St Laurence.

There are many documented variations on name: Lari, Lauri, Laurie, Laurri, Laury, Lawrie, Lawry, Larrie, Larry, Lowry, Lourie, Lowrie, Loury, Lowrry. ("y" is usually Scots-Irish) Prior to the 19th century spelling variants are not important, the keeper of the register would write whatever he heard, so Lowrie, Lawrie, Laurie can be recorded over a period for births to the same parents.

Despite the preponderance of the name in the Lothians and Lanarkshire, and with other Lawrie families in the Borders and South-West from the fifteenth century, including the barony of Maxweltoun (family of Annie Laurie of the ballad); there could be an origin in North-East Scotland from Angus to the adjoining county of Aberdeenshire.
Lour is a place in Inverarity near Forfar, Angus. (Lord Lour became Earl of Northesk).
This group with the name could be derived from James de Lour (ad1250) and Jacobus de Lur, a juror 1257.
William Lowar, a burgess of Arbroath 1458.
John de Lowre was a councillor to the Earls of Crawford in 1458.

Church dedications
there were at least 11 medieval churches, 6 chapels and 2 hospices dedicated to St Lawrence around Scotland. Foundlings were often named after the local saint.
From: Ancient church dedications in Scotland, McKinlay, James Murray; Edinburgh, D. Douglas, 1910-14. https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001407155

Churches: Lundie; Edzell; Rossieclerah; Portmoak; Forres; Fordyce (Banffshire); Burray (Orkney); Rayne (Aberdeenshire); Slamannan (Stirling); Morebattle (Roxburgh); Bondington (Berwickshire)
Chapels: Bankhead, (Cunningham, Ayrshire); Overkelwood (Dumfries); Fairgirth (Kirkcudbright); Perth; Stonehouse (Lanarkshire); Beaufort Castle (Inverness-shire).
Hospices: Peebles; Haddington. The modern surnames Lawrence and Lawrie with all their variants have multiple origins.

Possible derivations
The usual derivation is from the Latin "Laurentius", which meant "victory". (Hence the laurel crown awarded in Rome to a victorious legate). The early church at Edzell, Forfarshire, was dedicated to St Laurence the Martyr who was martyred in Rome in 258 A.D. A well in the churchyard of Edzell may have been named the 'lourie'; Also the bell donated in 1351 to St Nicholas church in Aberdeen was also known as 'the lourie'.

The name has also been suggested as deriving from the Gaelic "Labhruidh" (pronounced Low-ri) meaning "the spokesman". Griogair Labhruidh is a Gaelic poet, musician, and Hip Hop producer/MC with strong roots in the Gaelic tradition of Ballachulish in the Scottish Highlands. In 2014, he became the main vocalist for the Gaelic supergroup Dàimh.

Placenames
The hamlet of Laurie, in the Auvergne region of France, is first mentioned in a Papal Bull in 1185 - see discussion below

Lowrie is the name of a field in Nether Dumeath, Glass parish (Banff) on the Deveron, 7 miles West of Huntly according to “Placenames of W. Aberdeen”, Spalding Club, 1899..

In the Berwickshire Place-name resource at https://berwickshire-placenames.glasgow.ac.uk/ created by Dr Simon Taylor of Glasgow University I found the following description of "Lowrie's knowe":
'Small hills or knowes associated with foxes'; or 'associated with a man or a family called Laurie'. Both derive ultimately from a hypocoristic form of the personal name Laurence (see DOST under lowry for more details.
This is described in the OS Name Book as: 'Several small hills or knowes on the farm of "Dulaw". They are very rocky and are covered with heather. The site is in the Coldingham area close to St Abbs Head at OS ref NT854697

It is an interesting coincidence that locations named "Lowrie" exist in both Berwickshire and Moray, both seats of Gordon power!

"Lowrie" a designation given to the Fox in Scotland' (OS1/5/9/21) and also, Lowrie is a Scots word referring to a fox or a crafty person. Perhaps a character definition of one possible ancestor?

DNA evidence
I have come to the conclusion that ‘Lawrie’ and its variants are likely to be of multiple origin with no one single founding eponym or place of origin. It could be that some descend from foundlings named for the local church dedication to St Laurence. These multiple origins may explain why I have not, so far, found a match to any of the Lawries who have tested their DNA (Lawry group on FTDNA for instance, and two independent testees whom I have contacted).

The MacLaren claim
The Clan MacLaren list "Lawrie/Laurie/Lowrie" as a recognized sept of the clan. I read somewhere that their justification was based on a fugitive 17th century MacLaren who found refuge in NE Scotland and adopted Lawrie as an alias. However, their current claim appears to be that all Lawries and Lawrences, however spelt, are automatically MacLarens! It was also the case that in the later 18th century, Highlanders trying to obtain work on the estates bordering the Highlands encountered considerable prejudice and often had to change their name, thus MacTaggart became "Priest", Macaree became "King" and so MacLaren might become "Lawrie".

The Clan MacLaren claim that their eponym or founder was Laurence, the Abbot of Achtow in Balquhidder, who supposedly lived during the thirteenth century.
However, according to Hilton Lamar McLaurin, the claim for a Balquhidder origin is based on an error of interpretation by W F Skene in 1837 of a manuscript dated 1467 and Skene's error was subsequently published by James Logan in his "Clans of the Scottish Highlands" of 1845. McLaurin's view, based on recent scholarly work by Dr Ronnie Black into MS1467 (here - https://www.1467manuscript.co.uk/ ), is that the Abbot of Auchtow in Balquhidder never existed. Mclaurin says that Laurence de Ergadia, who was born around 1220, became Bishop of Argyll in 1264 until his death in 1299. His descendents took the Gaelic name mhic Labhruinn (pronounced VicLaurin). They were minor tenants of the Stewarts of Appin. A few of them appear to have been transplanted to the area around Loch Earn, including Balquhidder as part of the expansion of the Campbells in the early 16th century. Thus, the MacLarens do appear to descend from a clerical Lawrence - which does not, in any way, justify claiming all Lawries as members of Clan MacLaren!

My own genealogical research
Moving on to my research into my own antecedents, my Aunt Jean Lawrie (who died aged 97 in 2016) informed me that the family had come to Lancashire from Tillicoultry in Clackmannan. Jean's grandfather (my great-grandfather) John Lawrie and his brother Robert had relocated to Rochdale in 1876 or 77 when unusually heavy rain over the Ochil Hills caused extensive flooding and damage to the mills which depended on the usually manageable streams which flowed down the hillsides. In Rochdale, the brothers set up a business distributing boots and shoes.

Assuming that the Clackmannan area had been the family origin, was to consult the memorial records for the burial grounds around Tillicoultry but found hardly any Lawries there.

Eventually, in the 1871 census, I found John Lawrie (1789 -1873) living with his grandson, Hugh Lawrie, in Union Street, Tillicoultry. John's place of birth was recorded in the census as Turriff in Aberdeenshire. I later discovered that John had a sister Janet, born in 1786, and married to James Fife in Turriff. Their son, John Fife, was listed in the 1851 census of Tillicoultry, where he was lodging in the house of his cousin, Hugh Lawrie.

So the trail now took me to Turriff, and the next step was to call up the old parish records (OPRs) on microfilm for Turriff and the adjoining parishes in Western Aberdeenshire: Gamrie, King Edward and Montquhitter. In a painstaking study from the end of the films back to the beginning, I noted down every occurence of a Lawrie birth or marriage (including spelling variants). Once I had reconstructed the families of these farm workers, I was able to go to the coastal burgh of Banff for the most likely birth of John Lawrie in 1712 (yet another one - there are nine generations of them!!). The Banff OPR is one of the rare but brilliant and meticulously kept sources. I wish there were more like it! The OPRs for the Aberdeenshire parishes are not as good as that for Banff, with gaps in the sequence. I have to stress that assuming that the John Lawrie in Gamrie, King Edward & Montquhitter with children born to Margaret Bannerman between 1751 and 1769, is the same as the John Lawrie born in Banff to William Lowrie and Jean Anton in 1712 is my best guess based on the sources available.

However, this took me back to William Lowrie, his possible great-grandfather who had family in Banff in the 1650s and who appeared in a number of censures by the Kirk session for misdemeanours, such as being "drunk in kirk" and fighting.

Then I found the (Presbyterian) minister of Banff and Boyndie in 1562 (immediately after Reformation) was William Lawrie, MA Glasgow. Following up on the reference in 'Scottish Schools and Schoolmasters’, 1560-1633 I ordered Durkan's University of Glasgow 1451-1577 and found this on page 200 - "William Lawtie (not Lawrie?), the future minister of Banff and Inverboyndie, graduated Master in Glasgow in July 1543, aged about seventeen and is later found with the archdeacon in Peebles, the archdeacon's prebendial kirk. From there he went to Cullen, where the collegiate church was of the archdeacon's foundation, becoming chaplain of St Anne's and song schoolmaster. It is only because he was registered as a notary in February 1564 that we learn that before moving to Cullen he was a clerk of the Glasgow diocese and born near Glasgow at Lochwinnoch.

Banff session and parish records start in the mid 17th century, so I speculated from the Lawtie Minister in 1562 to fill gap to 1650.
A William Lawtie (Lawrie?), who was born in 1526, graduated MA Glasgow 1543, and was appointed the Minister of Banff, Cullen, Fordyce, Inverboyndie from 1562. He died in Banff 1589 leaving a widow and family (according to the Fasti). If perhaps, he married in the 1560s, it is possible that a grandson, or great grandson might be the William Lowrie I refer to. However, as I mentioned my doubts above, I have come to the conclusion that Lawrie (and its spelling variants) are not the same as Lawtie. I note on ancestry.com that in the 1841 census there were 4 Lawtie families living in Banffshire, which represented 100% of all the recorded Lawties in Scotland. This makes one wonder what happened to the Lawties of Lochwinnoch from whence he came?

It is apparent from the documentation on the location of early Lawries and variants of the name around Scotland that the majority lay in two groups, some around Edinburgh, the Lothians and Fife, while the others were in the Western counties of Ayrshire and Lanarkshire. Very few can be found in the North-East. There was one well-to-do Lowrie in the hearth tax list who was a merchant in Aberdeen.

The 1696 hearth tax list for the parishes of Aberdeenshire (List of Pollable persons within the shire of Aberdeen) included just these individual Lawries.
In the Toune and Freedom of Aberdeen: "Charles Lowrie, merchant, stock above 10,000 merks, for himselfe and wife, no child ; servants, William Lowrie".
listed elsewhere in Aberdeen was "Lawrie Marnoch, for himselfe and wife, no child nor servant" - I'm not sure if this was a firstname or surname?
In King Edward parish, at Milnseatt, "Walter Lowrie, grassman there and Margaret Smart his spouse" were sub-tenants of Alexander Baxter;
In the parish of Turriff, "George Laurie, a servant" under Alexander Pantoun in Slap;
In the parish of Auchterless, "John Lourie, a servant" under John Neper at Miln of Towie;
In Ruthen & Botarie, (now the parish of Cairnie in Strathbogie) "Walter Lowrie with Walter, Jane & Issobel his children;"
An equivalent list of polled persons in Banff does not survive, only the summary return.

As shown in my page on William Lowrie (circa 1650) in Banff, he appears to have been a solitary who gave rise to a number of descendent families with occupations of weaver, workman or gardener in Banff who had a less than respectful relationship with the burgh authorities. My contention is that several of these moved in the early 18th century into the adjoining parishes of Western Aberdeenshire, perhaps adding to the very few already there in the 1696 hearth tax list.

There was a good reason for assuming a movement of labourers from a coastal burgh into the inland farming zone at the start of the 18th century. "King Billie's ill years" was a period of national famine in Scotland during the 1690s, caused by an economic slump and four years of failed harvests (1695, 1696 and 1698–99). The famines of the 1690s were remembered as particularly severe and the last of their kind. It has been estimated that starvation probably killed 5–15 per cent of the Scottish population, but in Aberdeenshire the population loss reached as high as 25 per cent. The Old Scottish Poor Law was overwhelmed by the scale of the crisis, although provision in the urban centres of the burghs was probably better than in the countryside. The famine led to migration between parishes and emigration to England, Europe, the Americas and particularly Ireland. In terms of my investigation into the Lawries, a shortage of farm labour may well have tempted John Lawrie, or perhaps his father William to take a fee along the coast in Gamrie, with John later moving inland to King Edward and Montquhitter.

North-East farmworkers at the time worked on a fee basis, being hired for 6 months or a year at a time. Unmarried workers might lodge with the farmer, but married workers could expect a basic cot house. Thus the observed movements of John Lawrie and Margaret Bannerman as identified by the baptism of their nine children in three adjoining parishs of Gamrie (on the coast next to Banff), King Edward and Montquhitter might be typical of this class of farm labourers in the 18th century. I believe the births of John & Catherine's children - Janet & John Lawrie - in Montquhitter (close to Turriff, a growing local population centre) in 1786 and 1789 does tie in to the last three baptisms of John & Margaret's children in Tillymauld, Montquhitter.

I have noted in the Mormon records available online a different analysis of the 18th century Lawrie families found in these parishes, but I consider that to be wrong.

Ken and Iain Laurie
Prior to 2000, Ken and Iain Laurie, of Fife, designed a tartan for their personal use but permitted anyone of the name to wear it. With brown changed to red it becomes Laurie. With brown changed to yellow it becomes Lowry. It was marketed in 2002 by The Laurie Tartan Company of Elgin, which is now defunct. The tartan is recorded by the Scottish Register of Tartans https://www.tartanregister.gov.uk/tartanDetails?ref=2070

Click on the image for a large view

Ken Laurie, brother of Iain, contacted me in July 2025 and very kindly provided some additional information. This was specific to the surname spelt, "Laurie", however, as I mention above, prior to the 19th century names even, sometimes, within the same family may be recorded with a variety of spellings, so this is quite relevant. However, I should also refer to my stated views above that there may be multiple genetic origins of the name Lawrie/Laurie/Lowrie &c. A comparison of DNA results showed that my relation to Ken and Iain is thousands of years in the past.

Ken wrote that there are only two settlements in the world called Laurie.

Laurie, founded in 1937, is located in the Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri, USA. The 2020 census recorded a population of 939. Ken said that he and his brother Iain both became Freemen of the town.

The hamlet of Laurie, in the Auvergne region of France, is first mentioned in a Papal Bull in 1185 as part of the dependencies of the Abbey of Blesle.
Ken Laurie said that a professor of archaic French believed that Laurie means a man-made clearing in a forest for animal grazing - which is interestingly paralleled by "Lowrie - the name of a field in Nether Dumeath, Glass parish (Banff)" which is within the Huntly estate. I wonder if the name might not originate so much from the "man-made clearing" but from the occupation thereon - that is herdsmen?

a) Guy de Laurie is recorded in 1342 as the village's first lord.
b) The coat of arms for the Laurie family is recorded as: “D’argent à trois roses de gueules.” - illustrated on the right

The hamlet of Laurie has its own website here - https://www.hautesterrestourisme.fr/en/visits-expertise/charming-towns-villages/laurie/

Ken Laurie included historical notes on the village and community

(Sources: Association Cézallier - Sianne Valley)

100,000 to 5,000 BC: eruption of the last volcanoes in Charouliac (Laurie).

2000 - 700 BC: agriculture, creation of a necropolis on the plateau of Lair (Laurie).

1185: A bull of the Pope takes stock of the outbuildings of the abbey of Blesle. In the Sianne valley are confirmed Chanet, Lussaud, Molèdes, Laurie.

1329: Laurum is the name of Laurie.

1342: Guy de Laurie is the first known lord of the village.

1483: A bull of the pope dated February 26 incorporates the church of Laurie under the responsibility of the monastery of Chantoin in Clermont.

1538: Laurio is the name of Laurie's village

1646: Investigation of Laurie, the prior of the convent of Prébac, on the history of the Virgin in majesty and on the miraculous facts related to it.

1836: Laurie absorbs the neighbouring commune of Lussaud.

1877: Fire of Laurie's Castle.

1927: Laurie's church is listed as a historical monument by order of June 1, 1927.

1962: discovery by two children, Gilles Morel and Jacques Roche of the first tumulus of the plateau of Lair (Laurie).

There is, of course, no certainty that either Ken & Iain Laurie’s family or mine have any connection to the French hamlet of Laurie, however, it does raise intriguing questions about whether some persons with a name derived from the hamlet of Laurie may, in fact, have come with the Norman conquest. Perhaps, as suggested above, among the followers of the knight of Gourdon were herdsmen recruited as footsoldiers.

The following "origin of the Lawrie name" is pure speculation on my part. - The invasion of England by a Norman army in 1066 is well known, but it is not so well appreciated that Scotland had its own Norman "invasion" under David I, the youngest son of King Malcolm III of Scotland "Canmore" and Queen Margaret.

David went to England and became a dependent of King Henry I from 1100, who created him Earl of Huntingdon. When his older brother King Alexander died in 1124 leaving no male children, David unexpectedly found himself in line to be King of Scots, once he had defeated the Gaelic claimants descending from Malcolm Canmore's first marriage. To enforce his claim David recruited an army from among his friends in Henry's Norman court. Many of today's Scots "clans" descend from David's friends. - Bruce, Cumming (Comyn), Forbes, Fraser, Gordon, Stewart - to name but a few. So it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that a younger son of the demesne of Laurie, despite it being located well South of Normandy, may have taken part in the Norman invasion.

Some popular genealogy books (eg. Scots Kith & Kin) list Laurie/Lawrie as a sept or dependent of the Gordon family. I had assumed that this was because some Lawries lived on the Gordon estates in Aberdeenshire and their dependency on that mighty family was the reason for the Lawries being viewed as a "sept". By the 16th and 17th centuries, Western Aberdeenshire and part of Moray were dominated by the Earls and Marquesses of Huntly - created Dukes of Gordon in 1684. The Gordons are claimed to have originated from the Gourdon family of Normandy and some of that family were probably among the army of William the Bastard in 1066. Richard of Gordon was among the supporters of David Earl of Huntingdon in 1124 and he was rewarded by David I with lands in the Merse which became the Barony of Gordon.

It is noteworthy that one of the areas of greatest resistance to David and his immediate successors had been the district of Moray. Óengus of Moray (Oenghus mac inghine Lulaich, ri Moré) was the last king of Moray of the native line which had ruled Moray in north-eastern Scotland from an unknown date until his death in 1130. Having presumably devastated the Moray lands, David and his successors replaced the supporters of Oengus with their own loyal feudal dependents. Originally, Duncan, 2nd Earl of Fife, had been granted the estate of Strathbogie around 1190 as a reward for serving William I, grandson of David I, in the continuing battle against the MacWilliams of Moray. The Fifes of Strathbogie lost their lands and titles in 1314, having opposed the Bruce faction and being on the losing side at the Battle of Bannockburn. The victorious King Robert Bruce granted Strathbogie to a loyal supporter, Sir Adam Gordon of Huntly, in Berwickshire, a descendant of Lord Richard of Gordon in the Merse. A descendant of Sir Adam, Alexander 2nd Lord Gordon, was created Earl of Huntly in 1445. The Gordons went from strength to strength, and a large area of north-eastern Scotland became known as ‘Gordon country’. It seems probable that Sir Adam would have brought some of his feudal retainers with him to his newly acquired estate and, if I may speculate, one or more of them could have been the ancestor of, at least, some Lawries.

While I am particularly interested in the name in NE Scotland, Gilbert Lowrie of Coldingham, is mentioned in 1497, [see list at start of page]. Coldingham, Berwickshire, is around 25 miles from Gordon, Berwickshire. Before 1600, there were records of the name in Midlothian, 30+ miles from Gordon, Berwickshire. David Lowry, a King's officer from Edinburgh is recorded in 1529. Sir Robert Laurie (1641 - 1698), 1st baronet of Maxwelton descended from John Loury (1450 - 1514) in the Canongate, Edinburgh, according to geni.com. So people with spelling variants of the name appear to have been spreading from both sites of Gordon power, both in the Merse and around Strathbogie, Aberdeenshire. As mentioned above under the heading "placenames", there is a field named "Lowrie" in Moray and a "Lowrie's knowe" near Coldingham, Berwickshire. Surely more than a coincidence.

Obviously there is an unbridgeable gap (unless DNA comes to the rescue) between the "invasion" in the early 12th century and "my" Lawries in the 17th, and it is just as likely that "my" Lawries descend from a foundling in one of the dedications to St Lawrence mentioned above. However, the name could have been derived from an archaic French word for a herdsman, some of whom may have been recruited into the Norman army of 1066, or perhaps it was a term used by the Gourdon family for herdsmen on their estates. This might explain the multiple genetic origins of modern bearers of the name.

One can enter my Lawrie genealogy [not that of Ken & Iain] by clicking on any of the following links. Each page has links forwards and backwards as well.

1. Family of William Lowrie (circa 1650) in Banff

2. Family of Walter Lowrie (circa 1650 to 1733) in Banff.

3. Family of William Lowrie (1675 -1758) in Banff.

4. Family of John Lowrie (1688-1742) in Banff.

5. Family of John Lawrie (1712-1781) in Gamrie, King Edward & Montquhitter

6. Family of John Lawrie (1789-1873) in Perths & Clacks

7. Family of Hugh Lawrie (1830 - 13/4/79) in Tillicoultry

8. Family of John Lawrie (3/6/1855 - 3/7/1890) in Rochdale, Lancs

9. Family of William MacFarlane in Blackford

10. Family of John MacEwan in Monievaird & Muthil

12. Family of John Ferguson in Kilbryde, by Dunblane

13. Family of John Forbes Lawrie (30/4/1886 - 17/8/1967) in Manchester

14. Maps showing property of John Forbes Lawrie in Blackley and Harpurhey

Family of Samuel Cheetham (1826-1862) in Rochdale

Family of William Cheetham (b.1700) in Rydings, Lancs

Family of William Hartley(1703-1789) in Heptonstall