Ayrshire Families of Johnstoun
"Here's to the Johnstons and the Johnstons' Bairnes, And to them that lies in the Johnstons' Airnes"Kilmore Toast
It is not unlikely that scions of the two Ayrshire families of Johnstoun settle in Ireland before 1620, but the name first appears there in official documents between that date and 1646.Edward Johnstoun, a merchant in Edinburgh, of the House of Wamfray, was one of the earliest who bought an Irish estate.He died soon afterwards, leaving a son, Francis.John Johnstoun in Edinburgh applied for land there after the Rebellion of 1641, but Captain Walter Johnstoun, a Royalist, was already in Fermanagh, and Thomas and John Johnstoun settled in Lowtherston, Fermanagh, at the time of the massacre of the British settlers on Oct. 23.In the Betham-Philllips M.S., 1718, it is stated that "260 Johnstons were enlisted at the beginning of the War of 1641, under the gallant and wise man Sir William Cole."
Several other Dumfriesshire names were among the immigrants, and as Christopher Irving, whose mother and son-in-law were Johnstouns of Newbie and of Beirholme, was a proprietor and a commissioner for levying fines there in 1630, probably many members of the clan joined him.
James Johnstoun, of Co. Fermanagh, borrowed L48 from Katherine Cockburn in Edinburgh.The bond is dated at Moffat, 1623.Another bond, dated at Marjoribanks, Annandale, 1627, and witnessed by James Johnstoun of Wamfray, disposes of lands in Moffat by Janet, widow of the late George Johnstoun, portioner of Moffat, to their son James;another James Johnstoun in Drumadown, Co. Fermanagh, and John Johnstoun in Moffat, called of Vickerland, are cautioners for the payment.They were all relatives, and of the Poldean, or Powdene, branch.
The Scottish settlers were obliged to be Protestants and to become English subjects, and were released from the obligations or protection of either English or Scottish law.Many Grahams and a Herbert Johnstoun were sent there as a penal settlement, turned loose amoung the ancient Romanist lords of the soil, to live, if they chose, their old brigand life.They were foredoomed to come in conflict with the natives.The massacre was carried out on the plan of the Sicilian vespers.At a given moment all the immigrants were to be murdered.The horrors of this action, the retribution which followed, and the Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland, have never been forgotten to the present day.
The Johnstouns of Gilford, Co. Down, claim descent from James of Johnstoun (1509-24) through his second son, named Robert, but although in the older Peerages Robert is mentioned, he cannot be traced in extant legal documents.He is said to have married a Carruthers, to have died about 1572, and to have had issue, James, married to an Irving, and died in 1589.James is stated by the traditions of this branch to have left issue, William, who married a M'Dowall of Gillespie, Co. Wigton, and died in 1608, leaving Richard, Adam and David.Richard married a Muir, and left David, ancestor of the Johnstouns of Duchrae in Galloway, and of Ballywillwill, as well as of Gilford.
This David, known as "in Orchardtoun" in the Duchrae pedigree and ancestor of the M'Dowall Johnstons, is believerd to have married Margaret Vans, the wife of Lochinvar's brother, James Grodon, whom she pursued for divorce in 1621.Her mother was an M'Dowall.David was a Captain in Colonel Leslie's army, which, with his brother William, he joined in 1640.They served under Leslie in Scotland and England till he was taken prisioner, when the Johnstons, including Thomas and James, believed to be also David's brothers, escaped to Ireland.They were settled in Down when Oliver Cromwell took the ocmmand of the army in Ireland in 1649, and carried on his devastating campaign against the Irish Romanists and the Scottish Royalists.David's return to Scotland was probably hastened by himself, William, John, James, and Adam Johnston being placed on the list of Scots whom the Grovernment proposed in 1651 to transplant from Antrim and Down to Munster.His friend, Sir Godfrey M'Cullock of Myrton, was one of those appointed with Graham of Clavers to enforce the test in Galloway.Probably David and his brothes had shared in the defeat of Leslie at Worcester, 1651.Captain William Johnston lent money to Colonel Ludovick Leslie about 1653, James Johnstoun, merchant in Edinburgh, witnessed it.
Captain David Johnston in Orchardton, Galloway, and Co. Down, borrowed money from his eldest son, William, in 1680.The cautioner to the bond was Sir Godfrey M'Cullock, who was executed at Edinburgh in 1697 for the murder of William Gordon.When arrested he was concealing himself under the name of "Johnstoun."In 1685,William obtained a tack of lands, called the Park, in Netherlaw, owned by Sir George Maxwell of Orchardton, who owed him money, and who also possessed the lands of Ballycastle, Co. Antrim, which he eventually lost through a dishonest agent, Maxwell of Cuil.Perhaps the agent was responsible for the grievance stated in a letter written from Ballywillwill by William in Netherlaw to Maxwell of Munches, when the writer was evidently an old man (1705-6).It is not unlikely that this William in Orchardton and Netherlaw was father, not brother, to the wife of Captain James M'Dowall, and to Richard (who succeeded through a clause in his brother-in-law's Will to M'Dowall's property of Gillespie in Wighton), as well as to William in Netherlaw, described as Mrs. M'Dowall's brother.
Captain David Johnston, in the parish of Donagh, who appears in the Irish Roll of the first subsidies in or about the year 1661, and who is said to have died at Donagh in 1675, was probably nephew or son to the elder David.Thomas, brother to the elder David, was Captain of Grenadiers, and is said to have been killed at the battle of Aughrim in 1691, but confusion is often made between two generations, when marriages were very early and families very large.Thomas Johnston signed the address from Londonderry to King William, July 29, 1689.
To be continued.
* Her brother Patrick Vans of Barnbarroch, married Grizel, sister to Sir James Johnstoun of the Ilk, and widow of Sir Robert Maxwell of Spots, Orchardton.
Pages 327, 328, 329
Johnstons in Ireland
History of the Johnstones
1191-1909
By Catherine Laura Johnstone
Published 1909
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Thomas Johnston m.lic.1737, Dublin, Ireland. Mary Dalrymple
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