Homecoming Scotland 2009

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 04:39 AM

Our games season is over and my winter SCD class started again last night. I have just one final Homecoming Scotland 2009 event left to look forward to and that is the Dumfries Fling over St. Andrews weekend to mark the end of the ten months of celebration of the Scottish diaspora, so perhaps now is the time to pen a few thoughts on this year's events.

The first international gathering which I attended was the Burns 250 Weekend in Dumfries in late January when Homecoming Scotland was formally launched in several towns in Scotland, our Prime Minister Alex Salmond had a busy weekend making opening speeches in several towns including Dumfries. The events included a funfair, pipe bands, torchlight procession, various Burns themed events including a formal Burns Supper and on an xmarks scale we had our own little group for the Ferintosh Burns Supper. Old friendships were re-kindled and new ones made and a good time was had by all.

Early in the year I became aware through my participation in Xmarksthescot, Clan Cunningham and Ancestry.com that I would meet many visitors from Canada and USA, and some from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa during 2009. First to arrive were Madelyn from California and her sister Joyce from Oregon, whose great grandfather's cousin's widow had adopted my maternal grandmother. Prior to their visit I had carried out some research for them and I took them on a tour of addresses in the Glasgow and Paisley areas where their ancestors would have lived.

to be continued.

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 04:51 AM

The following weekend was the Bathgate Games (here is the local Bathgate and Boghall Caledonia Pipe Band at their home games) and with summer now upon us it was apparent from the number of North American accents to be heard that there were many more visitors from the New World than in a normal year. The tannoy announcer gave a roll call of visitors from Canada, USA and Australia who had made themselves known to him.

I had maintained contact with my mother's Uncle Tom's family on Vancouver Island, but had not been in touch with her Uncle Dan's family since her passing in 1992, until I had contacted my second cousin Doug in 2008 prior to my visit to Toronto. Doug came from Kingston Ontario to see me in June 2009, here he is with me at the air museum.

Later in June, Steve Ashton, The Wizard of BC and his wife Bobbie came to southern Scotland where they took part in the Dumfries Guid Nychburris weekend and also the Hawick Highland Games, here Steve throws in the Haggis Hurling competition where he won second prize. Chas is also in this photo, spot the dandelion.
To be continued.

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 05:10 AM

In July, Clan Turnbull came to my home town of Hawick for their international Clan Gathering, here they parade along the town's High Street in the company of our Provost Zandra Elliot.

The following week, Clan Elliot held their Gathering in the small town of Newcastleton, twenty two miles south of Hawick. Some of their members stayed in guest houses here in Hawick, including xmarker SirWilliam, seen here with me at the monument to the Battle of Hornshole.

The following weekend was the Edinburgh gathering. From a personal perspective I had been unable to raise much enthusiasm for this event. The event had received very little publicity here in Scotland and I had expected it to be nothing more than a get together of a few American based clan societies, in the case of my own clan society we had been unable to take part as a more recently established group based in eastern USA had got in first with the booking for a clan tent. However I decided I would go along on the Sunday afternoon and it did provide an opportunity for an x-marks meet, besides home based TamBlackwood and myself in this shot are USA based OldHiker, Luckey and MaelColuim, all of whom I met for the first time, and recognised them because they were wearing dandelions.

The apparent snub to Clan Cunningham by the organisers of the Edinburgh gathering had led to steps being taken to find an heir to the chieftaincy, so that the various Cunningham societies would unite and be a proper clan once again. The head of my own society and also Steve Cunningham from CCUSA who represented the clan at Edinburgh had both asked me to meet up at the Edinburgh gathering with Leslie, a Californian lawyer who had done a lot of research on the genealogy of the Earls of Glencairn and who was also working towards clan unity, which was to lead to identifying an heir to the chieftaincy and to the formation of Clan Cunningham International four weeks after the Edinburgh gathering. Arising from the Edinburgh gathering I recruited Leslie to xmarks as LAscotswoman and also one of our CCUSA hosts, Steve Cunningham, as CSCunningham.
To be continued.

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 05:19 AM

Many of the people who came to the Edinburgh gathering stayed another week and went along to the Bridge of Allan games the following Sunday where the Royal Army of Oman Pipe Band are seen playing against a backdrop of the Wallace Monument.

The next Saturday was the North Berwick Games, where there was a lot more to see and do than there had been at the Edinburgh gathering. Many overseas visitors attended as the Edinburgh Festival had now started and the games were being held just 20 miles along the coast from Edinburgh. Around a dozen overseas bands took part, using the event to compete against local bands as a warm up for the World Pipe Band championships in Glasgow the following Saturday. This band came from Manawatu, New Zealand.
To be continued.

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 05:39 AM

The day after North Berwick Games was the Border Gathering where we see Pour1Malt with the Lord Lyon, who is probably having a busy time right now with a wave of petitions to recognise new Chiefs and Armigers for the lowland clans in the wake of interest in clans re-stimulated at home by the Year of the Homecoming.

When Steve and Bobbie had visited Scotland in June they had invited me to stay with them at their home in Victoria and I readily accepted. While there, Steve organised an xmarks kilt night. Here I met xmarkers Raphael, BigMikey, MacMan and the KiltedReverend for the first time. I renewed my acquaintance with my mother's Uncle Tom's family and also looked up Gord, who was a full cousin of Doug's from my mother's Uncle Dan's family.

Back home in time to take some pictures at the Clan Armstrong gathering in Langholm, Scotland, as an adjunct of which there was also a fairly low key Border Clans Day.

The Peebles games the following weekend also had more overseas visitors than usual.

At the final outdoor Scottish games of the season I began to feel carried along by the full tide of enthusiasm generated by Homecoming Scotland 2009. As a consequence of events surrounding the Edinburgh gathering, I now found myself hosting a Clan Cunningham table at the Muster of the Clans. The Muster was held in conjunction with the Clan Scott Gathering and had been a spin off from the Edinburgh gathering concept, at the initiative of the Duke of Buccleuch, and was well supported by representatives of lowland and border clans, many of whom had felt left out from the Edinburgh gathering two months earlier.

The Muster had been well marketed overseas and visitors from Canada and USA arrived in droves (plus a few from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa) and filled up our local guest houses and hotels and brought much needed trade to our local shops at a time of year when our tourist season would normally be winding down. Marching with a Cunningham banner, behind the Maple Leaf and the Stars and Stripes, knowing that Scots had helped establish North America, was a proud moment and was the undoubted personal highlight of my Year of Homecoming here in Scotland.
But I was not quite finished yet:-

**cessna152towser** · 21st October 09, 05:50 AM

As a consequence of meeting Doug, Steve and Bobbie here in Scotland in June, I had then met second cousin Gord in Victoria in August and I had also been put in contact with Gord's sister Diane who now lived in California. During Homecoming Scotland 2009 I had also met two lovely Californian ladies in Madelyn and Leslie, so a trip to California seemed in order. Here I am with Gord and his sister Diane at her house in Santa Barbara. I had flown in from Scotland and Gord had flown in from Vancouver.

I assisted Leslie with her Clan Cunningham tent at Ventura Games where Madelyn came to visit.

Finally another Clan March, my second one in two weeks, this time accompanied by Leslie and by Cliff Cunningham, the husband of one of my Flickr contacts. Going to Ventura also let me meet xmarkers BraveAndrew, BidDad1, Sydnie7, SoCalFerg and OldSarge. As I stood silent beside my new found American friends while the young soloist sung the Star Spangled Banner I fully appreciated what a wonderful event has been Homecoming Scotland 2009 in creating new bonds of friendship with those of Scottish roots now living in the New World.