Scottish Indexes Conference Speakers Past and Present
From November 2025, we will record all speakers at our conference and give them a dedicated biography on this page. Click on the speaker's name below to read their bio, see a list of presentations delivered and find links to their websites.
To book your space at our next conference, see our dedicated Scottish Indexes Conference page.
Caroline Brown, University Archivist and an Assistant Director in the Library Academic and Cultural Services at the University of Dundee
Website: www.dundee.ac.uk/archives
Caroline Brown is the University Archivist and an Assistant Director in the Library Academic and Cultural Services at the University of Dundee with responsibility for collections and resources. She was previously the lead for the University’s Archives and Family History programmes and is a strong advocate for the importance of archives and the stories they can tell for today's society.
Presentations
22 November 2025
"Weaving the threads of time: exploring the lives of Dundee textile workers"
Dundee was once the jute capital of the world; at one point around half of the city's workforce were employed in the jute and related industries, the majority of whom were women. Textile manufacturing had a huge impact on Dundee and its inhabitants, and its legacy can be felt in the city today. This talk explores that impact and looks at what we can learn about the lives of the men, women and children who were employed in Dundee’s many factories.
Margaret Fox, Archivist at Traquair House
Website: www.traquair.co.uk/history-of-traquair
Margaret holds an M.A. (Hons.) degree in History from Edinburgh University and is a professional archivist. For many years she has looked after the archives at Traquair House, Scotland's oldest inhabited house. She worked for twelve years in the National Records of Scotland where she immersed herself in the records of the Kirk (Church of Scotland) and the High Court of Justiciary, and in wills and testaments. She now enjoys promoting these records, and also Traquair’s fascinating archival heritage, at local and family history societies and at online genealogy conferences.
Fiona Musk, NHS Grampian Archivist
Website: www.nhsgrampian.org/archives
Fiona began working with archives in 2005, at Aberdeen City & Aberdeenshire Archives, and gained her masters in Archives and Records Management from the University of Dundee. She took over as NHS Grampian Archivist in 2015, following the retirement of Fiona Watson, who had been in post since the 1980s - big shoes to fill! Fiona is still learning new things every day, and really enjoys working with the extensive records held in the North East of Scotland. Fiona says that in her spare time, she is a glutton for punishment, being a season ticket holder at Aberdeen Football Club.
Presentations
22 November 2025
'The Doctor will see your ancestors now'
This presentation highlights the wide range of records created by hospitals across the North East of Scotland. The examples shared by Fiona from the archive help us to learn how to search and access these records. With some records dating to the mid-1700s, medical records can be a great resource when you are tracing your Scottish family tree. Of course, Fiona focuses on the area covered by the NHS (National Health Service) Grampian area, but even if your ancestors didn’t live in this area, this presentation provides good examples of the types of records held by institutions in other parts of Scotland.
Chris Paton, Genealogist and Author at Scotland's Greatest Story
Website: scotlandsgreateststory
Webinar schedule: scottishgenes.blogspot.com/p/webinars
Northern Irish born Chris Paton is a genealogist and writer based in Ayrshire, where he runs the Scotland’s Greatest Story research service at www.scotlandsgreateststory.co.uk. As well as contributing to the UK’s best known family history magazines, he also writes for his own Scottish GENES news blog at www.scottishgenes.blogspot.com, and regularly gives talks to family history societies across the UK and worldwide. His publications include Tracing Your Belfast Ancestry, Tracing Your Irish Ancestors Through Land Records, Tracing Your Irish Family History on the Internet (2nd edition), Tracing Your Scottish Ancestry Through Church and State Records, Tracing Your Scottish Family History on the Internet, and Sharing Your Family History Online.
Tessa Spencer, Head of Learning at the National Records of Scotland
Website: www.nrscotland.gov.uk
Website: www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk
Tessa Spencer is a history graduate from the Universities of St. Andrews and Glasgow where she studied medieval history and the history of medicine respectively. She is a professional archivist and has worked at the National Records of Scotland for over 20 years in various roles.
In her current post as Head of Learning, Tessa is responsible for education in the archives for all ages and stages of learning from school pupils to university students to lifelong learners. She also facilitates access to the archives for higher education collaborations and partnerships.
Presentations
22 November 2025
'Introducing the Ordnance Survey Name Books and historical tax rolls on Scotland's People'
In this talk, Tessa Spencer provides an introduction to the Ordnance Survey Name Books and historical tax rolls. Tessa explains what these records are, how you can access and use them for research purposes, and highlights some interesting and surprising examples.
The Ordnance Survey (OS) Name Books provide information about every Scottish place name found on the Ordnance Survey six-inch to the mile (1:10,560) 1st edition maps. They comprise the earliest complete gazetteer of Scottish place names. They will be of particular interest to local and family historians, hoping to gain insight into the evolution of the Scottish landscape and of the places their ancestors lived and worked. They also provide insight into the sources of names, their meanings, different spellings of place names, archaeological finds and the individuals involved in collecting this information.
The historical tax rolls from the 17th to the early 19th centuries comprise 15 different types of taxation which list a large variety of people, from cottars to dukes, in each of Scotland's parishes and burghs. These include taxes on hearths (or fireplaces), windows, servants, carts and carriages and horses and dogs. The records are of particular interest to economic, family, local and social historians and researchers, providing a snapshot into people's lives.
Dr Craig Thomas, Assistant Archivist at Buccleuch Living Heritage Trust
Website: blht.org
Dr Craig Thomas is Assistant Archivist at the Buccleuch Living Heritage Trust (BLHT). He is based at Bowhill House in the Scottish Borders and looks after the archives across the Buccleuch Estates in Scotland. Craig recently completed an AHRC funded Collaborative Doctoral Award between Newcastle University and BLHT. In addition to his role at BLHT, Craig is a Committee Member of the Scottish Association of Country House Archivists; Trustee of Wanlockhead Lead Mining Museum and Education Advisor to Historic Houses.
Presentations
22 November 2025
'5th Duke of Buccleuch: a forward thinking landed aristocrat'
The 5th Duke of Buccleuch (1806-1884) was one of Scotland's grandest landed aristocrats. Inheriting a largely agricultural set of estates with rudimentary industry, this individual transformed these estates into a diverse and modern business portfolio. Whilst this industrial transformation took place his paternalistic ethos was never forgotten. But could an individual of such eminence be wholly forward thinking? Through extensive use of the Buccleuch family archive including estate correspondence and assistance books, this presentation explores whether or not the 5th Duke of Buccleuch really was a forward thinking landed aristocrat.
Robert Urquhart of Abbotshall Palaeography
Website: www.abbotshall.net
Robert Urquhart is a native of the Kingdom of Fife, and worked as an archivist for 35 years in local authority archives in the west of Scotland and in Scotland's national archives. During his career he also taught palaeography. He was the joint editor of 'The Hearth Tax for Ayrshire, 1691' (Ayrshire Federation of Historical Societies, 1998) and the original content writer and editor of the www.scottishhandwriting.com website. He now runs Abbotshall Palaeography, a transcription and teaching business, dealing mostly with 16th and 17th seventeenth century wills and testaments, marriage contracts and other court records. In his spare time, he is involved in research projects concerning parish boundaries and early modern Scottish communities in the Netherlands.
Presentations
22 November 2025
'An Arran Jigsaw: some records relating to people and places between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries'
The island of Arran lies on the geographical boundary line between the Highlands and Lowlands of Scotland. For much of its history it sat between Gaelic-speaking parts of Argyll and Scots-speaking parts of Ayrshire and Galloway, and its culture and languages were influenced by both.
There are lots of sources of information about Arran (and for other parts of Scotland) covering the modern era: from the late-1700s onwards. Many of these, like census returns and statutory registers of births, marriages and deaths, are available online as digital copies, and they are often conveniently indexed by personal name and place-name, and structured in a way that makes it easy to identify and connect individual people.
By contrast, for the early-modern era (from the late-1500s to the mid-1700s) the sources of information are, in general, more difficult to get access to, harder to read and understand, and not often indexed. What is needed is a different approach from the straightforward searching of online indexes. A key to researching in this period is altruistic groundwork, carried out individually or in groups, to transcribe, summarise and index sets of records for the wider benefit of researchers.
For a long time Robin has been interested in the island of Arran, its people, landscape and ecology, between the 1500s and 1700s. He has been transcribing records for that era, some of which are in private hands and some of which are in public archives and libraries. The resulting work, compiled intermittently over more than thirty years, will be published in autumn by the Scottish Record Society. It will contain transcriptions and summaries of a selection of rentals, estate papers, wills and testaments, and other court records between the late 1500s and mid-1700s. It has been a bit like assembling a jigsaw, assembling a picture of everyday life on Arran before the agricultural improvements of the early-1800s and the migration and emigration associated with it.
The talk is not exclusively about Arran; it is more about the problems and possibilities of using early-modern records. There is a common misconception that once you get back beyond the late-1700s, you don't stand much chance of finding information about people, unless they were landowners, merchants or professionals. This is an overly-pessimistic assumption, as it is possible to compile information about ordinary folk, such as tenant farmers and their families. In particular, Robin would like to flag up commissary court records as an underutilised source for people and places in Scotland during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
Dr Kay Williams, The Past and other Places
Website: thepastandotherplaces
Dr Kay Williams became interested in her family tree as a teenager through her grandparents who helpfully provided details. She first visited Edinburgh's New Register House in the days of paper indexes and transcribed information from the registers. As a student, Kay studied history and geography at St Andrews and researched housing as a postgraduate. Having returned to historical research in retirement, she very rarely posts a blog, but does provide pages of links and resources on her site.
Presentations
22 November 2025
'Reverend Russell and relief from patronage'
In early summer 1820 David Russell arrived in the Perthshire village of Errol with his family to take up his new post. He was inducted as minister of the Relief Church on 21st June 1820. In the 1820s Errol's villagers had a choice of three presbyterian churches: the Church of Scotland parish church, the Secession church and the Relief church. The following decades were to prove tumultuous for the ministers, their congregations, and their families.
There are lots of sources of information about Arran (and for other parts of Scotland) covering the modern era: from the late-1700s onwards. Many of these, like census returns and statutory registers of births, marriages and deaths, are available online as digital copies, and they are often conveniently indexed by personal name and place-name, and structured in a way that makes it easy to identify and connect individual people.
Have you wondered why your ancestors joined a dissenting church? Why worshippers craved 'relief from patronage' and who the patron was? The Disruption of 1843 was an event staged in Edinburgh. What impact did that have at a more local level at a time when a parish was for civil and religious purposes?
This talk looks at social history from the bottom-up, the experiences of the people in Errol and in particular members of the Russell family. It will draw on a wide range of sources including maps, newspapers, church records, the statistical accounts and property records. Reference is made to Wikimedia's Churches of Scotland timeline diagram. A list of other sources are available on thepastandotherplaces.
