[See Illustration 1 - General George Wahab, 1752-1808] the ULSTER BRANCH of the FAMILY of WAUCHOPE WAUHOPE, WAHAB, WAUGHOP, ETC

[See Illustration 1 - General George Wahab, 1752-1808] THE ULSTER BRANCH OF THE FAMILY OF WAUCHOPE WAUHOPE, WAHAB, WAUGHOP, ETC. WITH NOTES ON THE MAIN SCOTTISH FAMILY AND ON BRANCHES IN AMERICA AND AUSTRALIA EDITED BY GLADYS M. WAUCHOPE, B.SC., M.D., M. R.C.P. from Material collected the late Robert Alexander Wauhope (Wahab), C.B., C.M.G., C.I.E., Colonel R.E., and the late Edward Wauhope (Wahab) LONDON: SIMPKIN MARSHALL, LTD. Stationers’ Hall Court, E.C.4 FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1929 Printed in Great Britain by UNWIN BROTHERS, LONDON AND WOKING INTRODUCTION THE name of Wauchope is well known in Scotland, especially in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. The family has never been a large one, and has held a remarkably uniform social Position from the earliest times. The Wauchopes of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries were not tenants-in-chief of the Crown, as were the greater families such as the Douglas, but held their lands from a baron, while Niddrie, which has been in the possession of the family since the end of the fourteenth century, is one of the smaller estates in Scotland. In Ireland the Wauchopes were substantial but not large landowners, and the same may be said of the early American colonists. The first records of the name are found in the Border country in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but no connected history can be traced till Robert III (1390-1406) granted to Gilbert Wauchop a charter of the lands of Niddrie. After this the story is continuous until the present day, with one break, for the estate was forfeited during the disturbances at the end of the sixteenth century, but restored in 1603. In the second half of the sixteenth century various branches of the family were founded: Stottencleuch, Caikmuir, and Gleghorne; while in the seventeenth century the Don Wauchopes of Edmonston took their origin from the Wauchopes of Niddrie through female inheritance. The Irish branch originated with a certain James [End of Page 7] Wauchope, of the Niddrie family, who settled in County Down at the time of the Plantation of Ulster (1610). Records of his descendants are found in Ulster during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but the name then disappeared from County Down, though a branch of the family remains in Cavan, while most of the present generation are in England or Scotland, or scattered over the Empire. The family has produced a few scholars, the first of whom was Robert Wauchope, Archbishop of Armagh in 1543 (see P- 39, Pedigree 1, 6). One or two have been valuable public servants, notably Sir John Wauchope, of Niddrie, in the seventeenth century (see P. 50, and Pedigree I*), and Captain Thomas Waughop, of Maryland, America (see p. 144). At least two have been Doctors of Medicine-Gilbert, of the Niddrie family (see p. 60 and Pedigree I, B), and Thomas Wahab, of Drumcarrow (see p. 93). There have been Wauchopes in the Navy-for example, Henry Wahup, who died in H.M.S. Burlington in 1713, and Admiral Robert Wauchope (Pedigree I, E), but the chief profession both of the Niddrie family and of the Ulster branch has been the Army. From General John Wauchope (p. 57, Pedigree I, A), who served in Ireland under Sarsfield and died fighting in Spain in 1693, to Andrew Gilbert (p. 63, Pedigree I, G), killed at Magersfontein, the Wauchopes of Niddrie have been good soldiers. The early Irish settlers were in the armies on one side or the other during the disturbances in the reigns of James II and William III. The next generation were in the Customs service, but in 1769 George Wahab (p. 105 and Pedigree II*) (as the name had come to be spelt in Ireland) entered the Honourable East India Com- [End of Page 8] pany’s service as a cadet. He had a distinguished military career, and, following his example, his descendants one after another joined the Madras Army and spent almost their whole lives in India. In America the early colonists showed their military tendency by the militia. The present generation has fully maintained the tradition. Andrew Wauchope, of the Niddrie family, commanded the Black Watch in the late war and became a General, while of the nine male members of the main Irish branch between the ages of fourteen and sixty at the outbreak of war, seven held commissions in the Regular Army and the remaining two were in the Navy. In the nineteenth century the Irish branch of the family had diverged so far from the Scottish Wauchopes that the Scottish origin of the name was almost forgotten, especially by those descendants of the County Down family who spelt the name Wahab. In 1836 General Charles Wahab, then Captain and living in Edinburgh, was surprised to learn from Doctor Thomas Wahab, whom he met by chance, that “the family belongs to the County of Down. The original name, was Wauchope, and came over from Scotland” (pp. 118 and 119, p. 93). This book is the result of researches made by Edward (p. 132, Pedigree II, B), the youngest son of Charles, and his cousin Robert (p. 111, Pedigree II, C) to verify this statement. Many years were spent in gathering material; Robert Wahab made two journeys to Ireland, in 1897 and 1910, and searched the places where traces of the early Wauchopes might be found, interviewing old inhabitants, visiting graveyards, and deciphering documents. He made the acquaintance of those representatives of the family who still lived in [End of Page 9] Ireland, and was courteously helped by Lord Dufferin, General Montgomery, Major Blackwood Price, and Colonel Nugent, descendants of the owners of the Clanbrassil, Clandeboye, and Savage estates on which the early Wauchope settlers held property (see pp. 69, 70, 75). Charles James Wahab (p. 130, Pedigree II, C) went to Ireland on a similar mission in 1892. Professional searchers were employed to search the records in Ireland and Scotland, and from America Miss A. Eleanor Hull, genealogist, of Baltimore, U.S.A., communicated material concerning settlers in Maryland and Virginia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Published works bearing on the period were collected by Edward Wahab, who financed the research. The war of 1914-1918 interrupted the compilation of this book, for which all the materials were ready, and many notes prepared by Robert Wauhope (Wahab) before he rejoined the Army in 1914. He served in Arabia and India till 1919, and meanwhile, in 1917, Edward, his collaborator, died. Robert took up the work again on his return, but died suddenly in 1921; and although it is believed that he left it practically ready for publication, no trace of any complete copy can be found. His son, Robert Stuart, collected and transcribed the notes and drafts of chapters left by his father, together with a memorandum by John Wauhope, of Carnalynch (p. 95), and the notes sent by Miss Eleanor Hull, of Baltimore (see Chapter VIII). He added as appendices copies of deeds and documents, pedigrees, etc. It was evident, however, that the material thus collected was not sufficiently coordinated, and was incomplete at several points. As a book it was in no way worthy of so scholarly and precise a writer as Robert, senior. Robert Stuart’s [End of Page 10] military duties in India intervened at this stage, and the task devolved on Gladys, daughter of Edward, whose aim has been to incorporate the whole of the material left by Robert, and, wherever the drafts left by him appeared to be final, to retain his own words. The compilers of this book did not set out to write a complete history of the family; their main purpose was to demonstrate the connexion between the Irish Wahabs, Wauhopes, Wachops, etc., and the Wauchopes of Niddrie, whose story is already known and is therefore here retold but briefly. The subsequent history of the Irish descendants has been compiled from unpublished letters and papers, and is necessarily unequal, since some families have preserved more records than others. Although the family is a small one, it is widely scattered, and a chapter has been added on the colonial branches. Special interest attaches to the American settlers of the seventeenth century, and it may be that some of their descendants will be led to a knowledge of their own origin, and that further research will reveal the identity of the first settlers and show where they came from. Much more remains to be searched out, and the present book can only claim to be a faithful presentation of the material gathered by Robert and Edward so arranged as to make an intelligible story. Chapter I, on the spelling of the name, was left by Robert partly written. It has been reconstructed and revised. Chapter II, on the origin of the name and the early history of the family, has been rearranged, and the argument has been more emphasized than in the original draft. Chapters III and IV contain a sketch, derived from [End of Page 11] published sources, of the main Scottish branch of the family. Chapter III has been revised, and the editor has verified the sources and recopied the extracts, adding occasionally such other material as seemed relevant. Chapter IV has been revised in the same way, and has been amplified from the sources acknowledged in the text. Chapter V traces the history of the first settlers in Ireland and their connexion with the Wauchopes of Niddrie, the links in the chain of evidence being set out in Appendix A.

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