Place:Glenmuick Tullich and Glengairn, Aberdeenshire, Scotland

[Condensed [and modernized] from F. H. Groome, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4), available on the Gazetteer of Scotland website

Glenmuick, Tullich, and Glengairn is a Deeside parish of southwest Aberdeenshire, containing the post office village and railway terminus of Ballater, 43½ miles west-southwest of Aberdeen, and 4 and 6½ miles WSW of Cambus o' May and Dinnet stations, both of which also are within the bounds of the parish.

It comprises the ancient parishes of Glengairn and Tullich to the north of the River Dee, and Glenmuick to the south of the river. The parish is bounded on the north by the parish of Strathdon, on the northeast by Logie Coldstone, on the east by Aboyne & Glentanner, on the southeast by Lochlee and southwest by Clova in Forfarshire (or Angus), and on the west by Crathie and Braemar. Its maximum length, from north to south, is 17¼ miles; its width, from east to west, varies between 4-1/8 and 12-7/8 miles; and its area is 88,981 acres, of which 1,437½ are water.

From a point ¾ mile E of Crathie church to the Mill of Dinnet, the River Dee winds 15 5/8 miles east-north-eastward. First 4 5/8 miles along the Crathie border, then 8 7/8 miles through the interior, and lastly 2 1/8 miles along the Aboyne border, during which course it descends from 850 to 505 feet above sea-level. [The rest of this description of the landscape has been omitted.]

The rocks include granite, gneiss, trap, and primary limestone, and other minerals are fluor-spar, amianthus, asbestos, serpentine, etc. Lead-mining operations were carried on at Abergairn in 1874. The soil along the Dee and in the lower glens is mostly boulder gravel or sandy loam. Barely a thirtieth of the entire area is in tillage; about the same amount is clad with woods and plantations of Scotch fir, larch, birch, oak, aspen, etc. The rest is all either sheep-walk or deerforest, moss or heathy moorland.

Glenmuick House, on the [river] Muick's right bank, 2 miles south-southwest of Ballater, was built in 1872 from designs by Sir Morton Peto, and is a striking Tudor edifice of native pink-coloured granite, with a massive square tower 75 feet high. Its owner, James Thomson Mackenzie, Esq. of Kintail (b. 1824), holds 25,000 acres in the shire, valued at £1116 per annum. Cambus o' May House, near the station of that name, is a pretty gabled and verandahed mansion of 1874; and other residences are Birkhall and Monaltrie. The chief proprietors are the Queen, the Prince of Wales, the Marquis of Huntly, Mr Farquharson of Monaltrie, and Mr Mackenzie.

Further notes on Glenmuick Tullich and Glengairn can be found in Samuel Lewis's A Topographical Dictionary of Scotland (1851) and A New History of Aberdeenshire, Alexander Smith (Ed), 1875], both available on the GENUKI website.

Wikipedia presents very short individual articles for Glenmuick and Tullich, but does not have one for Glengairn.

NOTE:No date for the merger of the three parts of the present parish is given in any of the references.

Population Growth

Populations 1801-1951 from A Vision of Britain through Time (http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk).
2001 population from Scotland’s Census (https://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk).

Research Tips

There was formerly a note on this page that the parish was linked to the Presbytery of Kincardine O'Neil, Synod of Aberdeen, Scotland. It would appear that since 1975 the organization of the presbyteries and synods has been revised. Readers are reminded that the Church of Scotland is Presbyterian in nature while in England the Church of England is Episcopalian. (See Wikipedia. )

• Scotlands People, the website of the Scottish Register Office provides

• official civil (from 1855) and parish registers (from when first produced) for births, marriages and deaths for all of Scotland
• original census images for all years available (1841-1911).
• references to wills and property taxes, and
• an extensive collection of local maps.

This site is extremely easy to use. There are charges for parish register entries and censuses. The charges are reasonable and payable by online transfer.

• The Statistical Accounts of Scotland Online provides access to digitised and fully searchable versions of both the Old Statistical Account (1791-99) and the New Statistical Account (1834-45). These uniquely rich and detailed parish reports, usually written by local Church of Scotland ministers, detail social conditions in Scotland and are an invaluable resource for anyone interested in Scottish history.
• Scotlands Places
• Gazetteer of Scotland includes descriptions of individual parishes from F. H. Groome, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4)
• The FamilySearch Wiki
• GENUKI which provides, amongst other data, complete quotations from A Topographical Dictionary of Scotland (1851) by Samuel Lewis, John Bartholomew's A Gazetteer of the British Isles (1877), and A New History of Aberdeenshire edited by Alexander Smith (1875)
• A list of Burial Grounds in Scotland is now available on the website of the Scottish Association of Family History Societies.
• Aberdeenshire and Moray Records. Town Council minutes, accounts, letters, plans and harbour records provided by Aberdeenshire Council plus other local records.
• Aberdeen and North-East Scotland Family History Society is one of the largest and most reputable family history societies in Scotland and has a long list of publications referring to individual parishes.