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For a brief description of the county, see The Gazetteer for Scotland.
- the following text is based on an article in Wikipedia
Sutherland is now a land registration county and lieutenancy area and formerly a traditional county within the Highland Council Area of Scotland. Its county town is Dornoch. It borders Caithness to the east, Ross and Cromarty to the south and the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west.
In Gaelic the area is referred to according to its traditional areas: Dùthaich MhicAoidh (or Dùthaich 'IcAoidh) in the northwest, Asainte (for the Assynt area), and Cataibh for the east). However, Cataibh is often used to refer to the area as a whole.
The name Sutherland dates from the era of Norse rule and settlement over much of the Highlands and Islands, under the rule of the jarl of Orkney. Although it contains some of the northernmost land in the island of Great Britain, it was called Suðrland ("southern land") from the standpoint of Orkney and Caithness.
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The northwest corner of Sutherland, traditionally known as the Province of Strathnaver, was not incorporated into Sutherland until 1601. This was the home of the powerful and warlike Clan Mackay, and as such was named in Gaelic, Dùthaich 'Ic Aoidh, the Homeland of Mackay. Even today this part of Sutherland is known as Mackay Country, and, unlike other areas of Scotland where the names traditionally associated with the area have become diluted, there is still a preponderance of Mackays in the Dùthaich.
The parish of Reay was originally partly in the county of Caithness and partly in the county of Sutherland. However in 1891 the parish boundaries changed so that the fairly substantial portion of the parish of Reay that was in Sutherland was disjoined and became part of the parish of Farr in Sutherland. The boundary line between the counties did not change.
Much of the population is based in coastal towns, such as Helmsdale and Lochinver, which until very recently made much of their living from the rich fishing of the waters around the British Isles.
Much of Sutherland is poor relative to the rest of Scotland with few job opportunities beyond government-funded employment, agriculture and seasonal tourism.
For more information, see the EN Wikipedia article Sutherland.
- 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).
- collections of wills and testaments and
- property tax listings
- an extensive collection of local maps
- kirk session records for individual parishes (added in 2021 and not yet complete).
This site is extremely easy to use. There are charges for parish register entries, collections of wills, and census listings (the 1881 census is free to view, also on Ancestry and FindMyPast). The charges are reasonable and payable by online transfer. Viewing the kirk session records is free, but a charge will be made for a copy.
- The National Library of Scotland have an online map collection of historic and modern day maps which can zoom in on a specific farmhouse or street in a town. Their collection also includes London and some counties of southeast England.
- Gazetteer for Scotland contains an article for each parish from the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland by F. H. Groome, (published 1882-4) and short details about each parish today including names of small settlements within a parish.
- The FamilySearch Wiki explains a great many legal terms only found in Scotland and provides a gazetteer for genealogists for each parish across the county. It reviews the availablility of parish registers.
- GENUKI Scotland which provides for each Scottish parish (indexed by county), 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 possibly other gazetteers from individual counties and regions. It is worth reviewing one of its county pages to see what is available online or in print from local archive providers. Each county page has a "Where in ---shire is .... ? section--very helpful in pinpointing the small places below parish level.
- A list of Burial Grounds in Scotland is now available on the website of the Scottish Association of Family History Societies.
- 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.
Notes for the Highland Council Area and the Western Isles Council Area
The local archives are held by The Highland Archive Service which is based in Inverness with branches in Stornoway, Fort William and Caithness. It is "responsible for locating, preserving and making accessible archives relating to all aspects of the history of the geographical area of the Highlands."
Family history societies and historical associations covering the Highland Council Area and the Western Isles Council Area are:
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These associations publish their aims on their websites as well as a list of publications. In many cases the publications are also available through the Scottish Genealogy Society (see below).
- The FreeCen Project--Scotland has a searchable (not browsable) transcription for each of the counties in the area. Nairnshire and Caithness have the 1841, 1851, 1861 and 1871 complete. Inverness-shire and Ross and Cromarty have 1841 complete with some work on 1851 and Sutherland has not completed 1841.
Transcriptions of Gravestone Inscriptions
- The Scottish Genealogy Society provides a series of monumental inscriptions either in print in booklet form or on CD for each of the counties in the area (Caithness, Inverness-shire, Nairnshire, Ross and Cromarty, and Sutherland). Some of the booklets cover only one graveyard, others cover a group. Prices vary. In many cases the coverage is of pre-1855 stones only--this is because gravestone inscriptions are often used by family historians as death registration equivalents in the era of the Old Parish Registers (when deaths were not universally recorded).
- The Fearn Peninsula Graveyards Project has a paid website which allows browsing in ten graveyards in Easter Ross. They charge £2.50 for 24 hours of usage with unlimited searches.
- An index of monumental inscriptions from Caithness compiled by D J Ryrie might prove to be a useful start for searching gravestones in that county. GENUKI states "All (?) of the monumental inscriptions (MIs) in Caithness have been collected and are in print currently from Books From Scotland amongst other places." The Scottish Genealogy Society also has a list of their holdings.
- Sutherland cemeteries are covered in Pre-1855 tombstone inscriptions in Sutherland burial grounds by A S Cowper & I Ross, published at Edinburgh in 1989 by the Scottish Genealogy Society.
- There are no specific notes for gravestone transcriptions for either Inverness-shire or Nairnshire in GENUKI. However, the Scottish Genealogy Society lists booklets for both counties.
Sources for Emigration Records
- Hebrides People have a database containing lists of people who emigrated to North America from a number of parishes in the Western Isles.
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