The Highlanders of Scotland - Clan Strachan Society

CHAP. VIII] OF SCOTLAND 323
have dwelt so long in the recollection of after generations, being
removed by death, we find the Rosses of Balnagowan appearing
as the head of the clan, and in this family the chiefship has
remained for upwards of three hundred years. The descent of
the Rosses of Balnagowan has hitherto been considered as
perfectly distinct, and it has never been doubted that their
ancestor was William Ross, son of Hugh de Ross, who was
brother to William, the last Earl of Ross. The family have in
consequence claimed to be the male representatives of the
ancient earls, but to this the objection naturally occurs, that if
the Rosses of Balnagowan are the descendants of the brother
of the last earl, how came Paul Mactire, a remote collateral
branch, to be considered chief of the race, as we know from the
MS. of 1450, and other sources, he unquestionably was? The
descent of the Balnagowan family from a William de Ross, the
son of a Hugh de Ross, who lived in the reign of David H.,
is undoubted ; but it unfortunately happens that the records
prove most clearly that there lived at the same time two
Hugh de Rosses, one of whom was certainly brother to the
last earl, and that each of these Hugh de Rosses had a son
William de Ross,
In 1375, Robert II. confirms " Willielmo de Ross, filio et
hcEvedi quond Hugonis de Ross," a charter of William, earl of
Ross, to the said Hugh, his brother, of the lands of Balnagowan,
and in 1379 he grants consanguineo suo Hugoni de Ross de
Kinfauns, and Margaret Barclay his spouse, an annual rent
from the lands of Doune in Banff. The one Hugh Ross thus
got a charter in 1379, while the other was already dead in 1375.^
In 1383, however, we find a charter to John Lyon of lands
in Fife, que fuerunt Roberto de Ross, filio et heredi Hugonis de
Ross de Kinfauns, and in 1377 the king confirms a charter by
the earl of Caithness, Willielmo de Ross, filio juniori quond
Hugonis de Ross, of the lands in Caithness, which had belonged
to Walter Moray.
^ Mr. Wood, in liis Peerage, quotes be dead. Xo doubt he was, but a
these cliarters as of the same Hugh grant of an annual rent to a dead
de Ross ; and in quoting the last, re- person does not seem to liave struck
marks, with the utmost gravity, Mr. Wood as singular,
that Hugh appears at this time to