From whence came forth the Ruttledges ?
The surname Routledge takes its ancient origins from two words, rudd leche meaning red stream . There are countless variations in the early spelling
of Rutledge, the earliest recorded have a Norman flavour and include De
Routluge, from the middle ages onwards Routledge becomes the main spelling
and still exists in this form today , later an "o" is dropped and Rutledge
becomes the common spelling, Ruttledge with 2 "T"s appears to come exclusively
from Co Mayo in Ireland
In the 15th Century the Routledges are found across
the debatable land, a lawless enclave on the English Scots border ,their earliest home is
said to have been on the Bailey waters near Bewcastle in the southern debatable
lands , on a present day map "Routledge Burn" ( Burn meaning stream, perhaps this is the red stream the name comes from ! ) appears in the Kershope forest
less than 1 mile south of the current Scots border which is marked by Liddle
water.
Click on map to zoom in !
Routledge Burn, Cumbria, Aug 1998
General Dacre the warden of the West March is said
to have assembled a force of over 500 men to destroy the Routledges, they
managed to escape north of the border with most of their possessions and
relocated around the Tarras Burn .
When the 2 crowns of England and Scotland united
under one kingdom the reiver families of the border region suffered great
hardship , no longer able to escape into a foriegn land and exploit the
many loopholes they had for generations . The new King of the United Kingdom
set about uprooting many of the troublesome clans which included Armstrongs,
Nixons, Bells, Grahams, Musgraves and Forsters.
The Grahams who were the strongest and most feared
clan next to the Armstrongs were exiled en mass to Connaught Ireland, it
was hoped that many of their reiving bretheren would follow.
Presently there are many Rutledges in Northern Ireland
, approx 60 listings in the phone book , some of these are thought to have
been refugees from the Tarras , evidence exists of others in South Ulster
settling there after taking part in Cromwells invasion.
The Ruttledge Families Of County Mayo Article mentions
Rutledges as early as the mid 16th century settling in Connaught , again
others appear to have served Cromwells army and benefitted from subsequent
land grants
From Ireland, The Rutledges ( Whatever their spelling
) have spread out across the new world, Today I am aware of Hundreds of
Kinfolk in the USA and Canada , a fair amount in Australia , a handfull
in South Africa and a small amount remaining in England.
The Dodgson Manuscript Portable Document File ( .pdf )can be viewed in an Acrobat enabled browser here, This document contains much info on the history of Bewcastle parish and a great deal of genealogy info on mainly the Routledge and Dodgson families of the border region, you can dowload Adobe's Acrobat reader free at WWW.Adobe.com If you already have acrobat reader, right click the Dodgson link above left and select "Save Target As" from the menu
Page published and maintained by Sean
J. Ruttledge
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