BEGATS AND BEQUEATHALS

“Many Americans might expect some discussion here of the family descended from Patrick Calhoun Sr. (ca. 1680-1741) due to the historical importance of one of his grandsons, Vice President John Caldwell Calhoun. John C. Calhoun’s name was inescapable in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and no fewer than eleven American states have counties named for him. I touched on this family already in an earlier blog article devoted to setting the record straight on Patrick’s name, and I fully expected to have to write more substantial articles on the origins of this family later.

Fortunately, I feel that I no longer need to do so, since two outstanding articles on this topic have recently been published by William D. Lindsey in his blog, Begats and Bequeathals. A glance through his home page will reveal a number of Calhoun-related articles, but in particular, I would strongly recommend that any readers interested in the ancestry of Vice President Calhoun read his articles on Patrick Calhoun Sr. and his wife, Catherine Montgomery. He uses my earlier post on Patrick’s name as a starting point but goes on to provide far more detail on Patrick and his family than I did. I may devote a future post to what Y-DNA analysis can tell us about Patrick’s family and its origins, but on the documentary side, I feel I have nothing to add to William’s exhaustive research, at least not at this time.”

This is a generous recommendation that means all the more to me coming as it does from a Calhoun (Colquhoun, Colhoun, etc.) researcher that I regard as one of the very best researchers focusing on that family at present. Anyone wanting an in-depth analysis of branches of the Scottish Colquhoun family represented in Ulster cannot go wrong in following Brian’s blog.