Saturday, December 5, 2009

Suffolk and Galloway drovers 1600's 1700's

Sometime ago a Scoggins cousin told me that they had Scottish customs in their family, and it was thought that they originally came from Galloway. (Galloway refers to Wigtown, Kirkcudbright, Dumfries counties in Scotland) I have consulted some books listed below that verifies the connection between Galloway and Suffolk. It is reasonable to assume that some of the Scotch would have settled in Suffolk.

On the agriculture of Suffolk By William Raynbird, Hugh Raynbird, 1849
"Culley, in his work ' On Live Stock,' observes, that the Suffolk duns are nothing more than a variety of the Galloway breed, originating in the intercourse that has long subsisted between the Scotch drovers of Galloway cattle and the Suffolk and Norfolk graziers who feed them. This opinion is, I think, incorrect; the breeds agree in nothing else except in their small size and being polled."

Coddenham and Badingham are pointed out as dairy centers. The 20 mile by 12 mile area is where the Scoggins are found, and it provides a reason that a branch of the family settled in Badingham in the 1770's.

General view of the agriculture of the county of Suffolk: drawn up for the ..., 1797
"The country, which is more peculiarly, but not exclusively, the seat of the dairies, is marked out by the parishes of Codenham, Ashbocking, Otley, Charlsfield, Lethei ingham, Hatcheston, Parham, Framlingham, Cransford, Bruisyard, Badingham, Sibton, Heveningham, Cookly, Linstead, Metfield, Wethersdale, Fressingfield, Wingfield, Hoxne, Brome, Thrandeston, Geslingham, Tenningham, Westrop, Wyverston, Gipping, Stonham, Creting; and again to Codenham, with all the places within, being a tract of country of 20 miles by 12. The limits cannot be exact, for this breed of cows spreads over the whole county; but this space must be more peculiarly considered as their head-quarters."

This points to a place where further research can be conducted. The first Scoggins to be found in the parish registers is in Helmingham in 1694. Helmingham is next to Otley parish and near Coddenham. How many Scoggins families came from Scotland? Was the surname spelled the same? Were the Scoggins drovers?

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