The Dinsmoor-Dinsmore Family of Scotland, Ireland & America (1891) - Searchable PDF & Surname Index

Tracing Dinsmoor, Dinsmore, McKeen, Bell & 1719 Londonderry Ancestors Across Scotland, Ulster & America

Originally published in Lowell, Massachusetts, in 1891 by renowned New Hampshire legislator and historian Hon. Leonard Allison Morrison, A.M., The Earliest History and Genealogy of the Dinsmoor–Dinsmore Family of Scotland, Ireland, and America (1600–1891) is an indispensable primary source for researchers tracing Ulster-Scots ("Scotch-Irish") lineages from the River Tweed in Scotland through Ballywattick, Parish of Ballymoney, County Antrim, Ireland, to colonial New England, Pennsylvania, Ohio, the Midwest, and the American South. Long out of print, this Fairbairn's Crests Digital Research Edition pairs the complete, archival-cleaned 1891 volume with a fresh Tesseract 5 every-word searchable OCR layer and a newly compiled, tri-column Alphabetical Surname and Place Index.

What's Inside This Enhanced Fairbairn's Crests Edition:

• Complete 66-Page Enhanced Digital Volume (51 Original Scan Pages + 15 New Research Pages): Includes the full, deskewed 1891 edition with Leonard Allison Morrison's frontispiece portrait and facsimile autograph, prepended with 4 pages of Fairbairn's Crests Front Matter (Pages i–iv) and appended with an 11-page Comprehensive Surname & Place Index.
• Nearly 300 Years of Documented Lineage (c. 1600–1891): Traces 213 numbered family entries across eight generations beginning with Laird Dinsmoor of Achenmead on the River Tweed (near Neidpath Castle, Peebles, Scotland) and his second son John Dinsmoor (b. c. 1650), who settled in Ballywattick, Parish of Ballymoney, County Antrim, Ireland, around 1667.
• The Historic 1794 Ballywattick Letter & Ulster Gravestones: Contains the full verbatim text of Robert Dinsmore's famous August 12, 1794 genealogical letter from Ballywattick detailing the family's Scottish origin, agricultural coat-of-arms (three upright golden wheat sheaves on a green field), and motto ("Spes Anchora Tuta" — "Hope is a safe anchor"), plus verbatim tombstone inscriptions from Ballymoney Cemetery and Morrison's 1889 firsthand account of the ancestral Irish stone homesteads.
• The 1719 Londonderry, New Hampshire Sixteen First Settlers: Preserves the previously unpublished 1785 oral history of Janet (McKeen) Cochran describing the 1719 voyage to Boston and settlement at Nutfield (Londonderry and Windham, N.H.), detailing the intermarriages of the McKeen, Bell, Morison, Gregg, Nesmith, Cochran, Cargil, Steele, Allison, and Anderson families, followed by Lucinda Jane Gregg's poem, "The Heroes of the Siege of Londonderry, Ireland, 1688–89."
• Newly Appended Fairbairn's Crests Research Tools: Features a newly written historical introduction, a Researcher's Guide explaining the exact page offset between the 1891 printed pages and PDF pages, interactive PDF chapter bookmarks, and a complete index of all 139 family surname groups and 45+ parishes, townlands, kirks, and military regiments.

Historical & Regional Overview

Few family histories capture the complete three-stage migration of the Scotch-Irish as vividly as Morrison's 1891 monograph. Beginning on the banks of the River Tweed in Peeblesshire, Scotland, the chronicle follows seventeen-year-old John Dinsmoor across the North Channel to Ballywattick in the Parish of Ballymoney, County Antrim, where his four sons—John, Robert, Adam, and Samuel—established a thriving Presbyterian community documented in the General Synod of Ulster records as early as 1715. From Ballywattick, eldest son John Dinsmoor emigrated by 1723 to Londonderry (Windham), New Hampshire, surviving Native American captivity in Maine to found a distinguished New England line that produced two Governors of New Hampshire (Samuel Dinsmoor Sr. and Jr.), the Scottish-dialect poet Robert Dinsmoor ("The Rustic Bard"), Indian Agent Col. Silas Dinsmoor, Massachusetts Attorney-General Hon. Albert E. Pillsbury, and Adams Express Company President William B. Dinsmore.

Morrison then reconstructs the Ulster stay-behind branches (who remained on the Ballywattick homestead until 1838 before removing to Bloomington, Indiana) alongside the major 18th-century Pennsylvania migrations to Peach Bottom and Chanceford (York County), Miller's Creek and Huntingdon Plantation in Canton Township (Washington County), Turtle Creek and Plum Township (Allegheny County), Pucketaw Creek and Parnassus (Westmoreland County), and Rich Hill and Crow's Mills (Greene County), as well as nineteenth-century pioneer families across Ohio (Ashland, Crawford, Jefferson, Miami, and Wayne Counties), Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, and Noxubee County, Mississippi.

Surnames & Families Indexed in This Volume:

Acheson, Adams, Alexander, Allison, Alter, Anderson, Andrews, Armitage, Armituge, Armstrong, Baldwin, Bancroft, Bane, Barnet, Barrett, Beabort, Beattie, Beauchamp, Beer, Beli, Bell, Belt, Blair, Booth, Boyd, Braddock, Brewster, Brown, Bucks, Bunger, Cargil, Cargill, Carpenter, Carr, Chase, Christy, Clargston, Clark, Clarke, Clendenin, Clutter, Cochran, Cochrane, Cogswell, Collins, Conkle, Cook, Cooke, Cooper, Copley, Covey, Cowan, Crosset, Culberson, Curry, Curtiss, Densmoor, Densmore, Dent, Dick, Dinsmoor, Dinsmore, Dinsmuir, Donnell, Douglas, Douglass, Dreher, Dunbin, Dunmore, Dunsemoor, Dunsmoor, Dunsmore, Eaton, Edwards, Elliott, Ferguson, Findley, Fitzpatrick, Fletcher, Fording, Forshee, Fox, Gamble, Garvine, Gates, Gilman, Glasgow, Goentner, Gordon, Gray, Gregg, Grey, Griffin, Grove, Hamilton, Harris, Harvey, Hay, Hayes, Heacock, Henderson, Henning, Henry, Herbert, Hood, Hoover, Hope, Hopkins, Hudsenpell, Hunter, Hutchinson, Jackson, Jay, John, Johnson, Jones, Kellar, Kennedy, Kerr, Keyes, Kilgore, Kimball, Kirby, Kirkpatrick, Knox, Langdon, Langhan, Lawrence, Lee, Little, Livingston, Livingstone, Loughbridge, Love, Lusher, Lyle, Macaulay, Martin, Mason, McAbee, McAffee, McAftee, McAllister, McCarrell, McCarty, McCheyne, McClean, McCluskey, McConaughey, McConkey, McCurdy, McDonald, McGowen, McGown, McGregor, McIlheavy, McIlhose, McIlreavy, McKarihan, McKean, McKee, McKeen, McKinley, McPherson, Metyar, Mitchell, Monroe, Moody, Morison, Morrison, Neal, Neill, Neistling, Nelson, Nesmith, Orr, Paden, Page, Park, Parker, Patterson, Perrine, Phillips, Pillsbury, Pinkerton, Pollock, Quinon, Ramsay, Ramsey, Ransom, Reed, Reid, Riddell, Riddle, Ridley, Ridlon, Ritchie, Robinson, Ross, Saulsbury, Scarborough, Scott, Simmons, Small, Smith, Snow, Starrett, Steele, Stewart, Stuart, Templeton, Thoburn, Thom, Thompson, Thorn, Throckmorton, Todd, Tomb, Toner, True, Upton, Usher, Van Buren, Vanaita, Vanatta, Vance, Volk, Walker, Wall, Walp, Ward, Watson, Weikart, Weir, Wells, Whitham, Wilkinson, Williamson, Willock, Wilson, Wirick, Witherspoon, Wolf, Wolff, Woodburn, Yanatta, Young.

Parishes, Townships & Settlements Indexed:

Achenmead (Auchinmede / Aikenmead, River Tweed, Scotland), Aghadowey (Co. Londonderry, Ireland), Allegheny County (Penn.), Alliance (Ohio), Antrim (Co. Antrim, Ireland), Ashland County (Ohio), Ayrshire (Scotland), Ballymoney (Co. Antrim, Ireland), Ballywattick (Co. Antrim, Ireland), Baltimore (Md.), Bloomington (Ill. & Ind.), Boston (Mass.), Bucyrus (Crawford Co., Ohio), Burnside (Co. Antrim), Bushmills (Co. Antrim), Canton Township / Huntingdon Plantation (Washington Co., Penn.), Carthage (Mo.), Chanceford (York Co., Penn.), Chester (N.H.), Coleraine (Co. Londonderry), County Donegal (Ireland), County Down (Ireland), Cronmore (Co. Derry), Cross Creek (Washington Co., Penn.), Crow's Mills (Greene Co., Penn.), Culbrom (Co. Antrim), Delta (York Co., Penn.), Derrock (Co. Antrim), Dunkendalt (Co. Antrim), Glenhall (Co. Londonderry), Greene County (Penn.), Greensburg (Westmoreland Co., Penn.), Highland (Kan.), Keene (N.H.), Kirk Connell (Scotland), Knowend (Co. Antrim), Londonderry (Ireland & N.H.), Lowell (Mass.), Macon (Noxubee Co., Miss.), Macosquin / Macquoskin (Co. Londonderry), Miller's Creek (Penn.), Mount Pleasant (Ohio & Iowa), Muff (Co. Donegal), Neidpath Castle & Peebles (River Tweed, Scotland), Nutfield (N.H.), Parnassus (Westmoreland Co., Penn.), Peach Bottom / Slate Ridge (York Co., Penn.), Philadelphia (Penn.), Pittsburgh (Penn.), Portstewart (Co. Londonderry), Rich Hill (Greene Co., Penn.), Secon (Co. Antrim), St. Clairsville (Ohio), Strome (Co. Antrim), Turtle Creek (Allegheny Co., Penn.), Upper Buffalo (Washington Co., Penn.), Wellsville (York Co., Penn.), Windham (N.H.), Wooster (Ohio).