Charles Thorpe McInnes [1892-1980] was a close friend of my family. He loved to visit Drumdruils.
‘Thorpe’, as he was known to his friends, grew up in Keirfield House, Bridge of Allan:
‘Thorpe’ was christened Charles Thorpe Haywood Turnbull McInnes:
Thorpe had a deep love of old Lecropt and called his family home in Saughton, Edinburgh, ‘Lecropt’
Thorpe became Curator of Scotland’s historical records:
Thorpe’s father, Charles Gardiner McInnes, was born in Cross Street, Dunblane on the 1st February 1860, the ‘illegitimate’ child of Charlotte Gardiner and Donald McInnes:
Map of Dunblane, circa 1861:
All that the records can share of Donald McInnes is that he was a ‘Bookbinder’ and that he had died before his illegitimate son married in 1881:
Like Thorpe, I love old Lecropt [even though the M9 motorway has replaced the Lecropt burn and its healing spring well].
I sometimes find myself wondering if Thorpe’s rise from a ‘second-class clerk’ to the Keeper of Scotland’s records might relate back to his family story and an understandable wish to find out more about his grandfather, Donald McInnes:
Footnote: In looking through surviving records I have not been able to establish any obvious reason why Thorpe was christened with these middle names: Thorpe, Haywood, Turnbull.
A few films about Lecropt [click on each image to play a different film]:
