| Chapter 5 - LANDED
ESTATES, FAMILIES, AND HISTORY CONNECTED WITH THEM AUCHLOCHAN
AUCHLOCHAN
The property of James T. Brown Esq. - (Click to see larger image)
The property of James Thomas Brown, Esq., is pleasantly
situated on the banks of the Nethan. The name signifies the "Field of the Small
Loch." According to family tradition, the Browns of Auchlochan were church vassals at
an early period, and there is no title to show that any other family were proprietors of
the lands of Townfoot of Auchlochan before them. The lands of Midtown and of Townhead of
Auchlochan, and of Over Auchlochan, are also portions of the estate of Auchlochan, of
which Mr. Brown's ancestors have long been the proprietors. Until within about a century
the family name was spelt Broun or Broune.
In the Charter Chest at Auchlochan, there is an agreement between John Broune and Thomas
Weir, dated 1572, and various charters of subsequent date, one being a precept of sasine
directed to John Broune in Authinlothan by Francis Stewart, Earl of Bothwell, Commendator
of Kelso, with consent of Sir John Bellenden, Justice-Clerk Administrator of the Monastery
of Kelso, to infeft Alexander Broun in the lands of Fulfurde, dated 1575.
The Browns of Auchlochan allied themselves by marriage with the Weirs of Birkwood, Weirs
of Kerse, Whytes of Stockbriggs, Alstons of Muirburn, and Weirs of Johnshill.
The present proprietor is Major-Commandant of the third Administrative Battalion of the
Lanarkshire (Upper Ward) Rifle Volunteers. He succeeded to the family estate on the death
of his father, the late Thomas Brown, Esq. of Auchlochan, in 1856.
It will be seen from the chapter on the Covenanters in this work, that one of his
ancestors was distinguished among them for zeal and valour, and aided in keeping alive the
sacred flame of civil and religious liberty, in that dark era of Scottish history, when
the Stewart dynasty had well nigh extinguished it. There is at Auchlochan a fine specimen
of an Andrea Ferrara sword, of the Rose pattern, used by that worthy veteran.
The Auchlochan Charter Chest contains several charters from the Monastery of Kelso, of the
sixteenth century, granted by the ancestors of the Dukes of Roxburgh, and by Francis
Stewart, grandson of James V., and afterwards Earl of Bothwell.
A modern mansion supplanted the ancient one at Auchlochan about fifty years ago.
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