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Clan Lumsden (Tartans, Crest) and The Story Behind

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Lumsden

Clan Crest: Issuant from a crest coronet Or a naked arm grasping a sword, Proper

Clan Motto: Amor Patitur Moras (Love endures delays)

Lands: Borders

Historic Seat: Blanerne Castle & Lumsden Castle

Clan Chief: Gillem Lumsden of that Ilk and Blanerne

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Lumsden Clan History

Lumsden is a geographical name derived from Lumsden, an old manor in the parish of Coldingham, Berwickshire. Between 1166 and 1182, brothers Gillem (William) and Cren de Lumsden were witnesses to a charter granted to the Priory of Coldingham by Waldeve, Earl of Dunbar. This is the first known instance of the surname Lumsden. However, the first mention of the Lumsden lands comes from a charter issued by King Edgar of Scotland in 1098 at the end of the 11th century. Gillem and his brother Cren are the first recorded owners of the land.

Many Scottish nobles and clan leaders were forced to sign the Ragman Rolls in 1296 in order to pay homage to England's Edward I. This list contains two Lumsdens (or Lummefdens as it was spelled): Adam de Lummefden and Rogier de Lummefden.

The Earl of Angus granted Gillbert de Lumsden a charter for the lands of Blanerne in 1329, after he married the heiress of Blanerne the previous year, in 1328.

By the mid-1300s, branches of the Lumsden clan had charters and lands confirmed all along Scotland's east coast, including Conlan in Fife and Medlar and Cushnie in Aberdeenshire.

Clan Lumsden members fought for Swedish King Gustavus Adolphus during the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648). "Lumsden's Musketeers" was the name of their unit.

James Lumsden and his men returned to Scotland from the European war to fight on the side of the Covenanters in the Civil War raging throughout the British Isles. They took part in the 1644 Battle of Marston Moor in Yorkshire, led by Alexander Leslie, Earl of Leven, which resulted in a crushing defeat for Charles I's Royalist army. They also fought at the Battle of Dunbar in 1650, this time under David Leslie, where they were defeated by Oliver Cromwell's Parliamentarians.

Robert Lumsden, James's brother, assisted in defending Dundee against General Monck, but was killed when it surrendered. During the 1745 Jacobite Rebellion, the Chief of Clan Lumsden served as Bonnie Prince Charlie's secretary. The chief fled to Rome after the Battle of Culloden in 1746. When he returned to Scotland in 1773, the British government released him from prison for his role in the uprising. The chief's tartan waistcoat is preserved at Pitcaple Castle near Inverurie.

Lumsden Places & People

Lumsden Clan People

Lumsden, Harry Burnett

Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Burnett "Joe" Lumsden (1821-1896).

Lumsden was born in the Bay of Bengal aboard the East India Company's ship Rose, the son of British Army Colonel Thomas Lumsden, C.B. He was sent to Scotland to study when he was six years old, and he returned to India when he was sixteen.

Lumsden joined the 59th Bengal Native Infantry in 1838 and was present at the Khyber Pass forcible entry in 1842. He was wounded at Sobraon during the first and second Sikh Wars. In 1846, he became an assistant to Sir Henry Lawrence in Lahore, and in 1847, he was appointed to raise the Corps of Guides. The goal of this corps, which consisted of horse cavalry and foot soldiers, was to provide trustworthy men to act as guides to troops in the field, as well as to collect intelligence beyond and within India's North-West frontier. The regiment was based in Mardan, near Peshawar, and has become one of the most well-known in the Indian army. Lumsden invented the khaki uniform for this corps' equipment in 1848. In 1857, he was sent to Kandahar with his younger brother, Sir Peter Lumsden, in connection with the Indian government's subsidy to the amir, and remained in Afghanistan throughout the Mutiny. He was a member of the Waziri Expedition in 1860, commander of the Hyderabad Contingent from 1862 to 1869, and left India in 1869. In 1875, he was promoted to lieutenant-general and retired to Scotland, where he spent the rest of his life.

Ernest Stephen Lumsden (1883 - 1948).

E.S. Lumsden studied at Reading Art School under Frank Morley Fletcher beginning in 1889, and briefly at the Académie Julian in Paris in 1903. He accepted a position at the Edinburgh College of Art in 1908, where he taught for a few years. Between 1912 and 1927, he visited India several times and is best known for his prints of Varanasi (Benares) on the Ganges. Between 1905 and 1946, E.S. Lumsden created approximately 350 etchings, many of which are housed in the Burnaby Art Gallery in British Columbia, Canada.

Lumsden was elected an associate of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers in 1909 and raised to full membership in 1915; an associate of the Royal Scottish Academy in 1923 and full membership in 1933; and President of the Society of Artist-Printers from 1929 to 1947.

The Art of Etching, published by Seeley Service in 1925, is still regarded as the seminal treatise on the subject of etching. Lumsden describes the various techniques of intaglio printing using etching, drypoint, mezzotint, and aquatint in the book; he describes the history and development of etching through Rembrandt, Goya, and the etching revival; and he reproduced personal, illustrated notes on their techniques from several eminent etchers of the period, including: Marius Bauer, Frank Benson, Muirhead Bone, George Clausen, David Young Cameron, The book was released in two editions: a trade edition, which is still in print, and a limited edition of 125 copies, which included four original etchings by Lumsden.

E.S. Lumsden married Mabel Allington Royds, a well-known woodcut artist, in 1913. They had a child.

Lumsden Tartans

Lumsden Contemporary

Lumsden Crest & Coats of Arms

Clan Lumsden Crest

Issuant from a crest coronet, or a naked arm grasping a sword, Proper

Coats of Arms of Lumsden:

A word about Coats of Arms:

A coat of arms is granted to an individual under Scottish heraldic law (with the exception of civic or corporate arms). A 'family coat of arms' does not exist. With the exceptions noted above, the arms depicted below are personal arms. Only the person who has been granted these weapons has the right to use them.