A number of people researching the origins of David Eagleton (1748-1828) have suggested that his original surname in Scotland was Eaglesham. I have never seen a good explanation as to why people think this, other than the fact that there is a village named Eaglesham.

The y-DNA results for David Eagleton show high resolution relevant matches to a Petticrew family, whose descendants maintain that they are from Lanark in Lanarkshire, Scotland. This is only about 20 miles from Eaglesham in Renfrewshire. The Most Recent Common Ancestor (MRCA) may have lived anywhere from 300 to 500 years ago.

The results led me to investigate Lanark. Imagine how surprised I was to learn that there was a family named Eglinton that lived there in past centuries.

So was Eagleton derived from Eaglesham or Eglinton? The simplest transformation would actually be from Eglinton to Eagleton. Vowels can change with greater ease than consonants. Eglinton to Eagleton just requires the deletion of the middle "n", which makes it easier to say the name. Eaglesham to Eagleton actually requires "sh" to be replaced by "t" and "m" to be replaced by "n". The latter could easily happen, but "sh" to "t" is unlikely.

I suggest that David Eagleton researchers consider that Eglinton may have been the surname in Scotland & that Lanarkshire might be a plausible place to look.

Timothy Peterman