Dig into the past

Q I BELIEVE one of my ancestors worked on the canals in Scotland. Are there any records which include the names of canal builders? H Jeffrey (by e-mail)

A The original impetus for the development of canals was to improve transport and revitalise local trade routes. The Forth and Clyde Canal was the first to be completed, in 1792, and the next four major canals that followed were all completed by 1822. There were seven major canals in Scotland: the Caledonian; Crinan; Edinburgh and Glasgow Union; Forth and Clyde; Forth and Cart; Glasgow, Paisley and Johnstone; and the Monkland.

Records of the canals and the companies that ran them are principally held by the National Archives of Scotland (NAS). A lot of the records of the canal companies are found among the records that the NAS holds from British Rail, as many of the canal companies were taken over by the railway companies. These records can include minute books, contracts, reports, letter books, cash books, stocks and shares registers, canal and wharf dues and public notices. Papers relating to the Caledonian and Crinan canals can also be found among the records of the British Waterways Board and the Ministry of Transport. Records can also be found among collections of private papers, both in the NAS and elsewhere.

As is often the case, there are unfortunately very few records of the employees who worked on the canals or who built them. A small number of canal workers found themselves on the wrong side of the law and you can find out information about them and their misdeeds in the records of the Lord Advocate's Department, also held by the NAS (their ref: AD). If your ancestor ran a cargo ship along the canal, accounts of dues collected often provide details of the vessels passing through each canal and their cargoes.

If you have a question for the Genealogy Clinic e-mail the team at [e-mail]. We will endeavour to deal with all enquiries as quickly as possible, but we regret that we cannot enter into personal correspondence. ScotlandsPeople is a partnership between the General Register Office for Scotland, the National Archives of Scotland and the Court of the Lord Lyon.