Knowledge Sharing Platform

Blair Castle is the ancestral estate of the Earls and Dukes of Atholl. It remains a private home, but is open to the public

GRASAC received permission to include Great Lakes items in the collection of the Duke of Atholl in the GKS through archivist Jane Anderson in April 2009. No MoU was required.

Blair Castle is the home of the Murray family, who hold the title of Duke of Atholl, though the current (11th) Duke, John Murray, (born 1929) lives in South Africa.

The Castle is said to have been started in 1269 by John I Comyn, Lord of Badenoch. It commands a strategic position on the main route through the Central Scottish Highlands. Lowland Clan Agnew held Blair Castle, seat of the Duke of Atholl, against the Jacobites who laid siege to the castle during the Jacobite uprising of 1745-1746.

Members of the Murray family  served in the British army and navy in North America during the Seven Years War, and the small but important Great Lakes collection now on display at Blair Castle was made by these men. A sister of the Duke of Atholl married the Laird of Invercauld during around this time, linking the Murray and Farquharson families.  There is documentation in the Blair Castle archives showing that at least one of the collectors of the Blair Castle items also sent things to the Lady Sinclair, wife of the Laird of Invercauld.