Records of the clan and name of Fergusson, Ferguson and Fergus

478 CLAN FERGUSSON
(IV.) 1. William, married and has issue ; and
2. Francis James, married and has issue.
III. John Mansfield Ferguson, who died in 1862, leaving
issue.
IV. John M. Ferguson (A.R.I.B.A.), married and has issue.
Mrs. Ferguson died on 17th April 1895.
The family have always believed themselves to be of
Scottish descent, and their tradition is to the effect that an
ancestor fled from his home more than once owing to political
troubles, and eventually found refuge in London. It is also
remembered that one member of the family, named Alexander,
met his death by a fall from his horse. Mr. William Henry
Ferguson, who at one time served as Mayor of Wokingham,
has in his possession a coat of arms and crest handed to him
by his grandmother, who died about 1830 at the age of eighty-
one, with the statement that it was the crest and arms of his
family. The crest and arms appear to be precisely those of
the family of Craigdarroch, and this would indicate a descent
from the Dumfriesshire Fergussons. It was also under-
stood that some ancestors had lived in Clerkenwell, and the
Registers of St. James's, Clerkenwell, contain the following
entries : —
Marriages.
Dec. 23rd, 1669. James Ferguson and Elynor Steevins,
by banns.
Baptisms.
January 7th, 1724. James, son of Henry and Elizabeth
Ferguson.
Marriages.
June 16th, 1740. Paul Sharlong and Dorothy Ferguson.
Banns.
Curiously enough, in the same Register the Rev. James
Fergusson x — believed to be the clergyman of that name of
the Kilkerran family — is mentioned as officiating at the mar-
riage of Henry Fisher and Alice Laurence on May 28th, 1719.
On the other hand, ' a remarkable resemblance ' has been
traced between the portraits of William Ferguson, who died
in 1856, and the description of Robert Ferguson, ' the Plotter,'
1 See p. 340.