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The family of Hairstanes rose to prominence as burgesses of Dumfries in the later 1500s, only to die out in the male line in the mid-1700s when four sisters inherited. In 1739 they sold the family properties, Over and Nether Kelwood and Bourlands. The family took their designation from the lands of Over Kelwood, but used the name ‘of Craigs’, that being the house on the property. In Edgar’s History of Dumfries (1915) which R C Reid edited, there is a long note, no 30, on Kelwood and its owners and at the end of the volume a pedigree of Hairstanes is included. Unfortunately, the descent as deduced by Reid is not correct in some details, although one must pay tribute to his scholarship. Only two of the four sisters, Isabella and Elizabeth, appear to have had issue. Elizabeth married William Maxwell of Preston and was the mother of two daughters; Mary, wife of William Gordon, 17th Earl of Sutherland; and Willielma wife of John Campbell, Lord Glenorchy. Lady Glenorchy died without issue, so it is probable that the surviving genes of the family rest with the Sutherlands.