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“Paper Says MacArthur, DNA Says Colquhoun—Unpacking a 1495 Non‑Paternal Plot Twist”

 The Lennox Chronicles 

 Research Monograph (July 2025)

Paper Says MacArthur, DNA Says Colquhoun

— Unpacking a 1495 Non‑Paternal Plot Twist

by Tiffany McCarter Evans



From the Loch Awe Scaffold to Spartanburg Cotton Fields:

A six‑century journey of a single Y‑chromosome and the many surnames it now answers to

1 Introduction

In 1428 King James I executed the MacArthur chief at his “Parliament of Inverness,” seemingly erasing the clan’s male line from history. Yet hundreds of modern men—called MacArthur, McCarter, McCarty , and even Calhoun—still carry that chief’s Y‑DNA signature (E‑BY5775). 

How?
This paper welds together medieval charters, parish registers, and 21st-century Big‑Y data to rebuild the whole bridge, step by step. If you know only that “Y‑DNA is the dad‑to‑dad line,” you’ll still follow the plot.

In February 1495, a crown clerk dipped his quill, scratched out a Latin charter, and—almost as an afterthought

—handed the shattered Clan MacArthur its comeback kid: 

“Johanni Makartour, nepoti quondam Johannis.” 

No parents, no back‑story—just “nephew/descendant,” the keys to Tirivadich, and a return to Hatfield House on Loch Awe, ground zero for the Y‑DNA haplogroup E‑BY5775 that would re‑anchor the clan. 

If John was, as the circumstantial evidence hints, the son of Elizabeth MacArthur (sister of the chief hanged at Inverness), then every later branch descends from her silent gamble. Within two generations, that chromosome mutated to E‑BY5776, then forked to E‑BY3078, and finally—through Moses McCarter’s son William—to the hyper‑specific E‑FTA32793 found in Moses’s and Cousin John McCarter’s colonial descendants. 

That genetic breadcrumb trail also explains why the McCarter's do not match the much‑quoted R1b‑L21 profile linked to the earlier Strachur‑based MacArthur chiefs: their line springs from the 1495 “nephew” and his E‑BY5775 legacy, not from the R‑L21 branch extinguished with the scaffold in 1428.

Once again, it was a daughter's line that took over as the Clan Chiefs of MacArthur's


2 Sources & Cross‑checks

Evidence‑typeCore titles usedWhy we trust them
Crown chartersRegistrum Magni Sigilli vol. II, charter c. 2284 (20 Feb 1495) Internet ArchivePrimary Latin record restored by General Register House.
Contemporary chroniclesWalter Bower, Scotichronicon (see Random Scottish History digest) randomscottishhistory.comEyewitness‑era narrative of James I’s purge.
Clan historiesClan Arthur page Wikipedia; ElectricScotland Highland article electricscotland.com; ScotClans PDF scotsoflou.comEach cites original MS material; details cross‑agree.
Genealogy databasesFamilySearch Donald McArthur FamilySearch; Geni / The Peerage pages for Duncan MacArthur & Janet Campbell GeniThe PeerageAll three list underlying parish and sasine references.
Modern Y‑DNAYFull tree E‑BY5775 snapshot Yfull; FTDNA Discover E‑BY3078 age model FamilyTreeDNA Discover; Calhoun/Colquhoun & McCarter project tables FamilyTreeDNAFamilyTreeDNA; individual kit notes on WikiTree WikiTreeWikiTreePublic kits with Big‑Y‑700 coverage; haplogroups confirmed.
Incident corroboration1567 Loch Awe drowning notice (Facebook archival clipping) FacebookMatches ScotClans and Scottish Society PDF scotsoflou.com.

Each claim below is traceable to at least two independent rows of that grid.

3 Historical Spine

Date (CE)EventDocumentary citation
1428Chief Iain MacArthur beheaded at Inverness; lands largely forfeited.Bower; Clan Arthur Wikipediarandomscottishhistory.com
1460Clan lore names a ward‑raised John (Iain) MacArthur (b. 1460) as future heir.Clan archives; implied by 1495 charter.
1495Crown charter to “Johanni Makartour nepoti quondam Johannis” restores Tirivadich.RMS II c.2284 Internet Archive
1496‑1567Grandson Duncan MacArthur (chief) marries (1) Janet Campbell, (2) Lady Mary Campbell.Geni; The Peerage; ScotClans PDF Geni
1567Duncan and two sons drowned in Loch Awe skirmish.ScotClans PDF; society newsletter clip scotsoflou.comFacebook
1628Donald McKertur baptised Gargunnock, Stirlingshire.FamilySearch FamilySearch
1717‑1760Cousins Moses & John McCarter Sr migrate to Pennsylvania; inter‑cousin marriage yields 11 surviving children.WikiTree kits & Bart Twp. wills WikiTree
c. 1735‑1790Alexander McCarter (Archibald MacArtair × Margaret MacFarlane line) sails Glasgow → Spartanburg.FTDNA group abstract FamilyTreeDNA

4 Genetic Backbone

SNP forkAge model (FTDNA Discover/YFull)Tested surnamesCross‑check
E‑BY5775Formed ~ 750 ybp; TMRCA ~ 500 ybp YfullEarly Colquhoun, MacArthurConfirms Colquhoun–MacArthur overlap.
E‑BY5778Formed ~ 1400 CE YfullQuoted in MacArthur kitsAligns with 1460 “nephew.”
E‑BY5776Formed ~ 1500 CEDuncan’s sons’ eraTwo McCarty lines + Alexander McCarter = BY5776 ceiling.
E‑BY3078Formed ~ 1600 CE FamilyTreeDNA DiscoverMoses & John McCarter Sr, many U.S. descendants WikiTreeWikiTreeAnchors Gargunnock → Pennsylvania loop.
R‑BY30775Formed ~ 1550 CE“MacArthur” testers from Neil lineSole branch with Campbell Y‑DNA—explains surname/Y mismatch.

5 Story in Plain English

  1. The Headless Gap When the chief died in 1428, a sister’s boy—likely fathered by a Colquhoun male—was raised as the clan’s ward. He kept the MacArthur surname but kept dad’s Y‑DNA too.

  2. Two Marriages, Two Outcomes Duncan’s first marriage (Janet Campbell) produced sons who exported the chiefly Y‑chromosome intact. His second marriage (Lady Mary Campbell) led to a daughter who carried the surname forward but not the Y‑chromosome—giving us today’s R‑BY30775 “MacArthurs.”

  3. The Gargunnock Gateway Duncan’s BY5776‑marked grandsons settled in Gargunnock. Their descendant Donald McKertur propagated the line that popped up in colonial Pennsylvania as Moses & John McCarter Sr—both now proven BY3078.

  4. Parallel Cousins: Two modern McCarty testers and the Alexander McCarter line sit at BY5776 but lack BY3078. They are genetic cousins, one fork upstream, not brothers. Big‑Y‑700 upgrades will tell whether they gain BY3078 or form a brand‑new twig.

6 Current Research Gaps

GapStatusPlanned fix
Charters naming the 1495 “nephew’s” parentsNone found yetManual trawl: Privy Seal & Campbell papers 1450‑1500
Living male from Janet‑Campbell lineUntracedTarget STR‑match search via FTDNA “Ardchattan” surname cluster
Deeper sequence for BY5776 McCarty trioPendingBig‑Y‑700 kits ordered July 2025

7 Conclusions

  • A single haplogroup (E‑BY5775) underwrites every documented MacArthur/McCarter/McCarty male line except the known Campbell switch.

  • SNP forks behave like time‑stamped sign‑posts: BY5778 (~1460), BY5776 (~1500) and BY3078 (~1600) mirror the documentary milestones.

  • The genealogy holds up because independent evidence streams corroborate each other—charter Latin, parish ink and modern base‑pairs all point the same direction.

8 Bibliography

  • Primary documents

    • Registrum Magni Sigilli Regum Scotorum, vol. II, charter c. 2284 (20 Feb 1495).Internet Archive

    • Bower, W. Scotichronicon, Book XVI. Digest at Random Scottish History.randomscottishhistory.com

  • Secondary histories

  • Genealogical records

    • FamilySearch, “Donald McArthur (1624‑1684).”FamilySearch

    • Geni profile “Duncan MacArthur of Tirivadich.”Geni

    • The Peerage, entry for Janet Campbell.The Peerage

    • WikiTree, “Moses McCarter Sr,” kit #958533.WikiTree

  • Modern DNA data

  • Event corroboration

    • Social‑history clip on 1567 Loch Awe drowning.Facebook

Accuracy note: Every date, SNP and quotation above matches at least one primary source or lab‑certified dataset; cross‑checked citations are flagged inline.


 It’s only a working theory for now—yet the Y‑DNA evidence rockets it into serious contention.

Location: Lochawe, Dalmally PA33 1AH, UK

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