Page News & Courier
Heritage and Heraldry
The Irish Dorraugh-Dorrough-Derrough family in Page
Article of March 22, 2001
Though a week behind in wishing the Irish descendants in Page a Happy St. Patrick�s Day, I'll make up for it by focusing on one of the Irish surnames of Page � the Dorraugh family.
Seemingly, the first traceable Dorraugh in Page County is William M. Dorraugh who was born around 1811. William�s first �blip� in Page County appears with his marriage to Sarah Ham on April 27, 1837. He then disappears until the 1850 census. Despite his diligence as the county census-taker that year, a listing for his family cannot be found.
During that same year, the only surnames close to �Dorraugh/Dorrough/Derrough� in Virginia are listed primarily in counties that would later be part of West Virginia. The closest spelling is that of a "Darragh" in Ohio County.
In the 1860 census, William M.�s family appears with the surname of Derrough in Grove Hill, District #1. From the records provided that year, William seems to have been doing rather well as a farmer/miller with $3,730 in real estate. Death records of two of his children in the late 1850s seem to zoom-in even further on the exact site of his residence - likely Poplar Mills near Somerville (later Ingham Station).
William and Sarah had at least nine children. Interestingly, the five oldest (born between 1837-1847) survived childhood, while the last four (1850-1857) seemed less fortunate. At the opening of the Civil War, both sons, James Hiram and Elijah Russell served with the �Massanutten Rangers� of Co. D, 7th Virginia Cavalry. Interestingly, Mary, Sarah and Rachael, all married veterans of that same company.
Oddly, the Dorraugh family is elusive in county census records after the war. Apart from showing up in 1860,the family does not reappear until 1880. By then, William M. had apparently died (he was listed as being the informant of the birth of one of his grandchildren in 1866) and his wife Sarah was living with son-in-law and daughter (Samuel B. & Mary Ann Davis) at Shenandoah.
So, where did the surname come from? One web page(http://home.att.net/~SMDRDD/RDD.html) states that �The Dorough surname is Scottish and Irish in origin and is a derivative of the Scottish name Darroch. Darroch is a sept of the clan McDonald of the Isle.
In 1794 the Lord Lyon King of Arms officially registered "Duncan Darroch of ourock, chief of this ancient name, the patronymic of which is MacIliriach," showing that Iliriach was the progenitor of this sept.
The name has its meaning based in the Gaelic Dubh Dara which is "Black Oak" . . . there are those who argue that the term Scotch-Irish does not apply to the McDonald Clan because the clan was in Ireland long before the plantations.
English land records for the plantations do list "Native Irish" who were given land. Among this list were the MacDonalds. This list also contains Irish with variations of the name Dorough assigned land. The name Dorough in Ireland has long been associated with county Antrim and Down.�
The same web page also gives us a possible clue for our Page County line. There was one William Derrough listed as having served in the War of 1812 in the 19th Regiment (Ambler�s) Virginia Militia � perhaps the father of William M. Dorrough?
Return to the Page News & Courier sponsored directory for
Heritage & Heraldry articles.