This was originally posted on an old version of the Armstrong Forum on tartans.com. However, the site has been updated and the post is no longer there. It was written by John L Fairbairn who still regularly posts messages on the forum. He is the USA Upper Midwest Region representative of the Armstrong Clan Society.
See the history available through
http://www.armstrongclan.org
for what the Clan Trust says is 'provable' at this time. This version
entirely ignores the founding of the Clan, and where the name Armstrong
came from. Then contrast that to the traditional history found under the
Clan Armstrong pages at http://www.tartans.com,
or what is found in the Scottish Family and Sept Encyclopedia.
What is glossed over at present is the reality that the name Fairbairn has
four characteristics.
It is a matter of Danish and English record that Siward Beorn really
existed, born in the late 900s as the son of the Danish King, and was the
nephew of the English King Canute. About 995, he was sent to England to
escape the internal pograms in what was then Daneland. Eventually, he
wound up in the English Court, where he eventually was made Earl of
Northumbria by Edward Confessor. I believe the Heraldic records contain
this notation. In addition, he was made Earl of Huntington by Edward
Confessor after he killed the previous Earl, Tostig, who insisted on
baring his way and insulting him publically on a bridge across the Thames.
This is also a matter of Heraldic record. He died in 1056, after
engineering the use of limbs from forest trees in Birnam Wood to approach
the town of Dunsinane where Macbeth was enthroned, and drive him out.
Tradition said that he was huge for his time, a discription exactly borne
out by the discovery in the middle 1900s of a skeleton in the Kirk of St.
Olave near York, which Kirk records and tradition claim was founded by
Siward Beorn. It was of a man 6 feet, 7 inches, with a broken neck, found
just below the Chancel steps, exactly the body discription and place from
the traditional story of his death and burial.
What is less clear is his progeny. He is listed as having had two sons,
the elder being Osbeorn Bulax. Bulax was killed in the battle with Macbeth
in 1054, according to the earliest recorded histories of both England and
Scotland.
Bulax left two sons, both named the same for their grandfather. They were apparently differentiated by hair color, one being Siward Bairn the Red, and the other Siward Bairn the White (or Fair Bairn). Siward Fair Bairn was unusual. He inherited his grandfather's tremendous physical stature and strength. At about 6 feet 6 inches, he sort of 'stood out' in a crowd.
Malcolm III, the 85th King of Scotland, greeted his cousin Siward the White with great kindness, and together they fought against William the Conqueror, driving him out of Northumbria. A traditional story (well enough accepted and acknowledged for nine centuries it was the legal basis of the Armstrong claim to lands and lineage). Now here is where things get a bit dicey, because the story involves Siward the White during the Battle of the Standard against William in 11381 near Northallerton in Yorkshire, where the size and discription points to the belief that the King's armor bearer, who was said to be named Fairbairn, was none other than his cousin ... Siward Bairn the White.
In this battle, King Malcolm's horse was killed under him, shot through by an arrow. Fairbairn, seeing his master go down on the field, leapt from his own horse. According to the traditional story, "Grasping the King with one hand by the thigh, did he set his master up on to his own horse, and send him back unto the battle." That action must have astonished the good King, since a small derrick was required in those days to lift an armored man into his saddle. And to lift him onto a horse made skittish by the noise and abrupt motion of the battle must have seemed like a miracle.
After the battle, the King began a search for his trusted cousin, who likewise had survived the day. This is not surprising, since any souls who witnessed such a deed must have cleared the area in a hurry, in fear for their lives. For his service to the crown, Fairbairn was knighted Sword of the Strong Arm (or Sir Arm Strong), and granted heritable title to lands around the area around Liddesdale.
The first Scottish record of the name Armstrong is found in Liddesdale, with the date 1376. Slightly later records indicate existence a family seat called Mangerton on the border with England midway between Newcastaton and Liddesdale, where the clan raised a keep. Little is said about the Armstrongs after the building of the Mangerton Tower, probably in 1135. Apparently no Chief was immediately recognized, until 1300 when Alexander became the first Laird of Mangerton.
As noted, Siward actually existed. Since originally his story and that of his progeny was almost exclusively kept alive by oral family history, the fact of its proven veracity seems to lend considerable credance to the remainder of the family traditional history of the founding three generations.
The Milnholm Cross near Mangerton has engraved on it a representation of a great two-handed sword. Down through history, the tradition is that this was a representation of the Armstrong Family Sword which was still in the hands of the Clan Laird at the time the second Laird was murdered by Lord Solis. His son received it, and it remained in the family until it was stolen after the murder of Will a' Greena Armstrong around 1590 by a man named Stingerside. This sword was said to have belonged to Siward Beorn.
The name Fairbairn has for over nine centuries been acknowledged, listed, and held as the founding sept of Clan Armstrong.
There is also an interesting general comment on Clanship by J A Armstrong at http://www.armstrongclan.org in the Clan History section.
1 The original text quotes 1183 as the year of the battle. However all other sources seem to quote 1138. (Many thanks to Kristina Armstrong of the USA for pointing this out.)
Last Revised: 9 April 2006