Clan Pollock

Origins and Name

The Pollocks are among the Norman families who settled in Scotland under the patronage of King David I in the twelfth century. The name derives from a place in Renfrewshire — Pollok estate, near what is now the southern suburbs of Glasgow — and the family held this land from at least the twelfth century. A branch of the family gave its name to Pollokshields, Pollokshaws, and other Clydeside districts.

The Pollocks were subordinate to the Stewarts of Renfrew, the family who would eventually become the royal House of Stewart. This proximity to the future royal dynasty gave the Pollocks an enduring presence in Scottish genealogical records. The family appears in charters witnessed alongside Walter Stewart and his descendants through the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

The Diaspora

The most significant American connection is through the family of James K. Polk, the eleventh President of the United States. Polk's ancestors were Scots-Irish emigrants from the area near Londonderry in Ulster, and the name had been anglicised from Pollock to Polk through the Ulster and American phonetic shift. This connection is well-documented in the Polk presidential papers and in Scottish genealogical research commissioned by the Polk family in the nineteenth century.

Beyond the presidential connection, Pollocks appear throughout the Scots-Irish migration records of the eighteenth century, concentrated in Pennsylvania, Virginia, and the Carolinas. In Canada, Pollocks appear in early Ontario records, and the name is common in Nova Scotia among the Lowland Scots settlements.

Researching Pollock Ancestry

Pollock genealogy is well-served by the Renfrewshire records. ScotlandsPeople.gov.uk covers the key Renfrewshire parishes from the late sixteenth century. The Pollok House papers at the City of Glasgow Archives hold estate documentation relating to the main Pollock landholding from the medieval period to the twentieth century.

For American branches researching connection to the presidential Polk line, the Polk Ancestral Home in Pineville, North Carolina maintains detailed genealogical records. The Tennessee State Archives holds the Polk papers from his time as governor and president, with supporting family documentation.