Although our name is uncommon in America, the villages of Northern Scotland are
full of Bremners, Rhynie in particular, and even as far north as Wicke on the North Sea. Thus we are merely an offshoot of the
mainstream of the Bremner clan, which still exists in Scotland. Our earliest known ancestor was probably James Bremner, from the
parish of Keith, born in either 1772 or 1766. Before then there are so many James and John Bremners that it is impossible to follow
the family lineage. His son, James Bremner II, was probably a simple farmer like his father, and all that we know about his life is
a simple statement from the parochial registers of Botriphinie, Scotland, concerning a most significant event:
“20th of June 1801, James Bremner and Isabel Mitchell both in this parish were this day matrimonially contracted in order to marriage
consigned for performance and married July 3rd.”
Their second child was John Bremner, born in New Mill, the 8th of June 1803. The other children were Jean (1802), James III (1805),
William (1809), and Isabel.
John Bremner worked as an “agricultural labourer” in Scotland. Little is known about his life but he was probably no different
from the countless thousands of Europeans who were driven by poverty and hopes of a better life to immigrate to America at that time.
He married Margaret Cran on Dec. 15, 1826, in Gartley, Scotland, and they had five children in Rhynie, Scotland: Jane (1827), Isabella
(1829), James (1831), John II (1833), and William (1838). The story of John Bremner II, Alaskan explorer, is told in Chapter 3. The
story of Washington homesteader, James Bremner, is told in the next chapter. His brother, James, emigrated to America in about 1832,
and sometime later his brother William, descendants of both of these members of the family were later recorded in Louisana, with a
descendant of James living in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, as recently as 1966.
John Bremner and his family immigrated to Massachusetts in 1841, where two more children were born: David (1842) in Hampton, Mass.,
and George (1946) in Kensington, Mass. He lived in New York and Massachusetts and worked as a stone mason in New Hampshire before moving
to Keokuk County, Iowa, in 1856 where he bought a farm. John died in Coal Creek, Iowa, Nov. 25, 1875. Margaret, died in Haverhill, Mass.,
Sept. 18, 1888.