All McMurtries descended from a common ancestor are considered members of the same family or clan family. Today there are over a hundred separate clan families on record as well as the history of numerous smaller families and separate individuals not yet identified with a larger clan family. From time to time, new data yields proof that connects one family with another by blood relationship.
The MacMurtrie Clan refers to all McMurtries including those of the various spellings - MacMurtrie, McMurtrie, McMurtry, McMurtrey, McMurtray and other variations.
On November 7, 1959, Alexander David McMurtrie died and, by his written bequest, the collection was given in trust to David C. McMurtry of the University of Kentucky in Lexington. The collection is officially referred to as The Alexander David McMurtrie Collection of MacMURTRIE CLAN-FAMILY HISTORICAL RECORDS WORLDWIDE and commonly referred to as the MacMurtrie Clan Family Records (MCFR).
Several family histories have been published many of which drew upon records which Alexander David McMurtrie and other family historians collected. Most of the records that he collected are still in manuscript form and bear the original cataloging system that he employed.
Photocopies of the published histories and unpublished manuscripts are being deposited by David C.McMurtry in the Kentucky Department of Libraries and Archives and the Kentucky Historical Society, both at Frankfort. It is Dr. McMurtry's intent that those records and manuscripts pertaining to individual families will also be deposited in state historical societies around the United States where they will be accessible to interested persons.
Photocopies of the complete collection will remain in the two above-mentioned libraries. All original manuscripts will eventually be deposited with the Special Collections in the Margaret I. King Library, University of Kentucky, Lexington, where they will be permanently kept and made available for research
In 1995, David C. McMurtry transferred the bulk of the collection to Richard K. McMurtry in California. In 1999, Richard transferred most of the non-American family materials to Samuel A. McMurtry in New South Wales, Australia. In August 2001, Sam and Richard began to place some of the materials on the following Internet Web Site:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~mcmurtriecfr
It is hoped that this web site will lead more family members to discover their ancestral origins and share what they have learned.