HALLIDAY, a surname, from holiday, originally belonging to a border clan settled in Annandale, but for more than six centuries common on both sides of the Solway. When a plundering excursion on the English border was determined upon, “a holiday” was the slogan or gathering cry of the Annandale mosstroopers, and the small hill where they were accustomed to assemble on such occasions, still retains the name of the “Halliday hill.” The chieftain who first assumed, or to whom was first given, the surname of Halliday, had his castle or strong tower at Corehead, ear the source of the river Annan, and about three miles from the village of Moffat, celebrated for its medicinal waters. In the time of the Crusades, of the five thousand men wh were sent by William the Lion, under his brother the earl of Huntingdon, to the assistance of Richard the Lion-heart in Palestine, one thousand were from Annandale, and nearly all of them Hallidays. Several persons of this surname subsequently settled in England, chiefly, at first, in Wiltshire and Somersetshire. In 1435 Thomas Halliday of Pontefract commanded five hundred archers in Sir John Shirley’s division of the English army at the battle of Agincourt. In 1470, Walter Halliday, called “The Minstrel,” a younger son of the Annandale chieftain, was master of the Revels to Edward the fourth. It was no unusual thing for a mosstrooper to find his way at court. George Armstrong, of the same family as Willie Armstrong, hanged by King James the Fifth, was the celebrated court fool of King James the Sixth. Walter the Minstrel was the first of the Hallidays of Rodborough in Gloucestershire, to which family the learned Baron Halliday belonged. In 1605, Sir Leonard Halliday (knighted by King James) was lord mayor of London. The first chairman of the united East India Company was William Halliday, merchant and alderman of London, who died in 1623.

      The direct Scottish line failed in the fifteenth century. Walter the Minstrel’s great-grandson, Theolbald Halliday, married in Holland a Miss Hay, heiress of Tulliebole, Fifeshire, only daughter of Colonel Hay, in the Dutch service, and at her death, their son, Sir John Halliday, inherited that estate. In the youthful days of James the Sixth, during the progress of the court from Stirling to Falkland, that monarch often slept at Tulliebole house, midway on the journey, and, on one of these occasions, he is said to have knighted the laird. In 1722, Catherine Halliday, daughter and heiress of John Halliday of Tulliebole, the descendant of this Sir John Halliday, married the Rev. Archibald Moncrieffe, who obtained the estate of Tulliebole in her right. Her great-grandson, Sir James Wellwood Moncrieffe, baronet, of Tulliebole, a lord of session, died in 1851. Sir John’s second son, William Halliday, provost of Dumfries, and one of its representatives in parliament, had the honour of entertaining King James the Sixth at his house in that royal burgh, after his accession to the crown of England, on his last visit to Scotland. One of the provost’s sons, Thomas Halliday, who had gone to England, returned in 1679, in the army of the duke of Monmouth, sent to suppress the Covenanters, but left the king’s service on finding that all his kinsmen were on their side. Among those who suffered in Galloway in the persecutions of the seventeenth century, were several of the name of Halliday, particularly David Halliday, portioner of Mayfield, who, on 21^st February 1685, was, with Bell of Whiteside, and three others, surprised by Grierson of Lag on Kirkconnell Muir, parish of Tongland, and barbarously shot on the spot, ‘without so much as allowing them to pray, though earnestly desired’ [Wodrow’s Hist. Vol. iv. p. 242.] Another David Halliday, once in Glengape, was also shot, on 11^th July following. By his marriage with Miss Wright, an heiress of the Four Towns, Thomas Halliday acquired some property at Berngaw, Annandale, which became the title of the family. His second son, Simon Halliday, acquired the lands of Whinnyrig, on the banks of the Solway Firth, and his descendants still bear that designation.

      William Halliday, the elder son of the provost of Dumfries, inherited Berngaw, and on his decease in 1745, he was succeeded by his son, Thomas Halliday of Berngaw, who married Margaret, daughter of Archibald Porteous, portioner of the Copewood. He died in 1804, leaving an only surviving son, Sir Andrew Halliday, a memoir of whom follows. Sir Andrew married Helen, daughter of Peter Carmichael, Esq., merchant in Edinburgh.

HALLIDAY, SIR ANDREW, an eminent physician, was born in Dumfries-shire in 1783. He was educated for the church, and was an unsuccessful candidate for the parish school of Duncow, Dumfries-shire. He afterwards changed the clerical for the medical profession. Like his dalesman and friend, Telford the engineer, he was of reduced parentage, though of good and ancient blood, being a descendant of that brave “Thom Halliday, my sister’s son so dear,’ spoken of by the renowned Sir William Wallace. After finishing his studies, he travelled through Russia and Tartary, and subsequently settled at Halesworth, near Birmingham, where, having taken his degree of M.D. at Edinburgh, he for some time pursued the practice of medicine. He afterwards served on the staff of the army, both in Portugal and Spain, as surgeon to the forces, was at the assault of Bergen-op-Zoom, and at the battle of Waterloo. He was subsequently appointed domestic physician to the duke of Clarence, and was knighted by George the Fourth shortly after his accession to the throne.

      With the history and antiquities, the poetry and traditions of his native land, Sir Andrew was familiarly acquainted. He possessed a vast fund of general information, with a fine taste in literature, and in natural philosophy, as his ‘History of the House of Hanover,’ published in 1826, and his ‘Account of the West India Islands,’ which came out in 1837, sufficiently testify. In November 1833 he was appointed inspector of army hospitals in the West Indies, from whence he returned in 1836. He had early turned his attention to the sad and neglected state of the insane poor in Great Britain and Ireland, with the benevolent view of leading to an amelioration of their condition, and his representations and communications to the public, and to persons in power, on the subject, some of which were anonymous, were so appalling, and found to be so true, that they procured the appointment of the select committee of the House of Commons of 1806-7. He died at Dumfries, September 7, 1839. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and Gottingen, and a member of several other learned and scientific institutions. – His works are:

      Observations on Emphysema, or the Disease which arises from the diffusion of Air into the Cavity of the Thorax. 1807.

      Remarks on the present state of the Lunatic Asylums in Ireland. 1808.

      Observations on the Fifth Report of the Commissioners of Military Enquiry. 1809.

      Observations on the present state of the Portuguese Army. 1811, 4to. Second edition, with additions. 1812, 8vo.

      Translation of Professor Franck’s Exposition of the Causes of Diseases. 1813, 8vo.

      Memoir of the Campaign of 1815. Paris, 1816.

      Letter to Lord Binning on the State of Lunatic Asylums, &c., in Scotland. Edin. 1816.

      A General History of the House of Guelph, to the Accession of George I. London, 1821.

      Annals of the House of Hanover. 1826, 2 vols. A well-arranged and judicious work.

      A General View of the present state of Lunatics and Lunatic Asylums in Great Britain and Ireland. 1828.

      A Letter to Lord Robert Seymour, with a Report of the Number of Lunatics and Idiots in England and Wales. 1829.

      The West Indies: The Natural and Physical History of the Windward and Leeward Islands. With some account of the Moral, Social, and Political Condition of their Inhabitants immediately before and after the abolition of Negro Slavery. London, 1837, 8vo.

      A Letter to the Secretary at War on Sickness and Mortality in the West Indies. 1839.

      He had collected materials for writing an Account of the Chief Campaigns of Wellington, in which he himself was present; but his death prevented him from carrying his intention into execution.