Early descendants of this line had strong connections with Dumfries town, including several Burgesses.  It is notable for Sir John Richardson.

The earliest RICHARDSONs recorded were from Kirkpatrick Juxta, Gloughfoot.  John RICHARDSON(1) had two sons Archibald and Gabriel.  Both settled in Dumfries town, Archibald (d 1846) being a wine merchant and Gabriel (1759-1820) a brewer.  Gabriel married Anne MUNDELL, a descendent of the Maundells or Maundevilles of Torthorwald and Tinwald, Dumfries, who are thought once to have been border raiders. Anne’s mother owned Rosebank, outside Dumfries, and Anne was borne there.  The Richardsons were friendly with the poet Robert BURNS who was excise man in Dumfries, and it was for Gabriel that Burns inscribed a whisky tumbler with a poem believed to have run:

Here Brewer Gabriel’s fire’s extinct,

And empty all his barrels;

He’s blest — if as he brew’d he drink —

In upright virtuous morals.

The tumbler stayed in the Richardson family until at least 1923, when it was smashed in a removal.  For my own 60th birthday, my son Richard had a replica commissioned.  Gabriel lies buried in St. Michael’s Church Yard, Dumfries, near to his friend’s mausoleum, his grave part of the modern Burns trail.

Gabriel’s eldest son John and Burn’s eldest son Robert were of the same age and went to school together.  On the first day they were escorted by their fathers and Burns remarked to Gabriel that he wondered which of the would become the greater man.