James M. Duncan family.

James Marshall Duncan was a Scottish seaman. He was born in 1842 to James Duncan and Mary Marshall and lived his early life in Partick, Scotland. He had at least one brother, Laurence, with whose son William he served in the Confederate Navy on board CSS Virginia (family history is confusing on this point, as to whether Laurence is James Marshall Duncan's brother or uncle). He married Janet Stewart in 1860 in Partick.

James Marshall Duncan signed on with the Confederate Navy into Captain Kevill's Artillery Company in March of 1862. He served, for the most part, at Drewry's Bluff, a Confederate stronghold on the James River south of Richmond, Virginia. Near the war's end in February of 1865, Mr. Duncan was discharged, along with a Peter McGill, from the British blockade runner Lizzie (Steamship : 1864) by the British consul at Tampico. It is within the boundaries of possibility, but not proven by the material in this collection, that Mr. Duncan was active in blockade-running expeditions of that era. Papers from the National Archives suggest that Duncan was among those who surrendered with Lee to Union General Grant at Appomattox Courthouse. It may be presumed that shortly thereafter, he took passage aboard a vessel sailing to Europe and returned to his wife and home in Lanark, Scotland. He worked as a riveter in Scotland and eventually returned to the United States where he worked in a steel mill, earning enough money by 1873 to acquire passage to the United States for his entire family. When his first wife died in childbirth, he married Mary Lillian Follin McDaniel. The family moved to Oderick's Corner in Fairfax County, Virginia, to farm. He inherited a small portion of nearby Wolf Trap Farm from his wife's father, and also farmed that land. He remained in his adopted country until his death in January of 1911.

Elsie May Westenhaver (1917-1998) was James M. Duncan's granddaughter. Her grandmother was James Marshall Duncan's second wife, Mary Lillian. Westenhaver's mother was their daughter, Edna Elsie Duncan.