2027 Clan Gathering – SAVE THE DATES

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The 2027 Gathering of the Clan Hannay Society will take place on May 21 – May 23, 2027

SAVE THE DATES! We will be providing more details including specific times and pricing in the coming months.

The general timetable is:

May 17 – May 21

PRE-GATHERING WORK PARTY at Sorbie Tower
Monday morning through Friday afternoon of the week leading up to the Gathering, we’ll be preparing the grounds and structures at Sorbie Tower.


If you are able to arrive early for the gathering that week and are willing to help us out for one or more of those days, contact Steve at sphcb@aol.com for more information.

Friday 21st May

Evening reception at Sorbie Tower. A chance to see the Tower by candlelight with the fires lit. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Saturday 22nd May

Late morning Annual General Meeting (AGM) at the Garlieston Village Hall. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Light buffet lunch following AGM. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Afternoon Clan Gathering and Piping in the Colours at Sorbie Tower. Free of charge, no ticket required, all welcome.

Evening Clan Dinner Dance at the Creebridge House Hotel, Newton Stewart. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Sunday 24th May

Afternoon picnic with Clan games at Sorbie Tower. Bring your own picnic and watch or take part in the Clan games (donations welcome), which are open to all, adults and children. Free of charge, no ticket required, all welcome.

SAVE THE DATES:
Pre-Gathering Work Party May 17-May 21
Gathering May 21-May 23

MORE INFO COMING!

2026 AGM VENUE CHANGE at Clan Gathering

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ATTENTION Members attending the 2026 Gathering:

Clan Hannay AGM VENUE CHANGE

If you are attending the 2026 AGM on Saturday, 23rd May, please be advised that the location has changed.

The AGM meeting will now be held at:

Sorbie Village Hall, Main Street, Sorbie DG8 8EG, Scotland

The timing remains the same –

10.30 hrs – for 11.00 hrs AGM.

  • Clan members and their guests are welcome. Free of charge, no ticket required.

13.00 hrs. Light buffet lunch following AGM. £20 per head. Note that you must be logged in as a member to have access to the tickets page.

  • Click here for tickets and more details.  Click here if you need to log in.  Not a member? Click here to find out more about membership.
  • Clan members and their guests are welcome.

Jacquie Hannay

Membership Secretary

Video: Piping The Colours 2025

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This 360-degree video (click and drag your mouse to look around!) from last year will whet your appetite for our 2026 Gathering! Find out more!

2026 Clan Gathering – tickets available!

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The 2026 Gathering of the Clan Hannay Society will take place on 22nd-24th May.

The timetable for the Gathering is:

Friday 22nd May

19:00 – 21.00 hrs. Reception at Sorbie Tower. £15 per head including wine (or soft drink) and nibbles. A chance to see the Tower by candlelight with the fires lit. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Saturday 23rd May

10.30 hrs for 11.00 hrs. AGM. Garlieston Village Hall. Clan members and their guests welcome. Free of charge, no ticket required.

13.00 hrs. Light buffet lunch following AGM. £20 per head. Clan members and their guests welcome.

15.00 hrs. Clan Gathering and Piping in the Colours at Sorbie Tower. Free of charge, no ticket required, all welcome.

18.30 hrs for 19.00 hrs prompt. Clan Dinner Dance at the Creebridge House Hotel, Newton Stewart. Tickets £38.50 per adult, £19.25 per child up to 12 years. Please note that under 12s will receive a child’s portion dinner. Dress code: feel free to dress up if you wish, or smart casual if you don’t. Clan members and their guests welcome. Space is limited for the Dinner Dance. Please make your reservation as soon as possible to avoid disappointment.

If you have any special dietary requirements or food allergies, please contact the Membership Secretary.

Sunday 24th May

12.00 hrs onwards. Picnic with Clan games at Sorbie Tower. Bring your own picnic and watch or take part in the Clan games (donations welcome), which are open to all, adults and children. Free of charge, no ticket required, all welcome.

Note that you must be logged in as a member to have access to the tickets page.
Click here for tickets and more details.  Click here if you need to log in.  Not a member? Click here to find out more about membership.

Singer Bet Hannah

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I just recently finished reading British musician Joe Jackson’s 2000 autobiography A Cure For Gravity. Although I found it to be an enjoyable read, I was quite surprised to come across a Hannah connection!

Although most of us think of his hits from the 1980s such as Is She Really Going Out With Him? and Steppin’ Out, earlier in his career he was a backup musician for a cabaret duo called Koffee n Kreme.

Half of Koffee n Kreme was singer Lance Ellington (born 1957), son of renowned British musician Ray Ellington.  The other half was Beth (“Bet”) Hannah (c. 1951 – mid 1980s).

Beth hailed from Glasgow, but little is known about her life before and after her singing partnership with Lance. She originally wanted to be a nurse, but as a teenager, she bought a guitar and entered the Glasgow music circuit playing folk songs at clubs, hotels and restaurants. Eventually she moved south and sung in a band at the Locarno Ballroom in Portsmouth.  Three years into the job, Lance joined the band. A couple of years later, in the mid 1970s, their bandleader/manager encouraged them to strike out on their own as a duo.

In 1977, after winning the New Faces final, Koffee n Kreme released a 45 record with two singles, My World Keeps Getting Smaller Everyday / Sunshine and Roses (B side). That same year, they played for the Queen Mother at the London Palladium as one of the acts for the “Fall in the Stars” charity concert. In 1979, they were featured on an episode of the British show Star Treatment.

Unfortunately, Bet died soon after, apparently in the 1980s.  Lance went on to have a successful career working with some big names like Sting and George Michael.

Sources and for further reading / viewing

Images © Mick Cooper, Stage Media Company, Independent Broadcasting Authority, TV Times

Squadron Leader Donald M. Hannah, DFC, RAF (1916 – 1982)

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Donald Murdock Hannah was born on the 3rd September 1916 in Prahran, Victoria that is now a suburb of Melbourne, Australia. He died on the 28th December 1982 and his remains are in the Queensland Garden of Remembrance in Brisbane, Australia. Donald’s father was Leslie Arthur Hannah, a World War 1 veteran (1879-1953) and Tobacco Grader from the state of Victoria, one of 9 children. His grandfather, Captain John Hannah (1845-1898) had actually been born in Taranaki, New Zealand, but moved to Australia for work as a ship’s pilot in Melbourne. Donald’s great grandfather, Thomas Hannah was a Scotsman from Stranraer in Wigtownshire (1820-1890) who had travelled to the antipodes to pursue his profession across the British Empire. He had arrived in New Zealand as a colonist in 1842.

After the outbreak of World War 2, in 1940 Donald Hannah moved to the UK to enlist in the Royal Air Force (RAF) where he trained as a pilot officer. He was posted to the Northern Ireland Aldergrove Aerodrome near Belfast (now known as Belfast International Airport) to be part of RAF Volunteer Reserve 502 Squadron. He saw action throughout the Second World War and rose up three levels to be a Squadron Leader by 1945. His squadron was part of British Coastal Command and he flew Mk. V Armstrong-Whitworth Whitley bombers that patrolled the coasts of Europe from Norway right down to North Africa helping to protect the crucial North Atlantic Convoys and to attack Nazi German ports and any submarines that they detected on the surface off the coast of Ireland.

The attached Newspaper clipping from The Age newspaper in Melbourne, Australia of Tuesday, July 27th, 1943 (page 4) describes how he won his DFC, the Distinguished Flying Cross, near Tunisia in north Africa when his plane was hit by enemy flak and he was forced to make an emergency landing after his crew bailed out. He accepted his award at Buckingham Palace in October 1944 and was also Mentioned in Despatches in 1943.

Donald Hannah met and married Mary Kerr in Belfast on the 3rd September 1941. They were to go on to have two sons and moved to various air bases across England during and after the war when he stayed in the RAF in a desk job as a flight instructor and then a senior Staff RAF Officer in the British Air Ministry. In this 1951 The Sun News-Pictorial Melbourne newspaper clipping of Saturday, February 10th we hear of his opinions on the use of jet engine fighters in both the RAF and RAAF. Eventually he decided to take his wife, Mary, and their two sons, Sydney, aged 16 and Peter, aged 1, to Australia on the P&O Ship Himalaya in November of 1957 where he was to retire.

2025 Clan Gathering – tickets available!

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The 2025 Gathering of the Clan Hannay Society will take place on 23rd-25th May!

Friday 23rd May

19:00 – 21.00 hrs. Reception at Sorbie Tower. £15 per head. Clan members and their guests welcome.

Saturday 24th May

10.30 hrs for 11.00 hrs. AGM. Garlieston Village Hall. Clan members and their guests welcome. Free of charge.

13.00 hrs. Light buffet lunch following AGM. £18 per head. Clan members and their guests welcome.

15.00 hrs. Clan Gathering and Piping in the Colours at Sorbie Tower. Free of charge, all welcome.

18.30 hrs for 19.00 hrs prompt. Clan Dinner Dance at the Creebridge House Hotel, Newton Stewart. Tickets £36 per adult, £18 per child up to 12 years.

Sunday 25th May

12.00 hrs onwards. Picnic with Clan games at Sorbie Tower. Bring your own picnic and watch or take part in the Clan games (donations welcome), which are open to all, adults and children. Free of charge, all welcome.

Note that you must be logged in as a member to have access to the tickets page.
Click here for tickets and more details.  Click here if you need to log in.  Not a member? Click here to find out more about membership.

The day I fell in love with Sorbie Tower

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My name is Louise Julia Hannah, and I have always been interested in my own family history.  My Granda Sam (Hannah) used to tell me stories about when we was growing up in Port Glasgow in Scotland all about his time in the Merchant Navy and the shipyards. It always made me think of all the other ancestors I had.

One day last term in school I was in primary 5. There was an article on Children’s BBC Newsround about family trees. I then researched a BBC article online with my Mum. We read about Clan Hannay and discovered an article about Sorbie Tower, and David Hannah, the constable of Sorbie Tower, was in it. We saw the Clan tartan and loved it. I wanted to find out more.

I then told my Mum and Dad that I wanted to visit Sorbie Tower and find out more about my family history. They agreed to take me during the September school weekend. I was very excited about my visit.

We arrived at Castlewigg Caravan park on Friday 22nd September 2023. We drove through Sorbie on the way, then back to the Tower to check where it was. The next day, Saturday, we visited the Tower.  We were very lucky to meet Steve. He was cutting the grass and said hello to us and that he’d give us a tour in ten minutes. We also met two very nice sisters who were visiting the Tower all the way from America. They were called Hanna and were very nice to us.

Steve shows my family and me around the tower

Here I am with my parents and our tour guide, Steve, who always makes Tower visits special.

Sorbie tower was an amazing experience to see centuries of our family history. It is absolutely beautiful inside and out I would definitely recommend it for a holiday. I got a fabulous tour from Steve; I would go again to see this fantastic place. It is a magical experience inside and out. It truly transports you to another world. I cannot wait to see it when it is fully renovated and I hope all Hannah, Hannay, Hanna and Hanneys can enjoy it, as well as tourists, visitors, and locals. Please help and donate to the cause of transforming the tower back to what it was.

My Dad, Mum and I are now members of Clan Hannay, and I love it.

Thank you for reading my article. Over and out, Louise Julia Hannah, age 10.