Angus Folklore quotes Jervise, including a verse that ties the ghost to the tree: Earl Beardie would never die, nor poor Jock Barefoot be set free, as long as a chestnut tree grew. The tree is said to have died in the severe winter of 1760 and to have been later felled in a storm. Some later guides put the story at Kinnaird instead, calling him Jock Barefut and saying he is seen dangling from trees or running through the castle.
The story fits a pattern in which a cruel lord's victim walks the local road. Jervise was a nineteenth century antiquarian collecting local tradition, and no fifteenth century source is cited for it.
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