Mary. Blair Thornhill

[Maifitz]

WOW I went to bed last night thinking about the puzzle  even had dreams about it. I found information on Granny Blair's grave stone just before I packed it in for the night and it had Buchanan, Blair nee McAlpine and I was so frustrated.

Then I get up this morning and find all this information waiting for me, Thank you thank you thank you

What a fabulous group you are. I spoke with my husband's Aunt and she has given me another family member to call who would be more likely to remember the info on her Granny. So hopefully I can get some answers on this generation before I move on. 

I'm so excited

[Maifitz]

Oh Gosh Anne I see that you have a posted a picture of the gravestone..... Thank you so much, the info I found last night only had a portion of the text and I was going to see if I could find more info today.

I'm overwhelmed by all the help I'm getting from everyone.  I'm so excited.

[MonicaL]

The big breakthroughs are always exciting aren't they  I am excited for you, and it is not my family!

Some thoughts for you to progress through on details:

The NAS (the National Archives of Scotland now merged and is being renamed the National Records of Scotland) details provided by Hume:

Reference CS258/11465 in  1945
Title    Mary E Gray or Blair v Robert H Blair - Divorce

Reference    CS46/1964/732 in 1964
Title    Mary Gray or Buchanan: Appointment as Trustees under Feu Disposition by Rob Thomson of Rev John B Mackenzie & others (Polmont Domestic Mission)

You can contact them (email enquiries[replace with 'at' sign]nas.gov.uk) and ask them for a quote to photocopy these documents and send them to you via 'snail mail'.

The other route, need to do more homework on this, is to check on the voter's roll to see who lived at Burnside Cottage between at least 1920-45, maybe more years either side. This seems to be where all the family women lived! These searches cannot be done online though but likely a main local family history library would have the voter roll ledgers to check (this is where the homework is needed as to which one!). Again, this is likely to require some emailing direct to the relevant library for to ask for help (unless a family member...or RootsChatter...lives nearby  ).

Monica 

[Maifitz]

Got the Marriage certificate for Thomas and Mary that Ev found on FHS.  It was Thomas's second marriage and he already had 6 children and 1 child that died. Looks like Mary Hollas was from Belfast.

Thanks Monica for the suggestions for next steps.

[MonicaL]

1855 BMDs are great aren't they. The first year of official Scottish registration and the certs ran over two pages of the registers. For one year only, lots of additional info was included.

Remember to look at the link I posted earlier which has some further info on this line going back  http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~heron1/fam725.html

Monica

[Maifitz]

I decided to do a search on the 1901 census for a peter or john Gray in maybole.  I found a peter living on the same street as Mary McAlpine was born. His occupation is listed as slater which matches Mary's death cert. He is listed with a Mrs Gray, whose age and birth location matched Mary's mothers info. Three children were listed, John Gray b 1889' Charles Gray 1899, and Thomas Gray 1897.  I searched for them on the Scotland's people site but couldn't find them with the last name Gray. So I decided to try last name mcalpine and found john (father not  listed b. Stranraer) and Charles (father was listed as peter Gallagher, slater b. in 1899 dalbettie) both matching with the dates from the census, both illegitimate, both born to Mary McAlpine. I  still haven't tracked down Thomas yet, but it is looking like these are Mary Jr.'s siblings.

Now if I could just figure out what name she used in the 1891 & 1911 census

[monks13]

There are still Blairs living in Low town Thornhill

[Hairy haggis]

Looking for info on my mother-in-laws family. Her grandmother was Mary Blair not sure if this was her married name. Her daughter was Catherine Blair and her granddaughter was Mary(May) Blair my mother-in-law. May was born in Burnside cottage in Thornhill  having difficulty reconciling GRO records for this family.

                                                                                                       
Hi I've just stumbled onto this web site and some how found this conversation, the lady you are talking about is my great granny, my grandfather was Robert (Bobby) Blair he would be a brother to Catherine Blair! I have a full history going back,way back and would be happy to share... My mother (M. Blair) has spent a wee bit of time documenting her family and would love to share..
my email is *

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