So Alexander had been married before, but to whom?

 Knowing that Alexander’s daughters Ann and Mary were supposed to have been born in Strathglass, it was possible that Alexander had married a Strathglass lass.  I decided to look for a marriage certificate on Scotland’s People.  I knew that Ann had been born about 1858 so I searched for any marriages taking place in Strathglass in 1857 +/- 2 years and I searched only for Alexander McRae.  Incredibly, only two records came up in the search and when I opened the second record there he was.

 On the 25th June, 1857, Alexander married Jane Morrison at Struy Church in the Parish of Kilmorack.  He was 33 years old, a shepherd, who at the time of marriage was residing at Lochournhead in the Parish of Glenelg.  Alexander’s parents were Alexander and Ann m.s McPhie, as mentioned on his marriage certificate to Mary, so I was confident this was the marriage I’d been looking for. 

 Jane was 27.  She was living at Comer, Kilmorack.  Her father, Donald Morrison, was also a shepherd and her mother was Christian m.s MacLennan.  It was fairly safe to assume that Jane was the mother of Ann and Mary but I needed to know for sure.  Searches on Scotlands People confirmed my thoughts.  

 Ann was born on the 28th May, 1858, at Comer.  It was her grandfather, Donald, who registered the birth and had been present at the time of the birth. Presumably Alexander was away shepherding at the time.  

 Mary was born several years later on the 19th May, 1862, at Kerrow, Kiltarlity.      This time Alexander was present and it was he who registered the birth.  I was so excited to find Ann and Mary’s birth certificates that I missed the fact that the gap between Ann and Mary was quite big.

 Having found Jane and confirming that both Ann and Mary were definitely born in Strathglass I went back to the 1861 census to find the family.  I still couldn’t find them under Alexander so I tried searching for Jane.  I had to use wildcards to find the record as McRae had been incorrectly transcribed so she wasn’t easy to find. When I did find her,  there was yet another surprise.

Scotland's People 1861 Census Entry.

Alexander is not on the census, which is not surprising.  As a shepherd it would not have been unusual for him to spend time away from home.  Jane is described as Head of the house and a shepherd’s wife.  Ann, age 3 is also on the census, so again I was fairly confident that I had the right household. The surprising entry was their one year old son Donald, who had been born in Kintail.   When Alexander and Mary marry, they go on to have a twin son called Donald, but neither my mother nor my grandfather were aware of an earlier Donald.  This isn’t altogether surprising as no one was actually aware of Alexander’s first marriage to Jane.  Also mentioned on the census is 8 year old Catherine McRae, a servant, born in Kiltarlity.  I was very surprised to see a shepherd’s family with a servant and have since discovered that in the earlier census records a relative was often described as a servant when they may actually have been a niece or a nephew.   I put Catherine to one side and focused on Donald.  I needed to confirm that Donald really was Alexander and Jane’s son.  

 Another search on Scotland’s people produced a birth certificate for Donald.  Donald was born on 19th November, at Aultcairn, Longord in the Parish of Kintail.  Alexander registered the birth at Kintail on the 7th December, but was not present at the birth.  My curiosity was well and truly piqued because I knew that Donald does not appear on the 1871 census with the rest of the family, at Gress in Lewis.  What happened to him?

 Sadly, 3 months after Mary was born, Jane died of pneumonia, in August 1862.  At some point between August 1862 and 1866 Alexander and his young family move to the Isle of Lewis but by 1871 Donald is no longer with them.  I searched for a death certificate for Donald but nothing came up.  The wonderful Anne Fraser from the Highland Archive Centre suggested re-searching the census records using wildcards.  When we did that, we found him, hiding behind a very poor transcription spelling.  Donald was still in Strathglass, living with his aunt and uncle - Jane’s sister and brother-in-law.  For reasons I may never discover, Alexander took Ann and Mary to Lewis and left Donald behind.  I’ve done some further research on Donald.  He has his own story to tell, but that’s for another day.