Biographical notes

James was one of five of the children of Elizabeth Downie and John Pettigrew and, in the Census of 1841, the resulting families are all living in Content Street, Wallacetown.

This family is that of the first marriage of James Pettigrew to Mary Edgar in 1829

There were two children from this marriage, Mary born 27 June 1830 and Elizabeth born 20 August 1832 and there are no other surviving parish records of children for this marriage. Also, there are no subsequent records for Mary (or for James and Mary) in the 1841 and subsequent Census records. Seven years later, a James Pettigrew married Agnes Kennedy on 26 July 1839.

This new family appears with one child called Elizabeth in the 1841 Census with a given age of 5. This age is anomalous as it would mean that she was born in 1836, several years before the marriage. This anomaly can be explained if Elizabeth was from the earlier marriage thus her actual age would have been 9 (in the 1841 Census childrens ages were rounded down to the nearest multiple of 5). Elizabeth subsequently married James Brovan in 1853 `and, in the 1871 Census, the Brovan family is living in Content Street, Ayr.