Samuel Hughan and Mary McKie.

This family has proved to be a fascinating research study, due mainly to several very interesting people who belong to its branches.
Whenever a 'Google search' is made for the name 'Hughan',the most hits are for two individuals in particular...W.J (William James) Hughan, a famous Freemason author and scholar, and Jessie Wallace Hughan, an American-born feminist and schoolteacher/author. These two characters just happen to be first cousins once removed...Jessie's father Samuel Hughan was the first cousin of William James Hughan, and their fathers, Peter and William Hughan, were brothers-the sons of Samuel Hughan and Mary McKie.

Of Samuel Hughan and his wife Mary McKie, very little is known. Samuel was born in c. 1768. He was a farmer at Balhasie near Creetown, in the Parish of Kirkmabreck. His wife, Mary McKie, was born c. 1766,not in Kirkcudbrightshire(according to the 1841 census)
Samuel Hughan died on October 17, 1835, in his 68th year. His sons, Peter and William, placed a memorial stone on his grave in the old Kirkmabreck Kirkyard:
"By Peter and William Hughan In Memory of their father Samuel Hughan late farmer in Balhasie died 17/ 10/1835 in his 68th year. Also their mother Mary McKie died 12/6/1848, aged 82."

In the 1841 census, Mary McKie Hughan was living in Meiklecarse Cottage at Minnigaff, aged 70 (she was actually closer to 75) and of independent means. Her son Peter and his family were living close by in Meiklecarse Farm House. Peter and his wife Jessie Forsythe had moved to England for a period where Peter had worked as a draper at Stonehouse in Devon, but in the late 1830s the family had moved back to Minnigaff to farm.

Mary McKie Hughan's death notice was published in the Wigtownshire Free Press:
Death: At Meikle Carse, Minnigaff, on the 12th inst., Mary McKie, aged 82 years, relict of the late Mr. Samuel Hughan, farmer in Balhazie by Creetown."-October, 1848.

I can only find reference to two children having been born to Samuel Hughan and Mary McKie, and will deal with them separately in following blog entries.