Robert McCreath (c 1806-1861) married Barbara Jamieson (1811-1877)
Robert McCreath, a Stone mason, married Barbara Jamieson (from Craigie, just to the N.E. of Ayr) on 17 June 1833 at Symington. Barbara was the daughter of Thomas Jamieson, ploughman, and Ann Baird.
They had 10 children –
Thomas McCreath (c.1835-1883) – born Dundonald. Married Margaret Laidlaw.
John McCreath (c.1837-12) – born in Kilmarnock. (i) Margaret Forrester (ii) Mary Robertson
Ann McCreath (c.1839-??) – born in Dundonald. Married Alexander McDonald.
Robert McCreath (1841- 1915) – born in Greenock. Married Isabella Laidlaw.
James McCreath (1843-1891) – born in Eaglesham. Married Jane McConnochie.
William McCreath (1848-??) – born in Eaglesham. Married Sarah Ann Leaver.
David McCreath (c. 1849-??) – born in Eaglesham.
Janet (1) (1851-c.1852) – born in Eaglesham.
Janet (2) (1853-1859) – place of birth unknown.
Their eldest, Thomas, was born in Dundonald, Ayrshire; the others in Kilmarnock and Dundonald, followed by Greenock and Eaglesham in Renfrewshire – indicating the peripatetic existence of a stonemason in 19th Century Scotland
The family eventually ended up at Carrick Street in the Clyde District Glasgow (in the shadow of today’s Kingston Bridge), where Robert died at the age of 56 (the cause of death being recorded as asthma; though possibly, given his trade as a stonemason, he may have contracted the lung disease we know as Silicosis). The move to Glasgow took place sometime between the birth of the couple’s last child, Janet, at Eaglesham in 1853 and her death from tuberculosis at the age of 6 in 1859.
Another daughter, also Janet, is recorded as being two months old in the 1851 Census, when the family was resident at Polnoon Street, Eaglesham. This first Janet presumably did not survive. In common with the custom of that time, the next child was given the same name as the predeceased sibling.