Elisabeth Taylor was christened on January 10th, 1762 in Meigle. (Her first name is spelled variously in the records as Elisabeth and Elizabeth.) Elizabeth's father, John Taylor, was born in Meigle on December 28, 1733. Her mother, Janet (or Jannett) Whitten was born in Meigle on May 19, 1735 and married John Taylor October 25, 1760 in Meigle. We have the name of only one of Elizabeth's grandparents - David Whitten. As shown in the genealogical chart, Elizabeth was the first of 9 children born to John Taylor and Jannett Whitten. All were born in Meigle.

Elizabeth and Thomas Weighton were married in Meigle on October 24th, 1789. Both were members of the Meigle parish at the time. Elizabeth would have been 27 years old at the time of her wedding.

At the age of 29 in 1791, Elizabeth gave birth to her daughter Janet in Kettins. Brother John (our ancestor) was born there too in 1792. The family then moved to Newtyle where twins (Elspet and William) were born in December 23, 1794. Margarat was born in 1797 and then another set of twins appeared (Betty and Robert) on August 30, 1800.

One of Elizabeth's most important responsibilities would have been the kailyard - the garden that the family relied on for most of their food. While Elizabeth and her family enjoyed a better supply of food than was available to her parents and grandparents in the first half of the 18th century, nevertheless, hunger and deprivation were never further away than the next crop failure. She herself was born in one such crop failure year (1762). She likely would have experienced hard times in 1762, 1771, and 1782 as well. In 1772, when Elizabeth was 10, Perthshire experienced a shortage of grain that resulted in food riots in Perth but the effects would also have been felt in Meigle.

In the very decade that Elizabeth gave birth to 7 children, there were three crop failures (1795, 1799, and 1800). The crop failure of 1799 was due to the combined effects of the cold winter of 1798/99 and the cool and rainy growing season of the year. The summer was characterized by the prevalence of low-pressure systems resembling cyclonic weather patterns of the winter. The crop failure of 1800 was mainly due to a drought early in summer. In July there was either no rain at all or the amounts were negligible. Needless to say, raising a young family during this period would have been challenging, to say the least.

Click Food and Famine for more information about the food that Scottish lowland families ate in the 18th century, as well as information on the effects of famine on those families.

We do not know when Elizabeth died. We do know that she was not listed in the 1841 census (when she would have been 79) so, it appears that she died before then. In 1828, her first son John would name one of his daughters Elizabeth Taylor Wighton after her grandmother.

Sources

Family Search, The LDS Genealogical Website: (http://www.familysearch.org/)

ScotlandsPeople Database (http://www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk/)

Scots Ancestry Research Society (March 26, 1971). Report to John L. Wighton

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