John's infancy

The Scots Ancestry researchers were unable to find any record of Thomas Wighton and Elizabeth Taylor's children in the parish records but this was because they restricted their searches to just the Meigle and Alyth parishes. The ScotlandsPeople Database reveals that a John Weighton was born on December 16, 1792 to Thomas Weighton and Janet Taylor in the parish of Kettins which is about 5 miles south-west of Meigle. A confusing element is his mother being referred to as Janet rather than as Elizabeth, but all of Thomas' other children were born to Elizabeth or Elisabeth Taylor. Death certificate data confirm that John was born to Thomas Wighton and Elizabeth Taylor.

You may recall that Kettins featured prominently in our search for the Origin(?) of the Meigle Line. I had speculated that George Wighton of Kettins was the father of our earliest confirmed ancestor - John Wighton born in 1708 in Meigle. To read that essay, click on the button above. However, John's birth in Kettins was undoubtedly due to his father finding work as a mason in that parish, rather than there being Wighton relatives still there. John's parents were there as early as 1791 when John's older sister, Janet, was born. From the birth records of John's five other siblings, we can see that the family was in Newtyle parish between 1794 and 1800.

Life in Scotland when John was growing up/John's apprenticeship

By the 1790s, the transition of Scotland's economy from agriculture to an industrial base was well underway. The Lowland Clearances in the Strathmore Valley would have been nearly complete - I have documented earlier (in William's biography) how the number of marriages in Meigle declined steadily from the 1760s - a sign that the village's population was dropping as the cottars left farming and sought other employment. John's grandfather (William) was the first in the Meigle line to leave the land - at least partially as a corn dealer. John's father, Thomas, was a mason, and it is entirely understandable that Thomas would look to the trades as a desirable future for his oldest son. Presumably at some point in his teens, John was apprenticed to a shoemaker, possibly in Alyth. If John's apprenticeship lasted the standard 5-7 years, and if he entered the trade when he was a young teen, he would have become a journeyman shoemaker in his early twenties. (If you wish to take a short side trip, you can re-read the essay on apprenticeships.) Also, here's a new essay on the craft of shoemaking in 19th century Scotland.) During his 20s, John rose to the position of a manager of a boot and shoe factory in Alyth that was owned by John Baxter. (Information from Amy Louisa Hutcheon).

Marriage and a move to Dundee

John married Ann Baxter, the daughter of his employer, on December 30th, 1821 in Alyth. John was 29 and Ann was seven years younger. Sometime between 1823 and 1826, the family left Alyth and relocated to Dundee about 14 miles to the south-east. This move completed the Meigle Wighton line's transition from a rural, agrarian family to an urban, industrialized family: from a cottar farming in Meigle (John), to a cottar/corn merchant in Meigle (William), to a mason in Newtyle/Kettins area (Thomas), and finally to a shoemaker (John) who worked first in Alyth and then in Dundee. From this point on, everyone in our direct line lived an urban life.

It's interesting to speculate what prompted John and Ann to move from what may have been a reasonable life in Alyth. John was the manager/shoemaker working in a shoe and boot factory owned by his father-in-law. Presumably, this was a fairly secure job. Did he move because his prospects in Alyth were poor? Perhaps, Alyth's population was falling? Or were there too many shoemakers for Alyth's population? Was their move driven by a decision by Mr. Baxter? Did he close his factory in Alyth and move his operations to Dundee? Did John continue to work for his father-in-law, or did he move to Dundee to work for someone else? (John's death certificate described him as a "shoemaker", not as a merchant so we can assume that his working life was focused on the shoemaking part of the business.) Or, was their decision driven by a desire to provide for a better life for their children? Did they envision limited prospects for them in rural Perthshire? Dundee was growing rapidly with all sorts of new factories and businesses opening up. Did they see not only a more prosperous life for them with John's shoemaking, but more opportunities for their family as well?

Of course, we'll never know why they moved, but completing the transition from rural, agrarian-based jobs certainly did make a difference for the generations that followed. John Baxter went on to a military career, John Murray became a civil servant, Harry Latta a civil engineer, James Jackson a radio engineer, and your humble author an educator. Other members of the family were teachers (starting with John Murray's sister, this became the family's most frequent occupation), a mechanical engineer, a librarian, as well as other professions. But, the living conditions in Dundee were fraught with health perils and the family did pay a price in child mortality. John and Ann lost a daughter at 10-months from water on the head and a second daughter had her life cut short at the age of 47 from pulmonary congestion. Three grandchildren also died - one from consumption, a second from whooping cough, and a third from pulmonary congestion. That's five premature deaths within two generations. In a previous part of the website, I had written about the health problems that occurred during Dundee's industrialization; that essay now carries much more personal impact. If you wish, you can take a short detour and re-read the History of Dundee, part 2 again. I've added a second essay on health conditions - this one on Cholera during the 19th century. Dundee experienced four cholera epidemics during John's lifetime and the perils of that high mortality disease would have been a constant fear for them. The essay also will give you insight into what life in Dundee would have been like at the time.

John's family

John and Ann's first child, John Baxter Wighton (our 5th generation ancestor) was born in Alyth in 1823. Subsequently, they had 4 girls in Dundee: Barbara, Elizabeth, Ann, and Mary Ann in 1826, 1828, 1833 and 1836. John Baxter Wighton left Dundee in 1843 to serve in the army. He may have been able to return to Dundee from time to time on leave, but most of his life was spent overseas, and he probably would not have seen much of his parents. His wife, Catherine Latta, gave birth to two of their children in Dundee. From their birth certificates, we can assume that she stayed with John and Ann for the first birth, and with sister Barbara for the second. John Baxter retired from the army in 1864 and returned to Perthshire five years before his father's death. John and Ann's second child, Barbara, married but remained in Dundee. The third child, Ann, died at an early age. Mary Ann never married and lived with John and Ann until their deaths.

We get a snapshot of John and Ann's life through the 1861 census records. They were living at 174 Overgate in the St. Mary's district of Dundee. The census records do not show John's age clearly (he would have been around 69) but they do record his birth place as Meigle which was incorrect. Ann was listed as being 60 years old which was accurate. Also living with them at Overgate were his two youngest daughters, Elizabeth (33 years) and Mary Ann (24 years) as well as two grandchildren, Alfred (2 weeks) and Louisa (4 years), who Margaret Serzans was able to identify in subsequent research as Mary Ann's children. Efforts to find the family in the 1841 and 1851 census records were unsuccessful.

We don't know exactly how soon after their arrival in Dundee that John and Ann moved into the Overgate address. We do know that they were living at Overgate in 1855 when John Baxter's daughter Ann died. It's possible that they had lived at 174 Overgate ever since they had moved from Alyth, but we can't say that for sure. So, you may ask, "Where was Overgate and what was it like?" I was able to find some pictures of the Overgate area of Dundee that were taken around 1900. Although the general living conditions in the area may have improved from the 1825-1870 period when John's family lived there, the exterior of the buildings themselves would have remained the same. For further information, and for pictures, click the Overgate Area of Dundee.

Assuming that you're back from your brief detour to Dundee in the 1900's, I don't want to leave you with the images of those clean, cobblestoned streets in your mind. The buildings may have had the same rough appearance in mid century as they did at the turn of the century when the photographs were taken; however, it's doubtful that other aspects to the photograph were the same. From the cholera essay, you'll recall that significant efforts were made to clean up the environment. The 1900's city in the pictures you looked at had sewers, piped water, and even gas lighting. The 1850's Dundee that John and his family lived in had horse droppings, rotting animal flesh, and human middens in the streets. John's Dundee didn't even have the most basic of sanitary facilities such as a WC. Plus, they got their water from wells in the street - wells that very easily could have been contaminated. In short, we would consider the living conditions that John, Ann, and their family experienced in Dundee appalling. Yet, in spite of the unsanitary conditions, the threat of cholera, the other epidemics like typhus and influenza that hit Dundee on a regular basis, John Wighton lived to the age of 76 and died from old age on April 11, 1869. Daughter Barbara registered the death.

John's favourite joke

There was a Scottish tradesman, a painter called Jock, who was very interested in making a pound where he could, so he often would thin down paint to make it go a wee bit further.

As it happened, he got away with this for some time, but eventually the Presbyterian Church decided to do a big restoration job on the roof of one their biggest churches. Jock put in a bid, and because his price was so competitive, he got the job.

And so he set to, with a right good will, erecting the trestles and setting up the planks, and buying the paint and, yes, we're sorry to say, thinning it down with the turpentine.

Well, Jock was up on the scaffolding, painting away, the job nearly done, when suddenly there was a horrendous clap of thunder, and the sky opened and the rain poured down, washing the paint from all over the church and knocking Jock fair off the scaffold to land on the lawn, among the gravestones, surrounded by telltale puddles of the thinned and useless paint.

Jock was no fool. He knew this was a judgment from the Almighty, so he got on his knees and cried: "Oh, God! Forgive me! What should I do?" And from the thunder, a mighty voice spoke: "Repaint! Repaint and thin no more!"

Sources

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

Hutcheon, Amy Louisa (widow of John Murray Wighton, Gen.6): A letter to her grandchildren John and Ella in 1939.

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

Serzans, Margaret (generation 9).

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

Where to now? To read more about Generation 4 John's immediate family, just click top to make a selection from Generation 4's genealogical table at the top of this page. The navigation buttons just below will give you quick access to biographies in other generations.