52 Ancestors - Week 4 - Invite to Dinner - Mary Kennon

Under Scottish naming traditions, I am named after my dinner guest, Mary Kennon, my grandmother Mary's grandmother. I've always known of Mary Kennon, but I know very little about her. Firstly the menu - we'd probably have Solway Firth shrimps and flounder as Mary would have caught and eaten these as a girl. 

Mary Kennon was born at Carsethorn, Kirkbean on the shores of the Solway Firth in Scotland a month before the first official United Kingdom census, where she is registered with who appear to be her mother, Jean, a brother, James aged two, and an older couple. My first question would be to ask her about her mother, Jane. There is no father present, but that does not surprise me. Kirkbean today is a sleepy little village and Carsethorn is even quieter, but that belies its history as a bustling port. In fact, John Paul Jones, the famous United States naval commander was born close by and Mary is buried in the same graveyard as his father. In 1850 alone, 10,000 people emigrated through Carsethorn to North America, 7,000 to Australia and 4,000 to New Zealand. I'd ask Mary if her father was a seaman and if he ever returned home. I'd also like to know what happened to her mother and her brother.

Secondly, I'd ask Mary about her childhood. She must have stayed around Carsethorn as she was there in 1851. By 1861, things had changed for Mary and she was then working as a dairymaid for a family named McCall. There were three men in the house. By 1863, she was back at Carsethorn pregnant with my great-grandmother, Jane, known as Jean. The name of the father is not registered. Is Jean's father a McCall? Maybe Mary would be able to tell me this.

After that, Mary goes missing. The only time I find her again is on her gravestone in the Kirkbean graveyard. She is appended to a long list of names and it is unclear if the other people are present in the grave. I suspect the headstone was carved by her son in law, Jean's husband, Sandy King. I'd like to ask Mary about those other people. Who were they and how were they related to Mary? (More on this gravestone in my next post.)

The other person I'd like to ask Mary about is "Uncle Bob". He may well be Mary's son, and perhaps she had another called James, but if records are correct, they are quite a lot younger than my great grandmother. In his memoirs, my father mentions going to Carsethorn in the late 1920s. Uncle Bob had served on minesweepers in the Royal Navy during the Great War. When my father knew him, he was a fisherman and a coxswain on the lifeboat, Georgina Frances. His name is also inscribed on the memorial gates at the churchyard. What else could she tell me?

Mary Kennon would be the perfect dinner guest as she would fill in so many gaps on that family line.

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