Person:Margaret Johnston (50)

Margaret Johnston’s origins have yet to be established. Her first confirmed sighting is in 1816, by which time she was already married to a road labourer called John Maitland. Between 1816 and 1826 Margaret and John had four children at Chapel of Garioch in Aberdeenshire. All four of their children’s baptisms note that the family lived at Fordmouth, which was a farm or small hamlet shown on old maps as lying in the parish of Chapel of Garioch between the hamlet of Pitcaple and the River Urie near Mill of Durno. There are no buildings at Fordmouth anymore – the site is now farmland and a small wood.

Margaret has yet to be traced after the baptism of her youngest child; deaths and burials were not being recorded in the area at the time. However, she appears to have died some time before 1836, when John married again.