Mary Steele

Mary Steele came from Dalry in Ayrshire. She married William Laurie, a tailor in Greenock in 1776. they had 3 sons and 4 daughters.

William Laurie

William Laurie was a tailor in Greenock. He was born in Kirkmahoe, Dumfries, in Scotland in 1755, the son of John Laurie and Janet Jardine. William married Mary Steele from Dalry in Ayrshire, at Greenock, in 1776. They had three sons and four daughters. The youngest, Magdalen, married William Alston, whose grandson RA Alston later married Lizzie Steel, a great granddaughter of eldest daughter Janet.

Janet Laurie

Janet Laurie was the eldest daughter of William Laurie and Mary Steele of Greenock. She was born in 1779 and had three brothers and three sisters that we know of. Janet married John Heron, a watchmaker in Greenock, in 1795 and they had eleven or twelve children. Her husband died at Greenock in 1837 and Janet died in Glasgow in 1844. [Greenock Advertiser 3.12.1844]

John Heron

John Heron was the second son of James Heron and Mary Ninian. He was christened at Ayr in Scotland in 1772. He had four brothers and three sisters. He became a watchmaker in Greenock, where his older brother had been christened in 1768 and married Janet Laurie there in 1795. His eldest daughter Mary was our ancestor. We saw an exhibition of John Heron's silverware in the gallery in Greenock in 2004, but unfortunately we have not yet found any surviving among family members. I have also heard from the owner of a marine chronometer made by him.

John Heron died at Greenock in 1837, age 64 [Greenock Advertiser 2.1.1837]

Mary Heron

Mary Heron was the eldest daughter of John Heron, a watchmaker and silversmith in Greenock and Janet Laurie. She was born in 1798 and had 7 brothers and 4 sisters. She married James Steel, who had also grown up in Greenock, in 1825, when he moved to Glasgow with the Clyde Shipping Company. They lived in York Street near the Broomielaw docks and raised 8 sons, although one died in 1854 aged 21. Two sons joined their father in a lighterage and towage company, while three went to India and two to Australia. Mary's husband died in 1858 and she died of heart disease in 1871, soon after her son Thomas returned to Glasgow to marry. They are buried at the Necropolis in Glasgow.

Mary with sons, John, Octavius, Thomas and Robert - Jan 1871