Hi Rob,
Remembered where I came across the name - and it was actually
Charteris.
I found a marriage in Dumfriesshire of a Jean (Jane&Jean were interchangeable names) Hamilton to a John Charteris . But it was not your Jane.
I'd been considering an earlier marriage for Jane , wondering if she had already been widowed prior to William Ferguson. For let's face, in the early/mid 1800s Scotland, Jane was at approx 38 quite
elderly for being a first time mum ( this comes from a Scottish lass who gave birth at 38!). But during those times most women were married young and giving birth throughout their 20's to 40's. Therefore I wondered if Annie was the result of a second marriage. But I haven't came across any evidence of that - the above Charteris couple were having children in the 1830s and 40s and are on the Censuses.
It could have been that Jane was never married , that Annie was called by her father's surname and that Jane took the surname and called herself a widow to appear "respectable". This would not have been unusual
. Have you found an OPR of either a marriage for Jane or a birth for Annie?
Might be that none exists. Not everyone was married by the parish church minister. Not all births were recorded by the parish.
Not great for us family history researchers.
Same applies for records/MI's for John Hamilton & Anna Scott, unfortunately. Not to say there won't be any, but....good chance there's not.
Have you came across this website
http://edina.ac.uk/stat-acc-scot/Scroll down to where it reads
For Non Subscribers. Browse scanned pages . Click on it. Then you can search by Parish name i.e Keir or Peebles. You will have a choice of 2 reports to read from different years - circa 1790s and 1830s/40s written by the Parish minister. They can make fascinating reading and although it's unusual for a person to be named it gives you a flavour of life and conditions in the parish (the ministers are always complaining about drink!).
The Rev. Adamson of Newton Midlothian, who I suspect Jane could be employed by at the time of the 1841 Census, has written the report on Newton Feb 1845.
*Warning* Reading these reports can become highly addictive
. I spent hours on this site!
Looby