Hi Julieann & via Parkend,
It may be a long shot (but it did work for me more than once), but have you searched local cemeteries
and the lair records? If not, i'd suggest you ring up the Council's burial section (tel 01387 259 934) to see if they have any historic lair record for a David Bell, and if they do, get filtering!
The Council will likely charge you for a detailed search (I think its £20), but an initial search should be free (providing it doesn't take long to complete).
It may sound obvious, but finding a grave often opens up many doors...
A grave, especially one with a headstone may even confirm whether your ancestors were married. Thousands (4,059 to be exact) were married by priests at Gretna's Headless Cross in what is known as "Irregular marriages". These were not, and are not to this day, centrally recorded. Instead, the records for these legally binding marriages are held by the respective custodians. You will
not find them at scotlandspeople.gov.uk
You can always check with Gretna's Famous Old Blacksmith shop & Museum (they hold 22 volumes of irregular marriages, most of which are after the 1890s) to see if they hold any records of an irregular marriage for your families.
I wouldn't give up on there being a marriage either. In the mid 1800s, Dumfriesshire had a sizeable number of Dissenters, Catholics, Congregationalists and some Methodists who did not conform with the requirements set by the Establishment, and so records are inevitably patchy.
Good luck with your searches.
Kojak
