Henry Raeburn Brown

[Forfarian]

Thank you, Chawi.

In fact William Slater Brown (1875-1926) and Agnes Euphemia McCarthy had four sons. The eldest was William Slater Brown (1913-1970), who married my mother's sister. There are living descendants, and it is on behalf of one of them that I started looking into this side of the family.

Thank you for adding to the sparse details I had on Henry Raeburn Slater Brown. I had been told that he was known as Ray or Rae and that he had gone to Rhodesia, but I had no more information.

Also Sir William Slater Brown and Margaret Dods had eight children altogether: Margaret Ann, 1866-1946; Helen Clyde 1867-1870, Henry Raeburn 1869-1947, Elizabeth Dods 1870-1871, George Dods b 1872, Williamina 1874-1938, William Slater 1875-1926 and Robert Dods 1878-1972.

I can't give details of the descendants because RootsChat doesn't allow posting of details of living people. Post another couple of messages and we can then exchange e-mails by Personal Message (PM).

[Chawi]

Wow Forfarian! This is incredible!

Rae was obviously a very reticent man & seldom discussed his family, but a 4th son is ringing distant bells for my husband.  I only confirmed DMS Brown's existence yesterday via Forces Records & ScotlandsPeople, so this is an amazing discovery & we are very excited you replied!

Did William & your aunt have children? If so, there are cousins out there we'd love to contact & possibly even meet one day.  Again, DMS Brown may have had children, we have no idea.....

I am not sure how to go about sending a PM as this is the first time I've used rootschat.com

Do you Facebook?

I will leave discussion about the KIA in Gaza HR Brown for another time as I have yet to figure how he fits in to the picture I have.  Genealogy is not made easy by several generations using the same names! However, I am glad to confirm the Sir William connection as I couldn't quite believe it & I had Helen Clyde as a spouse of one of Sir William's sons, not a child of theirs.

Thank you for reaching out all those years ago, time to catch up....

Rgds

Chawi

[Forfarian]

I do FB but not for family history.

Helen Clyde was the wife of the first Henry Raeburn Brown, and the name Helen runs in the family. One of Sir William's daughters was named Helen Clyde Brown, but she died young.

I have not solved the question of why the first HRB was named Henry Raeburn. I am sort of assuming it was after the painter, but why?

I also came across a snippet in a newspaper that said Sir William was a native of Duns in Berwickshire. He wasn't; both he and his father were born in Edinburgh, but there must be some sort of connection to Duns further back.

[GR2]

No sign of H R Brown in the published Edinburgh burgess lists, so no help with parents there.

[Forfarian]

Thank you for checking, but no, I would not have expected him to be.

He was a tailor, and he died (inconveniently early) in 1852. I don't think he was notably prosperous because his widow was a laundress and later did mangling, and I think his father may have been a gamekeeper in the Duns area, so he didn't really have a ready way into being a burgess.

I need to try to have a look at the Edinburgh apprenticeship records to see if there is any record of him being taken on as an apprentice in the city. He has to have learned his trade somewhere!