Thanks for putting me right on the Jane/James confusion - my friend has deteriorating eyesight, which made her give up professional genealogy, and has obviously misread the certificate.
Unfortunately I subscribe to many different family history boards but I will make a note in my database of this correspondence instead of relying on the search facility in my email programme.
My family moved from Kilconquhar to South Leith some time between 1767 and 1770 as David Downie and Jean Boid had their fourth son in Kilconquhar in 1767 and their fifth, sixth and seventh in South Leith. I believe that David was the same David (labourer in South Leith) whose death on 11 February 1791 aged 55 and burial on 13 February is recorded in the South Leith OPR. That doesn't quite match his birth date of 9 October 1733 in Kilconquhar so there is still a doubt that this is his burial record, though the occupation is the same as shown on the birth records of the two sons whose records I could find.
I've been in to that OPR twice already, first for my Downies and then for another family in the early 19th Century whose head, Alexander, was a shipmaster - he was born in Braemar. There are lots of Downies there through the years so one day I must go through the whole thing.
I have often come across Lowries and Downies in the same OPR and I don't think there is any connection between the names. However I know that as I scroll through the films, I always stop when I see 'Lowrie' and double check.
Thanks for the information on Thomas Downie's burial record, which establishes his approximate date of birth. I have what appears to be a different record, from the Grange Cemetery records or a transcription from his gravestone, found on the Edinburgh Ancestors website (which I thought was defunct but has now been revitalised). I didn't know who it was but the details match fairly closely: Thomas Downie died 5 August 1832 aged 47. There is a picture of the gravestone there and I have sent a donation in the hope that the photograph which I will receive in return will be readable enough to make out the inscription:
http://www.edinburghancestors.org.uk/dbase/site/Gravestones_Databaseview.php?ID=15883Of course I didn't realise that this was the same Thomas but it seems quite likely. Can you give the full details from the OPR record to verify that this is the same person?
As an aside (maybe?), I have a William Downie born about 1796 in Crathie and Braemar who became head gardener at Traquair House. He was almost certainly a Catholic (he had a son who was a priest) and his birth is not recorded in the Braemar or Crathie OPRs. There are lots of loose ends in Braemar as there was a large Catholic population and the Catholic registers don't start till 1820. Some people had one or more of their children registered in the Church of Scotland OPR. He married Ann Frazer in November 1820 in South Leith and his son James Duncan Downie was a Gardener living at 43 Home Street, St Cuthberts in 1841. Unfortunately, William's death certificate, on which his son Robert William Wallace Downie of New Abbey Dumfries was the informant, does not give his mother's name, only the father William Downie Farmer (deceased). Most of the other children emigrated to Queensland and I have been in touch with their descendants.
I can't help at all with the children of John Downie and Alison Barrie as all I have is their dates of birth from IGI. I'm waiting for FreeCEN to find them in the 1851-71 Censuses!
All the best
Ian