CUMMING, Magdalene ¹

   Another name for Magdalene was CUMMING, Magdalena.²

Magdalene married Major John GORDON, son of John GORDON 4th of Minmore, Jacobite 1745 and Elspet GRANT, on 29 November 1807.¹ (Major John GORDON was born about 1761, died on 3 April 1819 in Aberdeen, Scotland ¹ and was buried on 9 April 1819 in Inveravon Churchyard, Banffshire, Scotland.)

  Marriage Notes:

"After his retirement (John) Gordon farmed Drumin, in Inveravon, just at the point where the Avon and Livet join, and near the ruins of the old castle of Drumin, the seat of the Barons of Strathaven (Stewart's ' Lectures from the Mountains ' 1860 : 1st series p. 101). On July 1799 he was admitted a member of the Highland Society, of which his brother Lewis was secretary.

He married on November 29, 1807, Magdaline Cuming, Kirkmichael. This marriage is the subject of a big dossier at the Public Record Office in London for it was never registered, and when Mrs Gordon, ' in indigent circumstances,' came to apply to the War Office for a pension she had to put herself to a great deal of trouble to bring witnesses before the Commissary at Aberdeen (July 8, 1819) to show that she and her husband were habit and repute man and wife while residing in Upperkirkgate, Broadford, and Frederick Street, Aberdeen, while the Rev. William Grant, the parish minister of her native Kirkmichael, forwarded this very interesting note : -

These certify that the late Major Gordon, of the 8th West India Regiment, and also his relict, Mrs Gordon, now residing at Tomintoul in this parish, were of the Roman Catholic persuasion ; and it has not been customary here for some time past when both parties are of that persuasion, for them to be married by a clergyman of the Established Church, and consequently the regis tration of their marriages has been almost wholly neglected. Given at the Manse of Kirkmichael, the 18th day of August 1819.

This letter satisfied the authorities, for the widow of Gordon who lived in Holburn Street, Aberdeen, in April 1819, was granted a pension of £70 from April 4, under a warrant dated November 13, 1819. He had three children, who were all placed on the Compassionate List on the recommendation of his brother Lewis, and the Duke of Gordon at £12 a year each, May 26, 1820."

from The Gordons and Smiths at Minmore ³