HOUIE, Susanna (DNA Linked) ^{1 2 3 4 5}

   Other names for Susanna were HOUIE, Anne,^{6 7} HOUIE, Annie,⁵ HOUIE, Sussanna,⁵ HOWIE, Susanna ^{5 8} and HOWIE, Susanna Anne.⁹

  Research Notes:

SUSANNA - WHERE DOES SHE BELONG?

"The problem is that (Sus)anna Howie, wife of John Gartshore, is not mentioned in the indexes to the Registers of Sasines but there are four children of Robert Howie and Elizabeth Manuel mentioned."
So says a seasoned family history researcher, Forfarian, in a Rootschat conversation of 2014.
So where does Susanna Houie fit in the Howie family?

1 'SUSANNA'

Like many of the Howie/Houie family of her area and time, this Susanna Houie is not listed in the Church of Scotland Registers of Births and Baptisms, possibly on account of religious differences; we know, for example, that Joseph Howie married into a family of Episcopalians. Or, it may be that the church records mentioning her baptism are not available, for a variety of other reasons. No-one by the name of Susanna appears in the Church of Scotland registers of baptism that might be interpreted as being her. There is, in Campbeltown parish registers in Argyll, a Howie husband, named Robert, married to a woman Susanna Allan, who presented him with a number of children, but none of these children carries her mother's forename.

A Susanna Howie is recorded in St Nicholas parish Aberdeen as being baptised on 11 January 1629. Her parents were Alexander Howie and Mariorie Gormack. A daughter Susanna was born to a Robert Howie and Elizabeth Walker in Edinburgh in 1711. These cases simply highlight the fact that we do not know, even, from which area this Susanna Houie's antecedents came, and so we have a huge difficulty in tracing whether any of these are related to the present family under investigation.

In the New Monkland area, however, before 1712, Susanna was not a recorded in the Church of Scotland registers as a forename, and where it occurs there, after that date, several of the families are known already to be related. However, there was a Susanna Allen born to Robert Allen and Jonet Young in 1696 in Slamannan, and a Susanna Rankine married Thomas Pennie in Slamannan parish in 1704, so the name is not unknown, or unused, in the general area. Moreover, there is a Testament dative for a Robert Allane which is linked to Glentore:

"Allane Robert 4/9/1671 in Glentore, parish of New Monkland TD Hamilton & Campsie Commissary Court CC10/5/8"

Is it possible that the Howies in Campbeltown, Argyll, were related to the Howie family in Airdrie, that there was some family connection that the name, 'Susanna', represents? On the other hand there may be no link at all. We simply do not know, and are having to clutch at straws to a great extent.There are births and marriages elsewhere in Scotland with variants of the name, Susanna, but our lack of knowledge of surnames in the female lines of the Howies makes it even more difficult to know if there are family traditions of this name among any of the Howie ancestors, either in the male or female line.

2 CIRCUMSTANTIAL LINKS

There are circumstantial links between Joseph Howie and Susanna, and by extension, possibly, between other Howies who seem linked to Joseph, and to her. According to Sasine evidence, Joseph was the son of Robert Howie. As others have shown (Forfarian 2016), his father could not be the younger Robert but was the elder Robert Howie of Glentore.

To consider these circumstial links, a series of marriages in the parish of New Monkland of Howies/Houies will be helpful. They are

-HOWIE ELIZABETH WILLIAM YOUNG/FR254 (FR254) 11/03/1709 651/10 243 Airdrie or New Monkland
-HOUIE SUSANNA JOHN GARTSHORE/FR260 (FR260) 29/12/1712 651/10 249 Airdrie or New Monkland
-HOUIE BARBRA JOHN RUSSELL/FR261 (FR261) 05/02/1714 651/10 250 Airdrie or New Monkland
-HOUIE JOHN CHRISTIN FINLAY/FR262 (FR262) 06/11/1714 651/10 251 Airdrie or New Monkland
-HOUIE JOSEPH ELIZABETH HAY/FR268 (FR268) 29/07/1717 651/10 256 Airdrie or New Monkland

We know that, of the parties to these marriages, Elizabeth, married 1709, and Joseph, married 1717, are children of Robert Howie elder of Glentore. The circumstantial links may convince some that the others, Susanna, married 1712, Barbra, married 1714, and John, married 1714, were siblings of Elizabeth and Joseph. Joseph and Elizabeth were half-siblings to Robert Howie, younger, of Glentore.

Robert, as eldest son would inherit whatever rights or resources his father had with regard to the Glentore property. It may have been that Robert, younger's mother had some rights there too. Joseph, from assorted records, was associated with Drumgray. Elizabeth was too, though her link may have also been connected with her husband and his family. There is, then a degree of linkage, among the known children of Robert Howie, elder, between Glentore and Drumgray.

In the text record of the five marriages, cited above, some clues are available:
1709 Elizabeth: two witnesses, including Robert Howie, linked to East Glentore
1712 Susanna: one witness asociated with Blairlin, a Gartshore connection, and William Thome of Easter Glentore
1714 Barbra: witness Joseph Howie of meikle Drumgray and William Young, linked to Elizabeth Howie, of Little Drumgray
1714 John: no immediate known link of witnesses to Glentore or Drumgray
1717 Joseph: both witnesses linked to Hay family intp which he is marrying

Turning to the children of these five marriages, certain forenames recur:
1709 Elizabeth's children: William William Elizabeth Joseph Margret Susanna
1712 Susanna(aka Anne +variants)'s children: John Elizabeth Jean John Susanna Robert Alexander John Joseph
1714 Barbra's children: Joseph Elizabeth Alexander Lisabeth Robert Mary James
1714 John's children: Bessie (variant of Elizabeth) Ann
1717 Joseph's children: Ann Robert James Margret Mary Jean Elizabeth Christin

Granted many names in these lists are not uncommon; but is Joseph? and Susanna? These two names are not at all amongst the commonest forenames in that area and at that time. The most often-recurring names have been underlined: Elizabeth or variant, Susanna or variant, Joseph and Robert are the most noticeable.

The repetition of the forename John, in Susanna's family, and William, in Elizabeth's, we can, without effort, attribute to the ancestry of the husband in each case. Alone, the presence of these forenames does not 'prove' anything; with the other details that link these individuals,drawing an inference that they were very possibly siblings is not unreasonable.

Of the five individuals in the marriage list, the case for John being a sibling of the others is the weakest. There are no identifiable connections, in the little information we have about him, to Glentore, Drumgray or the rest of the individuals under consideration. It is quite possible that he is a cousin of these others, and that is where he has been placed in the hypothetical Howie tree here. ^{5 10 11 12 13 14}

Susanna married John GARTSHORE in Middle Blairlin (DNA Linked), son of John GARTSHORE of Middle Blairlinn, DNA linked and Elezebeth WOOD (DNA Linked), on 29 December 1712 in New Monkland parish, Lanarkshire, Scotland.¹ (John GARTSHORE in Middle Blairlin (DNA Linked) was born in 1690 in Cumbernauld parish, Dunbartonshire, Scotland and was baptised on 11 May 1690 in Cumbernauld parish, Dunbartonshire, Scotland ^{5 15}.)

  Marriage Notes:

Old Parish Register
Airdrie or New Monkland parish Lanarkshire
Marriages

"1712
Decr 29 John Gartshore and Susanna Houie Witt John Craig yo^r in Middle Blairlin and William Thome son to Ro^t Thome in Easter glentore"

Note: A "Robert Thom in Easter Glentore" is a witness to a document of 1710 [National Archives of Scotland RS42/12/123] concerning Robert Howie, writer in Hamilton. ^{3 11}