This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/TeC.2ACE/1370.1 Message Board Post: When you say you have searched in vain, does that include the whole of Scotland or did you confine yourself to certain districts? And did you check English records as well? Could you post the dates, locations and ages from the childrens deaths that you know about - this may also provide a clue. Also Andrews age? There are several Andrew DOWNIEs on the 1901 census of England. One possibility is that he was not dead, but had simply left his wife - either by mutual consent or desertion. Hard to get away with a 'widow' fib in the islands but easy in Glasgow where the enumerator was probably a stranger. JAO