Christian Aitken

  General Notes:

On the night of the 1841 census Christian Aitken, listed as a female servant aged 15, but actually 16, was listed at Sauchie Mill, a farm and a watermill, one mile from Auchenbowie. Also at Sauchie Mill were her brother John, an agricultural labourer incorrectly listed as 15, and two uncles and one aunt on their mother's side: James McLauchlan, farmer, 55; John McLaughlan, independent, 50; and Christian McLaughlan, independent, 45. At Millholm, a neighbouring farm, which included a sawmill, lived another sibling of Mary Aitken, Lachlan McLauchlan, 40, his wife, eight children and three servants.

Thus in 1841, Christian Aitken was on census night living only a mile from Auchenbowie, where David Marshall lived. Her mother Mary Aitken in 1841 was living at Dunipace, adjacent to Denny, with Mark, aged 14. Dunipace was about four miles south of Auchenbowie, and five miles south of Sauchie Mill. Christian's father, Archibald, was not listed.

Auchenbowie in the 1850s was one of the nine "principal estates" in the parish of St. Ninian's. Samuel Lewis described St Ninians in 1851 as an ancient rural society, albeit in a transitional state due to agricultural and industrial changes. There were about 10,000 inhabitants of the parish, of whom 1200 lived in the actual village of St Ninians, one mile south of the town of Stirling. The Auchenbowie estate was situated about two miles further south.

The 18541 Census records her living at 85 Barn Road Stirling with her widowed mother and 2 unmarried brothers.

She arrived in Victoria, Australia in 1853 but died a few months later.

Christian married David Marshall, son of Living and Living, in 1848 in Torbrex, County of Stirling , Scotland, UK. (David Marshall was born in 1824 in Stirlingshire, UK and died on 27 Jan 1893 in Hawthorne, Victoria, Australia ¹.)