MacPherson, Peter

It was whilst staying with the MacPhersons that Mary Campbell died in the autumn of 1786, and it was in one of his 'lairs', which he had just purchased, or inherited, in the old West Churchyard in Greenock, that she was interred. In 1803, MacPherson gave the Greenock Burns Club permission to erect a memorial tablet on the grave, though in fact the memorial was not erected for another forty years. On 8th November 1920, because of the expansion of Messrs Harland & Wolff's shipyard, the grave was opened. As well as the remains of at least three people, an infant's coffin board was found, strengthening the suspicion, though by no means proving, that while Mary Campbell may in fact have died from a fever contracted from her brother Robert, premature childbirth may at least have been a contributory cause. The remains were transferred to the new Greenock cemetery without, unfortunately, any proper examination of them having been carried out.