Agnes Broun

Agnes Broun
Agnes Broun's headstone at Bolton Kirkyard
Born	17 March 1732 Whitestone Cottage, Culzean, Scotland
Died	14 January 1820 Bolton, East Lothian, Scotland
Occupation	Wife to William Burness or Burnes

Agnes Broun (17 March 1732 – 14 January 1820), or Agnes Burnes was the mother of the poet Robert Burns. Her father, Gilbert, was the tenant of the 300 acre farm of Craigenton, in Kirkoswald parish,South Ayrshire, Scotland.

Agnes Broun (or Brown) was the oldest of her five siblings, and was aged just 10 when her mother, Agnes Rainie, died. She spent two years looking after the family. Her sister, Jean, was to later become the mother of Captain Alexander Allan, patriarch of the Allan shipping dynasty.

In 1744, after her father Gilbert was remarried to Margaret Blaine, she was sent to live in Maybole with her maternal grandmother, Mrs. Rainie. This grandmother was a repository of much oral tradition, including Scottish songs and ballads. She had no great liking for her two stepmothers, one of whom was several years her junior and this may explain why Robert Burns had no contact with his maternal grandfather.

Agnes attended a dame school held in a weaver's cottage and learned the psalms by heart, picked up some basic reading skills, but writing was not part of her education and she never even learned to write her own name.

Agnes was eventually engaged to one William Nelson, a ploughman, who she worked with, but broke off the engagement after 7 years due, reportedly, to an indiscretion on Nelson’s part. It is thought that she met William Burnes or Burness, eleven years her senior, a market gardener, at the Maybole Fair in 1756. They married on the 3 December 1757 in Ayr, and settled at Alloway, South Ayrshire, living in a clay cottage that William had planned and built himself. Here they were to raise four of their seven children, including her eldest, Robert Burns, born on 25 January 1759. In 1767, about a year after moving to Mount Oliphant, Agnes gave birth to William Burnes (b. 30 July), followed at roughly two year intervals by John (b. 10 July 1769) and Isobel (b. 27 July 1771). Later homes were Lochlea, Mossgiel, and finally Grant's Braes, Bolton, near Haddington in East Lothian where she died.