Elizabeth Paton

Aird Bridgend with the Dallars Estate and Shaw Mill nearby

She is said to have had a plain face but a good figure. She eventually married John Andrew, a ploughman and widower,[5] on 9 February 1788 in Tarbolton, Ayrshire, Scotland. They had four children; she is said to have been a model housewife.[5] She is presumed to have died before 1799, when John remarried one Jean Lees.[6]

Isabella Begg had heard of Elizabeth Paton as "rude and uncultivated to a great degree... with a thorough (though unwomanly) contempt for every sort of refinement."'[4] In a letter to Robert Chambers she describes Elizabeth as "A well developed, plain-featured peasant girl, frank and independent .." and for these reasons a favourite with Burns's mother. She goes on to say that Elizabeth Paton had a "masculine understanding" and contempt for anything that savoured of culture.[4]

Full view of the Naysmith portrait of 1787, Scottish National Portrait Gallery

Elizabeth gave birth to Robert Burns's first illegitimate child.[1] Burns's mother, who was fond of Elizabeth, wanted her son to marry her, but his brother Gilbert and his sisters were against such a marriage. As the penalty for impregnating Elizabeth, Burns had to pay a fine of a guinea [4] and he also had to do penance in church before the congregation.[7] He responded by writing three poems:[1] some insignificant lines, when 'rough, rude ready-witted Rankine' twitted him over Miss Paton's condition, followed by the brilliant, but somewhat tasteless, outburst of sexual boastfulness of the 'Epistle to John Rankine' of Adamhill.[4] In this poem, Burns describes his seduction in terms of the field. The 'poacher-court' got to hear of the 'paitrick hen' he had brought down with his 'gun', so he had to 'thole the blethers' and pay the fee. However, he is quite unrepentant; for, as soon as her 'clockin'-time is by' and the child is born, he promises himself further 'sportin' by and by' to get value for his guinea.

When baby "bonnie Betty" was born Burns expressed fatherly tenderness, forgetting his earlier masculine posturing. In a Poet's welcome to his 'Love-begotten Daughter'[5][8] or alternatively 'his bastard wean' we find:

No poems seem to have been inspired directly by Elizabeth Paton,[1] but she may have been in the poet's mind when he wrote "The Rantin' Dog." A few lines in Burns's first Commonplace Book dated September 1784 relate to her.

In 1784, in the song "O Tibbie, I hae seen the day", which were addressed to Isabella Steven, the daughter of a Tarbolton farmer, Burns addresses her with:

In this piece the poet may have been referring to Elizabeth as the "lass beside yon park" although he never confirms this.[9]

The headstone of Elizabeth Bishop.

Elizabeth Bishop (22 May 1785 – 8 January 1817) was Robert Burns's first child following an affair with Paton. Elizabeth married John Bishop, factor to the Baillie of Polkemmet, also recorded as an innkeeper, and had seven children. Elizabeth died aged only 32, possibly during childbirth.

Elizabeth Bishop lived as a child at Mossgiel Farm, under Burns's mother's care, until Robert Burns's death. She then returned to her own mother, who was by this time married to John Andrew, a ploughman.[10] At the age of twenty-one, Elizabeth received two hundred pounds from the money raised for the support of Burns's family.

When Burns contemplated emigration to Jamaica he made over his heritable property and the profits from the 'Kilmarnock Edition' of his poems to his brother, Gilbert Burns, to enable him to bring up Elizabeth as if she was one of his own.[11]

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