Gravestone of Alexander Pattullo, Jane Watson and Thomas Pattullo, Melville White Church Cemetery, Caledon

Seen in a photograph on FamilySearch Memories (“Alexander Pattullo headstone,” contributed by JulieVWilcox, 9 July 2024, tagged to Alexander Pattullo LHW8-6P9, Jean Watson LWGR-1PW and Thomas Pattullo LWGT-9PN), from a screenshot of 10 Oct 2026; and in the transcription on Alexander’s Find a Grave memorial, as copied the same day (contributed by Monica Ross).

A tall marble slab, two arched panels side by side over a third:

ALEX. PATTULLO / DEPARTED THIS LIFE / Dec. 8. 1828: / In the / 55 year of / HIS AGE. / A native of / DUNDEE / SCOTLAND.

JANE WATSON / HIS WIFE / DEPARTED THIS / LIFE / Aug. 8. 1852: / In the / 84 [?] year of / HER AGE. / A native of / PRESTONPANS / SCOTLAND.

THOMAS PATTULLO. / Died Oct. 31. 1849. / in the 32 year of his age. / Erected by Halket Pattullo / A. D. 1855.

The second figure of Jane’s age is unclear in the photograph; the transcription reads her “aged 83,” which is the same thing (“in the 84th year”). The transcription’s “Halket/Harriet” is plainly Halket in the photograph.

A death notice of 1829, summarised on the Find a Grave memorial: a Scottish immigrant, killed “some time ago” by a falling tree in Caledon, leaving a wife and five or six children.

The contributor’s research notes (Find a Grave):

• “Unlikely spouse”: no record on ScotlandsPeople, Findmypast, FamilySearch, Ancestry or elsewhere of a marriage between Alexander Pattullo and a Sarah or Sadie Howe or Howie.
• “Possible parents”: a baptism at Carnbee, Fife, 5 Mar 1788, of Alexander, son of John Pittullo and Janet Halket (OPR 413/20 p. 257).
• “Another earlier Pattullo-Halket connection”: a baptism at Bo’ness, 8 Dec 1755, of Janet Halket Patullo, daughter of James Patullo and Elizabeth Erskine (OPR 663/30 p. 70).

The cemetery (Canada’s Historic Places, Melville White Church and Cemetery, 15962 Mississauga Road, Caledon): the white frame church was built in 1837 to replace an earlier log church, the centre of the Scottish “Rockside Pioneers” who settled the southwest corner of Caledon Township in the 1820s; “the adjacent cemetery was established in 1866.” Alexander’s burial in 1828 and the stone of 1855 come before that date, so the burying ground was in use before it was formally established.

What it shows:

• Alexander Pattullo was a native of Dundee and died 8 Dec 1828 in his 55th year, aged 54, so he was born between December 1773 and December 1774. That settles Dundee over Trimble’s “native of Prestonpans,” which was his wife’s birthplace.
• He was killed by a falling tree. Trimble tells this of his son Thomas; the 1829 notice has it of Alexander.
• Jean (here “Jane”) Watson died 8 Aug 1852 in her 84th year, aged 83: born 1768 or 1769, as the FamilySearch tree has it. That conflicts with the 1771 Prestonpans baptism WikiTree gives her (jean-watson-1771).
• Thomas Pattullo died 31 Oct 1849 in his 32nd year: the Thomas baptised in 1817, Halkett’s younger brother.
• Halket put up the stone, in 1855, the year he moved to Blenheim Township, where he died that June (gravestone-jane-robson-1879).
• The Carnbee baptism of 1788 cannot be this Alexander, who was 54 in 1828; and his first son was James, not John. Its value is the name: a Pattullo married to a Halket, in Fife, a generation before Halkett Pattullo was born. Halkett’s unusual given name very probably honours a Halket in the family, perhaps his father’s mother. A lead, not a link.