Anderson is the maiden name of one of our maternal great-great-great-great-great grandmothers, Helen Anderson (1754-1828) of Glasgow, who married John Turnbull in 1774. The sequence of surnames in the seven generations between us goes Anderson-Turnbull-Turnbull-Turnbull-Phillips-Phillips-Rogers-Dwyer.
Anderson is of English and Scottish origin, and is a patronymic of the surname Andrew.1 Our Anderson ancestors came from Glasgow.
John Anderson and Janet Brown of Glasgow are known to have been the parents of Helen Anderson from her baptism record, but from there any details about them are uncertain.
There are numerous John Andersons and Janet Browns recorded as having been born in Glasgow between 1720 and 1735, but there is no record of a John Anderson-Janet Brown marriage there. This does not necessarily mean that a marriage did not take place there. The only record of a child born to John Anderson and Janet Brown in Glasgow between 1740 and 1760 is for Helen Anderson.
There is a John Anderson-Janet Brown marriage record from South Leith, near Edinburgh, in 1742, and there are a number of possible John Andersons and Janet Browns born in the Leith and Duddingston area in the 1720s who could have been the parties to that marriage. So it is possible that our John and Janet were from the Leith-Duddingston area and moved to Glasgow some time between 1746 and 1754.2 On balance, however, this seems less likely than a Glasgow origin for the family.
It is presumed that John and Janet died in Glasgow, but it is not known when.
1 http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Anderson
2 The earlier year is assumed from the birth of a daughter of John Anderson and Janet Brown at South Leith in 1746. There were two daughters born at South Leith: Margaret (b.1744) and Janet (b.1746).