Hi Sue,

Thanks for your reply. Since I last contacted you I have been beavering away at the wills, just in case I could turn anything up that you may have missed.
As usual, you are ten steps ahead of me but it is no less fascinating and it is easy to spend a whole night poring over the wills.
I keep making great discoveries only to realise that you already know what has taken me all night to find. I suppose it's all part of the mystery.

Tonight I have found a will of William Christian dated 1797/8. He came from Balterson Parish, Maughold. His wife was Elinor, which fits, his sons were Thomas, Robert and William which also fit. Daughters, Isabel, Jane, Elinor and Catherine but no Dorothy. So I suppose that's a near-miss.
He left a share of his land in Curragh-Ballure.

There is another 1798 William Christian will but it does not seem to fit the bill.

A John Christian's 1741 will had my hopes up if only because he had a wife named Dorothy which you say was reasonably unusual, but it did not seem to lead anywhere.

The William Corkill that I have was born in 1779, so any of those three Elinors that you put forward fitted the age group although either of them would have been a few years younger than William.
I'll keep at it, but please feel free to overtake me whenever you want!

Thanks again,

Tony