I realize it's a long time since you posted this message, but I have just started looking into my ancestry and came across your post. I think the Robert Cowan you want to know about is an ancestor of mine. I have his birthdate as 1835, in the Isle of Man. He married Ann, for whom I have the birthdate 1834. The names of their children which I have are Joseph, Jane and Robert. Joseph (b.1856) married Elizabeth Mossop (also b. 1855 or 1856) and had a number of children, one of whom was called Dixon, by the way. Their son William married Catherine (Kate or Katie) Burgoyne in 1913. They had five children, and their youngest daughter, Jane, is my mother. She will be 87 in November and lives with father, Donald Swift, in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. We came to Canada in the early 1950s. I was born in Harrogate, Yorkshire, and I have two younger brothers born in Canada.
I'm not sure if this is of interest to you after such a long time--you may have found out more in the years since 2002.