Andrew William Cochran was born in 1793 in Windsor, Nova Scotia, and died in 1849 in Sillery, Lower Canada. He was the son of Anglican Minister William Cochran and Rebecca Cuppaidge. After completing Classical Studies at King’s College in Windsor, Cochran moved to Quebec in 1812, where he obtained a post of assistant in the office of the civil secretary, before being promoted assistant a few months later. In 1818, Cochran married Houstoun Thomson, daughter of William Thomson, a deputy commissioner-general who died in 1837. They had seven children. In 1843, Cochran married Magdalen Kerr, daughter of James Kerr, judge of the Court of Queen’s Bench. Cochran joined the militia staff as a deputy judge advocate in 1813. A year later, he became acting deputy judge advocate and clerk of the Court of Prerogatives. From 1816 to 1818, Cochran was the civil secretary to the governor Sir John Coape Sherbrooke. Cochran opened a law firm in 1818 after being admitted to the practice of law. From 1818 to 1821, he became acting general counsel, an auditor of land grant titles, legal clerk of the Legislative Council, and secretary of the Clergy Reserves Corporation. Cochran was appointed to the committee of the Quebec Emigrants’ Society in 1819, was president of the Emigrant Aid Society in 1820, and was the director of the Quebec Fire Office (a private fire insurance company) in 1823. He was also vice-president and president of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec, where he presented many papers. In 1822, he resumed his post of civil secretary under the government of George Ramsay, Earl of Dalhousie. When Dalhousie was recalled in 1828, Cochran abandoned his post. Since 1823, Cochran had been on the board of directors of the Royal Institution for the Advancement of Science and became the chair from 1834 to 1837. He also acted as president of the school commissioners of Quebec and trustee of Bishop’s College in Lennoxville. From 1830 to 1835, Cochran obtained thousands of acres in the townships of Leeds, Inverness, and Ireland. Cochrane became the appointed assistant judge in the Court of King’s Bench Quebec in 1839.

Sickly as a child, American country songwriter and singer Hank Cochran was sent to an orphanage in Memphis after his parents divorced when he was nine. He ran away repeatedly until he was sent to live with his grandparents in Greenville, Mississippi. At the age of 12, he and his uncle, Otis Cochran, hitchhiked to work in the oilfields in Oklahoma and New Mexico; en route, Uncle Otis taught him to play the guitar. Hank returned to Mississippi but at age 16 he was off hitching-hiking again, this time to pick olives in California. There he encountered another Cochran (Eddie - no relation) and the two formed a rockabilly duo they called the “Cochran Brothers” during the 1950s; they opened for Elvis at one point. In 1960 he began song writing in earnest in Nashville. Through the 1960s and 1970s he sang and wrote country music, including top hits sung by stars like Ray Price, Eddy Arnold and Burl Ives. His “She’s Got You” launched Patsy Cline’s career reaching No. 1 (country) and No. 14 (Hot 100). It was thanks to Cochran that young Willie Nelson got his start: Cochran, who was working at the Pamper Music Publishing Company in Nashville and singing at night at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, was struck by Nelson’s talent, and persuaded Pamper to take him on. Cochran’s songs collected 29 top ten ratings in 30 years and 40 Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) awards. As a singer himself, Cochran made the Billboard Country Music Charts seven times, his most successful being No. 20 for “Sally Was a Good Old Girl.” He has been honored by the Walkway of Stars (1967), the Nashville Songwriters’ Hall of Fame (1974), the Mississippi Music Hall of Fame (2003), and posthumously, the Country Music Hall of Fame.

John Cochrane was apparently a physician.