Interesting point.

I have been reading through the Military history of Perthshire 1660-1902 (Marchioness of Tullibardine edition) and at the moment the most likely candidate is the 2nd Batallion of the Breadalbane Fencibles that recruited replacements to ship directly to Ireland in 1798 from Perth, amongst others. This book is all well and good but doesn't pay enough attention to non-Pertshire regiments (such as Weymss 2nd Fencibles)that certainly stayed in and passed through Perth and also perhaps recruited.

As to the standing of wives and family - there are plenty of references to soldiers petitioning to quit as they could not support themselves and family on the wages but they tend to apply more to the militia and yeomanry. The fencibles were paid £3 3s and records mention a lot of marching to and from barracks in the North and west of Scotland in preperation to ship to Ireland or repel the Frnch but not the families. Hmmm.... very much worth investigation though.

Is frustrating as appears to be a very organised period of history with not a huge amount of publicly available info at the fingertips!