The People of Glengarry: Highlanders in Transition, 1745-1820Marianne McLean explores the relationship between economic changes in the Highlands and the clansmen's emigration to Canada in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. She challenges the currently accepted position endorsed in recent works by Eric Richards and J.M. Bumsted that the clearances and sheep farms did not have a central role in provoking mass emigration. While McLean does not argue that landlords forced people to leave, she uses local evidence to show that the economic changes brought about by these factors led many Highlanders to emigrate. Using a wide array of published and unpublished sources, McLean examines in detail nine group emigrations that left western Inverness between 1785 and 1802 for Glengarry County in Upper Canada (now Ontario). She describes how, once in North America, they built a new Highland community in an attempt to ensure each family's access to the land. By revealing the pattern of Highland emigration to Glengarry County - families and friends leaving and/or settling together - McLean confirms Bernard Bailyn's notion of a "provincial emigrant stream," and offers a convincing explanation for the development of one of Canada's "limited identities." |
Contents
Introduction | 3 |
Barisdale | 24 |
Estate of Barisdale 1755 | 26 |
Lochiel | 42 |
Lochiel estate 1772 | 48 |
Western Invernessshire 17701800 | 62 |
Barisdale tenant economy 1771 | 70 |
The Loyalist Emigrants | 78 |
The 17851793 Emigrants | 98 |
The Peace of Amiens Emigrants | 128 |
The Post1815 Emigrants | 151 |
Settlement 17841797 | 168 |
Selected allocations of land in Glengarry | 171 |
Settlement 17971816 | 188 |
Conclusion | 205 |
Part of Northeastern North America | 80 |
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Common terms and phrases
1786 emigrants acres agricultural Alexander America Angus arrived assisted Barisdale Board British brother Butter Cameron cattle century Charlottenburgh chief clan clansmen colonial concession continued Crown departure districts Donald Duncan economic emigrants evidence factor families farms Father five four friends Garry gentlemen given Glen Glenelg Glengarry County grants half Highland Highland emigrants important improvement included increase John John Macdonell join Knoydart Lancaster land landlords late later leaders leave lived located Loch Lochiel lots Loyalists Macdonald Macdonell major March McMillan miles military names North offered officers paid party passengers period petition pointed population Quebec reached received reel regiment remained rent reported result River Scotland Scottish seems settled settlement settlers sheep sheep farming ship social society southern substantial tenants townships traditional Upper Canada western Inverness York
Popular passages
Page 270 - Fighting Men of a Highland Catholic Jacobite Clan Who Fought in Canada to Gain It for and Preserve It to the Crown and for the Honour of the Name of Glengarry. Toronto: RG McLean, 1912. Flinn, Michael. "Malthus, Emigration and Potatoes in the Scottish Northwest, 1770-1870," in Comparative Aspects of Scottish and Irish Economic and Social History, 1600-1900, LM Cullen and TC Smout, eds.