Outgoing passenger lists, Scotland to Canada in 1889

[patti_d]

Yes, Mary, the images are poor aren't they?
They were likely poorly done by whoever placed them on microfilm in the Canadian archives. Don't really know when they would have been done.

They are available in the LAC, Library and Archives Canada as digital images.
http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/data ... tv3qt4rje7

Should likely have posted the link originally, but I did mention they were hopelessly bad. I even sent for the microfilm in the hopes that looking at it myself would be better than the images online. It wasn't.

[emanday]

If only he'd used a pencil instead

Your link shows all 10 pages and it seems as though the clerk was swiftly running out of ink

[patti_d]

The Glasgow Herald, Wednesday, April 24, 1889 under the heading “Emigration of Crofters” published a lengthy letter from Mr Colmer, Secretary of the Colonisation Board to the Secretary for Scotland describing the departure and various other things regarding the matter. There’s also a couple of items in prior issues, 8th February and 16th March.

=D> =D>

I would love to read the articles that you found!!! PDF is good.
Sending you my email address in PM

I wrote to the library in Stornoway asking for newspaper write ups with nothing found. Never thought to go further afield.

May I be curious and ask why you have the yearly reports?
If it isn't an imposition to you, I'd like whatever you were willing to share of those as well.
Or if that's a bother, where did you find them so I could access them myself? They would probably be of interest to the greatgrand daughter of the man who raised my grandfather. She has been helping me in my searches because her family has done some extensive research on their tree and the family at #43 (Archie Ferguson, wife, son aged 7 and four daughters aged 15, 13, 7 and 4) is connected to her through the daughter aged 13 who married one of the sons of James Sharpe. The Fergusons are supposed to have travelled with the same group as my McSweens.

I wonder if they had reports on the homestead that my Greatgrandmother filed for, since that wouldn't have been one of the original ones granted.


Thanks ever so much.

[Currie]

That’s okay Patti,

I can access the Parliamentary reports at this site http://parlipapers.chadwyck.co.uk/marketing/index.jsp but only because my local library subscribes. The only reason I have them is that I found it easier just to download them rather than to read them. I’ve only had a quick browse.

The Saltcoats settlement does not appear to have been very successful. There’s a reference in the 1900 report to Neil leaving the farm and a suggestion that some farmers were going to take up land elsewhere in their wives names. There’s a reference in 1897 to more detailed individual crofter reports but I can’t find them in the Parliamentary Papers and can’t quickly see anything in National Archives so maybe they weren’t preserved.

Emails are on the way with attachments averaging 4mb so please let me know if they’re not getting through.

All the best,
Alan

[patti_d]

Hi Alan
Thanks for the articles. Guess you know what I'll be doing today!
The optional housework can wait.

I had read that the settlement had problems and that the land wasn't the best that could have been offered.
Having been there, I can say lots of rolling hills, lots of rocky soils. Not the flat, open grassy plains one imagines when one says 'prairies'. The settlement in Manitoba (they came 1888) would have had better farmland. In hindsight, their settlement schemes might have worked better if they had taken more time choosing where to put these poor people who were likely mostly fishermen than plunking them in the middle of nowhere and telling them to 'have at it' and become farmers.

Makes for some head shaking reading of the history nowadays.

Patti

[patti_d]

There’s an earlier report by the Crofters Commission for the year from 31 December 1888 to 31 December 1889 in which the name Neil Macsween appears in a long list headed County of Inverness – Skye – Crofting Parish of Duirinish? He is on the Estate of McLeod of McLeod as a Crofter in township or district 17 Roag? It shows acreage and rent paid.

The only other Macsween that a search of the document brings up is also on Skye but in the Crofting Parish of Sleat on the Estate of Lord Macdonald, Crofters Alex Macinnes and Widow Isabella Macsween, the Township or district looks like ½3 Calligary.

The document appears to cover Inverness, Ross & Cromarty, Shetland and Caithness. Not sure what it’s all about.

Alan

Hi Alan
I've been reading through the correspondence you sent to me and don't think you sent this report. The one you sent for the year 1888 has letters dated April 11, 1888 to May 4, 1888.

Would you be willing to send me the one you were mentioning here, 31 December 1888 to 31 December 1889 ?

Thanks in advance, if you can.

Patti

[Montrose Budie]

Sadly, the outgoing passenger lists from the UK were only recorded from 1890 onwards !

There may be some special situations involving sponsored groups of emigrants where there are earlier surviving passenger lists, but it was only from 1890 onwards that it became the law that passenger lists for all ships bound for destinations outside Europe and the Mediterranean had to be recorded.

mb

[Currie]

Hello Patti,

The 88/89 report was of 284 pages totalling 29mb which was too large to send and I wasn’t too sure exactly what it was all about. I’ll send you the first 77 pages totalling 7mb which covers all of Inverness. The earlier pages will hopefully explain the purpose of the document.

I searched the whole document online for Mc/Macsween and the name only crops up on pdf pages (not paper pages) 22, 63 and 67 but you can’t search the downloaded pdf as it’s all images.

Please let me know later if there’s enough there to serve the purpose and when the document arrives safely.

All the best,
Alan

[patti_d]

Thank you Alan. The PDF arrived. I'll read it and let you know if I find anything.

[mma]

My mother was before her marriage Mary Jessie MacSween from Borsam and some of her father's grandmother was the only member of the family who stayed in Borsam the rest going to Canada. Mum tried when she was younger to trace what happened to the family once they arrived in Canada but with not a lot of sucess.