Following on Part 14:
In the newly
translated/published “Account of Donald Mackinnon,” the scribe
said:
“Part of the [Crossopol
McLean] family spent part of the year living in Totamore House ...
There were cottars – [one being] the family of Lachlan
son of John son of Charles who were servants to the farmer. [Of
Lachlan’s sons] Donald was a shoemaker, Alexander a tailor, John a
labourer. They had no sister; their mother was Catherine daughter of
Donald son of Alexander.”[1]
Paraphrasing the attached
Note 25 by Nicholas Maclean-Bristol (NMB):
In the 1776 List of Coll
Inhabitants, Lachlan
was the underage son of John McPhaiden
& Catherine Macdonald of Totamore. To which NMB added that
Lachlan himself married a Catherine McDonald on
29 October 1789 and had the following children (specific baptismal
dates were given; I merely cite the years here):
John 1791; Alexander 1795;
John 1802; Roderick 1804, “died Inverness, Cape Breton 1877”;
unnamed 1807; Neil 1810; Ann 1812; Donald 1814; Donald 1819.
Mackinnon continues:
“Donald and Alexander,
the sons of Lachlan [McPhaiden] son of John son of Charles, went to
America along with that Lachlan Macphee and his family and many
others from Coll, Rum and Muck in the year 1822. I believe they
arrived safely.”
NMB
adds in Note 33: Colin S. MacDonald thinks they sailed on
Commerce of Greenock from Tobermory to Plaster Rock Nova
Scotia with settlers from Muck (“Early Highland Emigration to Nova
Scotia and Prince Edward Island,” Nova Scotia Historical Society
Vol. 28, 45). My colleague Terry Punch has corrected the
reference to MacDonald's article in Collections of the NSHS, Vol.
23 (1936).
 | |
| Photograph CDM, July 2010 |
The emigration information
was new to me, and relevant to my erstwhile reconstruction of early
McFadyen families in Cape Breton. I'm particularly interested in
attempting to uncover their places of origin. But I find some of the
statements bothersome, asking:
• Did
Commerce of Greenock
sail to Cape Breton in 1822?
• Were
Lachlan McPhaiden's two sons on it?
• Are the two men in
evidence as Cape Breton settlers?
Point One. There are no
“complete” lists of ship crossings from the Scottish Highlands to
Cape Breton for the 18th and 19th centuries;
but Lucille Campey's Appendix II in After the Hector and
Punch's own Some Early Scots in Maritime Canada, Vol. III,
make headway at cataloguing them from a variety of sources. Commerce
of Greenock, like many ships,
made a number of crossings. MacDonald seems to have been the first to
assert its arrival in 1822, and
repeated by historians since, but his source
is unclear.
Point
Two. With few well-documented exceptions, extant lists of passenger
names in that time period are simply not available. In 1822,
Lachlan's oldest son Alexander would have been about age
twenty-seven, a reasonable age to emigrate. His brother Donald
(whether both Donalds survived or not) would have been about eight,
or a baby. The two names as brothers do not synchronize with
Mackinnon's emigration scenario.
Points
Two and Three. We know that two men had arrived in Cape Breton at
least a year sooner. An Alexander
McPhaden age twenty-two was in Cape Breton in 1821.[2]
He is described as a
tailor early on.[3]
MacDougall says Alexander was the brother of Donald
McFaden[4]
age twenty-eight in 1825.[5]
Clearly their ages do not match with the baptismal years of Lachlan
McPhaiden's sons, Alexander being younger and Donald being
considerably older. Nevertheless, when this Donald died at
Malagawatch, his parents were said to be Lachlan and
Catherine (specific place of
birth in Scotland not recorded).[6]
Scotland's
People
is no help in this regard for a baptism!
Donald
married Mary Ann Calder and settled at Militia Point near
Malagawatch; Alexander married Margaret McQuarrie and settled at
Lexington near Port Hastings. Both men named their eldest sons
Lachlan; both had daughters Catherine. I can follow at least the
first generation of their descendants.
Of the
putative companion Lachlan Macphee, there is no sign in Nova Scotia
land petitions.
A
Lachlan
McPhaden also applied for Cape Breton Crown land in 1821, having
arrived that year, age twenty-four and married.[7]
Further records show that this Lachlan and his wife Mary McLean had a
son Archibald baptized in 1829 by a visiting cleric at
Malagawatch.[8]
It's unknown if this was their first son. A marriage has not
been found in
Scottish parish registers 1795-1822 and I have no later information
about him.
Finally,
a Roderick
MacFadyen settled, date unknown, in the River Denys area. His death
record in 1877 shows him as a native of
Coll and his
parents as Lauchlan and Catherine.[9]
His age at death and the 1871 census infer a birth year of 1804-05.
In that census, his occupation was farmer. Roderick/Rory also married
a Mary McLean and did not apply for Crown land. Describing him as a
tailor, MacDougall says, “So
far as we know, he had no relatives in this country.”[10]
And yet, his location was a mere two lots away from my own ancestor
Donald “the soldier,” a generation older.
However,
while Roderick seems to be the son overlooked by Mackinnon, it was mandatory to consult my
photocopies of the original Coll kirk sessions containing baptisms
and marriages.[11]
The parents of the child Roderick baptized on Coll on 15 August 1804
were Lachlan McPhaiden and Catherine McKinnon
(not Macdonald) at Cnocleathan. Lachlan McPhaiden at Grimsary had
married Catherine McKinnon in 1801.The same couple had another son
Roderick baptized on 25 May 1807. No further children were recorded
after 1795 for mother Catherine Macdonald. The timing might suggest a
second marriage for Lachlan McPhaiden although I can't say whether a
switch in locale from Totamore to Grimsary between 1795 and 1801 is
plausible. We may have two different Lachlans.
 | |
| Photograph BDM, July 2010 |
Initially
I set out to ask if Mackinnon was simply out by one year in his
recall of the emigration date. And to compare Lachlan McPhaiden's
sons with the known early Cape Breton men. But Alexander and Donald
as brothers don't match either Lachlan-and-Catherine couple from what
we know of their children. Roderick might. All the analysis must
allow for variables:
• baptisms
potentially missing from the parish register;
• the
fact that not all Cape Breton arrivals petitioned for Crown land;
• perhaps
a loose attitude about one's age;
• the
accuracy of secondary information in a local history;
• the
possibility that “the sons” landed in Cape Breton at whatever
date and shortly went elsewhere;
• the
possibility that Alexander, Donald, and/or Lachlan originated in Rum, Muck, or even Mull.
I want so much to believe
that the oral tradition is a fairly reliable source in the absence of
original documentation. But I may be sinking my own ship.
[1] Nicholas
Maclean-Bristol, “Donald Mackinnon, 'An Account of the Island of
Coll and Its People' (2),” West Highland Notes and Queries,
Series 3, No. 19 (May 2012).
[2] “Land Petitions -
Cape Breton Island Petitions 1787-1843,” database, Nova Scotia
Archives (http://www.gov.ns.ca/nsarm/virtual/land/
: accessed May 2008), Alexander McPhaden, no. 2754; citing NSA
microfilm 15798.
[3] Nova Scotia census
1838, Inverness County, Canso Township,
unpaginated; Library and Archives Canada (LAC) microfilm
M-5220.
[4] J.L. MacDougall,
History of Inverness County, Nova Scotia (1922; reprint
Belleville, ON: Mika Publishing, 1972), 177.
[5] “Land ... Cape
Breton Island Petitions,” database, Nova Scotia Archives,
Donald McFaden, no. 3053; citing NSA microfilm 15799.
[6] “Nova Scotia
Historical Vital Statistics, Deaths 1864-1877,” digital image, Nova
Scotia Archives (https://www.novascotiagenealogy.com/
: accessed May 2008); Donald McFadyen, 10 June 1869, Inverness
County, register no. 1810, p. 36, no. 132.
[7] “Land ... Cape
Breton Island Petitions,” database, Nova Scotia Archives,
Laughlin McPhaden, no. 2755; citing NSA microfilm 15798.
[8] St. John's
Presbyterian (Belfast, Prince Edward Island) baptisms, 1823-1849,
Archibald, son of Laughlan McFadden and Mary McLean “basin of River
Denny,” born 13 February 1829, baptized 3 September 1829; LAC
microfilm C-3028.
[9] “Nova
Scotia ... Deaths 1864-1877,” digital image, Nova
Scotia Archives
(https://www.novascotiagenealogy.com/
: accessed May 2008); Roderick McFadyen, 28 February 1877,
Inverness County, register no. 1810, p. 142, no. 44
[10]
MacDougall, History of Inverness County, 496.
[11] Coll
Kirk Sessions, National Archives of Scotland, CH2/70/1/.
©
Brenda Dougall Merriman
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