GENEALOGY

ithin a generation of Prince Lord MacDonakTs Reels thought to be particularly relevant. By W Edward Island becoming a 1990 we had collected over 6,000 books British colony, the single-largest To begin with, the Trust concentrated but there was nowhere that our visi- cultural group was the Scots. By the on collecting a library. The subject tors, or staff, could use them. They mid-1800s over half of the Island's pop- areas tended to be historical, espe- filled every nook and cranny of the ulation was Scottish, and the second- cially relating to Skye and the other Trust's offices and, until the books took most common language heard here lands of the Lordship of the Isles, or over, what had been a staff flat. was Gaelic. Even a century later, over relating to MacDonalds and other clans. At the same time more and more of a third of Islanders considered them- Genealogical materials were not really our visitors, not just the MacDonalds, selves to be of Scots descent. Although the flow of this immigra- tion came from all over , a large •^^^w!'WSwfi^ ^ T* part of it was from the Highlands and Western Isles, in particular the , ancestral home to the powerful Clan . No clan had more influ- ence in early history as . In the 12th century a warrior named emerged to lead the expulsion of the from Scotland. Somerled's grandson Donald became the founder of Clan Donald - literally Genealogy "the children of Donald." His descen- dants and followers became at the "MacDonald." Also acknowledged as: "Lords of the Isles," Clan Donald ruled much of Scotland's western coast until Clan King James IV removed the title - and much of the Clan's power - in 1493. The Isle of Skye has been the seat of Donald Clan Donald since the 1400s. In the early 1790s, around the same time so many of his people were leaving for North America, the first Lord MacDonald built a mansion at Armadale, which was later expanded to create . In 1971 the Clan Donald Lands Trust was set up to save what was left of the once-vast Clan Donald lands. The Trust assumed responsibility for 20,000 acres, and the grounds of Armadale Castle became a centre for exploring and interpreting Clan Donald's vital role in Scottish history. Of particular inter- est to Prince Edward Island - where "MacDonald" is the single-most com- mon - is the Clan Donald Library and Study Centre, which opened its doors to the public 10 years ago this summer. The Library is run by < * the Trust as part of its duty to collect and preserve records, traditions and objects of historic interest bearing on the history of Clan Donald.

By Maggie Macdonald JiillPitSfefi

31 line what they cover for usually called the "OPRs" for short, for those who may not have much the same area as we have for the used them before. censuses. There is also an index for Censuses - We the whole of Scotland, again produced hold microfilm copies by the Mormons. of the censuses for In Skye there are no parish records most of the western earlier than 1800, when the parish of highlands and islands first began recording marriag- covering the period es and baptisms. The other six Skye 1841-91. The British parishes gradually followed suit so that government maintains by 1823, records were kept for the a 100-year closure peri- whole island. Even then they were by od on records includ- no means complete. This was for a vari- ing personal informa- ety of reasons. It was not compulsory, tion, such as censuses, but it was expensive, with an entry for a so the 1901 census is baptism costing in the 1820s, the equiv- not yet available. Nor alent of half a day's wages. As well, are the first four cen- people did not need a record of their suses (1801-31) much birth and other such documentation in use for genealogical the same way we do today. purposes as they were Even where events have been record- simply a numerical ed, only a basic amount of information count, giving little is given. For instance a marriage record detailed information will only very occasionally include a ref- and the returns were erence to the father of either the bride The Isle ofSkye. not preserved. From or groom. More commonly the entry 1841 more information will record just their names and place was collected, as each of residence. Birth records are slightly were asking questions about their roots householder had to fill i n a schedule, or better as they register the child's name, on Skye and adjacent districts. We form, giving information on those peo- both parents - including the mother's realised we had to get hold of the rel- ple, not necessarily family members, maiden surname - and the place of resi- evant information. In 1984 we bought staying in the house on census night. dence. Just occasionally, perhaps when copies of the census and parish records These were collated by the district the session clerk had been having a for Skye as well as a microfilm machine. enumerators into books known as the really bad day, the record will have This was set up in the museum entrance Census Enumerators Books (CEBs). blanks. I have seen marriage records but as using it became more and more It is films of the CEBs that we use. where the bride's name is not included popular there was often quite a traffic The CEBs are based on the sched- or as in one extreme case, a baptism jam. Somehow new space had to be ules originally handed out by the enu- where only the child's name and sur- found. merator. He would not have done this name, and dates of birth and baptism At the beginning of 1990 we set about in a haphazard way, but would have have been recorded. The parents' refurbishing what had been originally gone systematically round his district, names, as well as the place they lived, the head gardener's house, lived in lat- handing out the schedules. He would have been left out altogether. terly by the dowager Lady Macdonald. then have copied them in the same Deaths were rarely recorded in the This is the building that opened in 1990. order into the CEBs. This means that OPRs. In Skye the only death records We now have a store with a controlled the censuses are not an alphabetical are in the late 1830s for the parish environment, two small galleries for listing of the families in an area, but of . St Kilda also has deaths temporary exhibitions (this year's exhi- rather a geographical listing, depend- recorded, though parish records there bition is on and the Battle of ing on where each family lived. This do not begin until the 1840s; over half the Braes) as well as an office and a can present a problem if a researcher are the deaths of babies who died of the work room, but what is most important is not too sure where his family origi- eight-day sickness - tetanus thought is that we can now offer researchers a nally came from, but as compensation to have been brought on by the tradi- proper reading room, and the space to offer a glimpse into what an ancestor's tional application of a mixture of fulmar use our library, archive and genealogi- community looked like. oil and dung to the umbilical cord. cal collections. Luckily we have two indexes to the In 1855 statutory civil registration of censuses. One for 1851 covers only births, marriages and deaths was intro- Skye, and the town of duced. As Scottish records include a Genealogy research , while the other, recently mass of information, we try to maintain published on CD ROM by the a good relationship with the Registrar Our main sources, the census and the Mormons, covers the whole of Great in Portree who holds copies of the reg- parish records, will be familiar to any Britain and is searchable by computer. isters for the whole island. one working on 19th century Scottish Parish records - We also have One of the main problems in using family history. They are available else- microfilm copies of the Old Parish any of these sources is the lack of vari- where (not just our library) but I will out- Records of the Church of Scotland, ety of names in use, both and

32 first names. This is probably familiar to papers. Basically these are the busi- we like to try. It makes family history many in Prince Edward Island, especial- ness papers that detail the day-to-day come alive if the actual place of origin ly in those areas where Highland settle- operation of his estate. The earliest can be identified. ment is concentrated, and where there documents are charters granting prop- are many families with the same sur- erty to the various Macdonald chiefs name such as Nicolson, or MacDonald, (a seemingly endless succession of Sir The Dance Called America MacKinnon or whatever. However this Donald Macdonalds, with the occasion- is often unfamiliar territory to those who al "Sir James" thrown in). There are Annoyingly, the archive does not have grown up outside Highland areas. also letters, account books, bills and include much information about emi- They come hoping that we will find their receipts, reports and so on, the great gration - there are very few detailed John Macdonald, , or bulk of them dating from the 18th and ships lists, or lists of emigrants. At cer- their Angus Maclnnes, bringing only 19th centuries. Not everything has sur- tain periods, the estate correspondence the vaguest of details with them by vived. There was apparently a fire at does give an idea of what was going on. which we can corroborate which of the the factor's office sometime in the 19th This is true of the early 1800s, when many with that name, their ancestor century which destroyed some papers. Lord Selkirk was recruiting settlers might be. Others fell prey to damp and poor stor- for his experiment on Prince Edward age conditions. In addition some of the Island. The time of the Polly was one of estates administrators, known either upheaval on the estate. Matters of Estate as chamberlains (in the 18th century) nd th The then chief was the 2 Lord or factors (in the 19 ) were not good Macdonald. He spent relatively little The other great source we have at record keepers. At certain periods this time in Skye, living for the most part Armadale are Lord Macdonald's estate means that we have only a tantalising in London, and had delegated the glimpse of what running of his estate to Trustees or was happening on Commissioners, to whom the chamber- the estate, while at lain, his principal land agent on Skye, others, every last reported. However, though he lived scrap of paper was away from the island, he was very inter- carefully kept and ested in its affairs. He wanted to mod- we get a much full- ernize the estate by converting the old er picture. system of joint farms held by a group Certain parts of of tenants to one of small holdings this archive are or crofts, held individually. As a pre- very useful for liminary the estate was surveyed in genealogical 1800. He also wanted to maximize his research. For income. The population was growing - instance the lists it had increased by 50% in the 50 years of tenants, in the up to 1801 - so there was increasing rentals, can be pressure on the land. Lord Macdonald used in conjunc- hoped that by making all the tenants tion with the cen- put in new, higher offers for their farms, suses to trace fam- his income would increase as the rents ilies. There is an rose. At the same time he wanted to almost complete keep as many people as possible on run of rentals run- his estate and to discourage emigra- ning from 1823 to tion which was increasingly seen as an 1948. Before 1823 attractive option by many Skye folk. there are only a The following extracts from letters in very few rent lists the archives provide a flavour of what which include ten- was going on. ants' names - one First of all, there was quite a bit in 1733 and one in of uncertainty as to whether tenants 1802. As only the would get a farm or not. In April 1802, person paying rent John MacKinnon, of Ardnish, Strath is named, not the and others complained that they had rest of the family, been warned to leave their farms at and as the perenni- Whitsunday, and wanted to know wheth- al problem of simi- er they were to get any other farm or not lar names is very "before we lose time to join our neigh- apparent here, it is bouring emigrants who intend to sail for "MacAlister" R.R. Mclan, 1845. MacAlaster, or MacAlisdairno t always possi- America in the month of June." is a senior branch of Clan Donald. It was founded by Alasdairbl e to make a posi- In March of the following year Mor, the second son of Donald. tive identification an officer of the Canadian Fencibles in every case, but was on the island recruiting for his

33 regiment. But more worrying to the passage money" and "a considerable num- as the Old Statistical Account to dis- estate officials was that "Mr Angus ber" had done likewise in , tinguish it from a later version which MacAulay is to come over for a cargo of though he could not ascertain how many. was compiled in the 1840s (known, of emigrants this season, as very encourag- He was worried that he would not be course, as the New Statistical Account). ing letters have been written by those able to let all the farms. In response, The questionnaire asked the ministers who went with him the previous year." In Lord Macdonald and his commissioners to provide information on a number of April, the chamberlain, John Campbell, decided to reduce the rents after all. headings such as climate and diseases, reported that the buzz of emigration had This, combined with the effects of the towns and villages, inns and alehouses got to such a height "that I am quite at Passenger Act of 1802, which had made and the state of the church. This they did a loss how to manage, above two thirds it much more expensive to emigrate, in varying degrees of detail. Often they of the people of Strath and have reduced emigration from Skye for a while. concentrated only on those aspects of the already subscribed and paid part of their By 20 June Campbell could write: "the questionnaire that particularly interested emigration is entirely knocked on the them. This means that for some parishes head and I do not suppose that one third we get a lot of information on the archae- of those who once talked of it will go. ology and antiquities of the parish and One of Lord Selkirk's transports has very little on what life was like, as in arrived at the island of Rousay but has the following extract, written by the min- ;r i taken none on board yet." Of course emi- ister of Duirinish, in north west Skye. 4 gration did not stay "entirely knocked "In every district of the parish there are on the head" for very long. Within a gen- some weavers male and female, a few eration, the population on Skye would tailors, a blacksmith, some boat builders be a fraction o f what it once was. and house carpenters. Every farm keeps boats and the people go afishing for their own use. There are very few bred sea- Vital Statistics and Other men, but all [are] expert rowers, good Sources hardy watermen and skilled in making a boat with sails. Every married labourer Much of the information in the in this county has a small portion of land, ^ censuses and parish records he raises a little flax, and has a few sheep I is of too late a date for anyone so that his wife furnishes him his whole r searching for emigrants to wearing apparel." We can read in the OSA Prince Edward Island, where about the fair at Portree, the island's prin- the main period of emigration cipal cattle market, which was held each from Skye was the first part of May and July for four days at a time. the 19th century. Even where docu- We can read about wage levels, and how mentation on specific emigrants large numbers of the island's young men does not exist, it is still possible to and women had to find seasonal work find out a little of what their life outwith the island to supplement their I was like in Skye in the late 18th families income. The ministers tell us of and early 19th century, before the crops they planted and when. Oats leaving for North America. and potatoes were planted in March and Printed sources are particu- April, for instance, but if it was a very larly useful for this, and have wet year the oats might not be harvested the bonus of being available until October, while barley was sown at in other libraries, not just the beginning of May to be reaped in ours. In the 1790s, all the August. Church of Scotland ministers -**" were asked to answer a question- naire sent out to them by Sir John Family Names Associated with Sinclair of Ulbster, who wanted to com- Clan Donald pile a record of the current state of Scotland. The ministers' reports were all Even if you never thought your family published, parish by parish, under the name was associated with Clan Donald - general title of "The Statistical Account or even with Scotland, for that matter - of Scotland." A facsimile version was you still may have an affiliation. This is published in 1983. It is sometimes known especially so if you find your family name originating in certain parts of Northern , the West Highlands and Islands. "MacDugai;R.R. Mclan, 1845. Although It is very likely indeed if your roots are most MacDougalls belong to Clan on Skye. Here is a list of surnames his- MacDougall, those from are torically related to Clan Donald by blood, part of Clan Donald. marriage or legal adoption, lil

34 Addison Hawthorne MacCellach MacHouston MacLugas Marcusson Alcock Henderson MacChanney MacHugh MacLuHch Martin Hendry MacCleary MacHutchen ^ MacLure May Allan Henry MacCleireach Maclan MacLuskie Mayes Allanson Herron MacClellan Macllaheiney MacManechin Mays Allison Hewison MacCluskey Macllbra MacMarcus Michael Ambrose Houston MacCochran Macllbride MacMarquis Michaelson Anderson Howe MacCodrum Macllchomhghain MacMath Michie Arnot Howie MacCohenane Macllchrum MacMay Michison Balloch Howison MacColl Maclldonie MacMhuirich , Milloy Baxter Huchon MacConacher Maclldowie MacMichael Mitchell Beaton Huchonson MacConlea Macllfersane MacMichan Mitchelson Bethunes Hudson MacConn Macllhatton MacMichie Monk Bisset Hughson MacConnell Macllheron MacMitchell Murchie Blue Huie MacCook Maclllemartine MacMoris | Murchison Bowie Huston MacCorie MacIUergan [ MacMurchie Murdoch Boyd Hutchin MacCormick Maclllbui MacMurdo Murdochson Boyle Hutchinson MacCorran Maclllighlais MacMurdoch Murphy Bradley Isaacson MacCoshem Maclllguirine MacMurphy O'Brennan Brady Islesjeffrey MacCotter Macllmaluag MacMurrich O'Brolachain Brodie Johnson MacCowan f| Macllneive MacNakaird : O'Cahan Brown Kane MacCoy j|| Macllraith MacOnill O'Docharty Budge Kean MacCrain Macllraich MacOshen O'Drain Buie Kain MacCrindle Macllvenna MacOshenag O'Hanley Bulloch- Keegan MacCrory I Macllvie f MacOwen O'Kane Burke Kelly MacCrumb Macllvoir MacPhail O'Kerigan Cain Kendrick MacCuaig Macllvrenenich MacPhilip O'Loynachan Calbraith Kennedy MacCuish Maclnlay MacQueen O'May Callen Kerigan MacCuithen Maclndayn MacQuilken O'Shannaig Cambridge Kessock MacCulloch Maclndeor MacQuillan O'Shannon Canochson Killough MacCumbray | Maclnleich MacQuilly O'Sheehy Carmichael Kinnell MacCurry Maclnleister MacQuistan Padon Carroon Lang MacCutchen Maclnnes | MacRanald Park Chambers Leach MacCuthan Maclnstocker MacRanie Patton Clark Livingston MacCurry Maclntaylour MacRankin Philip Clerk Lynn MacCutchen Maclnturner MacRennie Philipson Cochran MacAichan MacCuthan Maclntyre MacReynold Philpot Colson MacAlasdair MacDaniel Maclssac I MacRory Pittullich Cone MacAlexander MacDonald Maclver MacRuari Poison Conlay | jij MacAllan MacDonnell MacKain MacRury Purcell Conn ;|!i MacAllister MacDonleavy MacKay MacScilling Queen Connell MacAlonie MacDonnell MacKeachan MacShannon Quin Connely MacAmbrose MacDougall MacKean MacSheehy Rainey Cook MacArthur MacEachan MacKechern I MacSherry Coppock MacBaxter MacEachern MacKechbie MaCvSorley Ranaldson Cowan MacBeth MacEanruig MacKee MacSporran Rankin Cromb MacBodach MacElfrish | MacKeithen MacStake Rennie Crum MacBrayne MacEleran MacKelloch MacStalke Reoch Cunningham MacBrehon MacEntire MacKelly I MacSwain Revie MacBrief MacEoghain MacKanabry MacSwan Reynolds MacBretine MacEvinney MacKendrick MacSween Daniel MacBride MacGachen ; MacKerracher MacSewwney Darroch MacBrion MacGeachie MacKerral MacTrain Rorieson Dennison MacBrolachan MacGee MacKerras MacUisdean Rory Donald MacBryde MacGilbrMe MacKerron MacVanish Samuel Donaldson MacBurie MacGill MacKessock MacNawan Sanders Donnell MacCaffer MacGillander MacKichan MacVarish Sanderson Drain MacCaig ' MacGillechalum MacKeigan MacVey Shannon Dunsleve MacCain MacGilleconga MacKeirgan MacVicar Sharp Fletcher MacCairlie MacGillelan MacKfflop MacVurrich Shaw Forrestor MacCaldret MacGillespie MacKinnel MacWalrick Sheehy Foster MacCaleb MacGiilies MacKiver MacWarish Smith Galbraith MacCall MacGillifedder MacLae MacWhan Sbrleyson Gait MacCallan MacGillivantic MacLafferty MacWhannel Sporran Gilbride MacCallister MacGilliver MacLarish MacWhellan Stalker Gill MacCalman MacGilp MacLardy MacWhiston Sweeney Gilian MacCambridge MacGinnis Macarthy MacWhitlee Taylor Gillis MacCannel MacGlashan MacLaverty MacWilkin Train Glashan MacCarlich MacGlasrich MacLeister MacWillie Turner Glass MacCarrol MacGorrie MacLellan MacWurie Whan Godfrey MacCarron MacGowan MacLergan Magee Whannell Gowan MacCarter MacGugan MacLerich Magill Whallan Gray MacCash MacHatton Maclinlagan Mann Wilkie Greenfield Macathail MacHendrie MacLiver Manntach Wilkinson Hattan MacCavor MacHenry MacLucas Marcus Wright

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