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BY ALEXANDER FRASER,
TORONTO.
1.-DEALING WITH THE
SETTLEMENTS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.
THERE is no ethnological
problem in Canada. Such questions as "Who were the Picts?" "Who the
Feinne?" we have not to solve. We begin with a clean and new leaf: with
Englishmen, Irishmen, Scotchmen, Germans, etc., with their well-defined
race divisions; and beyond the colonies which swarmed to our shores
during the period from one hundred to one hundred and fifty years ago,
there is but little inclination to push research. Our prehistoric Indian
races excite an interest scarcely greater in Canada than in London. Yet
there is genuine pride of race. The severance from the Fatherland has
not loosened the ties of blood. The Englishman is more loyal to
Lancashire or Devonshire—that he has left it behind, or that his father
or grandfather left it behind—than the average resident of Lancashire or
Devonshire is. So with the German, the plodding Lowland Scot, and so in
a very special degree with the Scottish Gael. The progress of racial
homogeneity must needs be slow. It is interesting to watch it grow in
new soil. The wonderful commercial and industrial development of the
United States has carried with it a rapid process of assimilation of
race, and a distinctive people, or it may be more correct to say
distinctive peoples, are being formed in a marvellously brief period of
time. In Canada it is different. The sparser population, the quieter
modes of living, and the greater segregation of the people
geographically have been less favourable to change from the original
type. Thus, in Nova Scotia, considerable sections of the country are
inhabited by Gaelic-speaking people from various parts of the Highlands
of Scotland, who for three generations have preserved, not only the
language, but the peculiarities of dialect and pronunciation of the
district whence their people emigrated more than a hundred years ago.
Many years ago I met a gentleman in Glasgow, who spoke Gaelic fluently
and well, and with a pronounced Mull accent. He asked me to guess, from
his mode of speech, what part of the Highlands he hailed from. I thought
the guess easy I replied, "From Mull." I was wrong. He had been born and
brought up in Nova Scotia, where his grandfather had been born also; and
was only on a brief visit to the land of his fathers. His forefathers,
however, had been Mull people, which accounted for his accent. This is a
fair example of the condition of things in many parts of Canada, and it
shows how long a time the peculiarities of speech, and I might add of
manners also, cling to a people in a strange land.
French Canada, or the
Province of Quebec, affords an example of a different kind. There the
first European settlers were from Normandy, Brittany, and Wolfe's
soldiers, especially the soldiers of the Forty-Second, Montgomerie's,
and Fraser's Highlanders, were given the option, at the close of the
war, to remain in Canada as colonists, or to return home to be
discharged on the disbanding of the regiments. Many of them settled on
the banks of the Lower St. Lawrence, below Quebec. They intermarried
with and soon were absorbed by the French-Canadians, so that it would be
almost impossible at the present day to trace their Highland names or
Highland features in their " Frenchified " surnames and puny physique.
Mackintoshes, Macdonalds, Mackenzies, Frasers, Macleods have undergone
curious transformations, and to-day a Beddce or a Broca might pick out a
Fraser as a typical French-Canadian, although Fraser's ancestor might
have been, so recently as 1758, a crofter in the Aird of Lovat, while
the Gaelic language, of course, passed away with the first mixed
generation. Where two races meet and intermingle, the mother's language
usually prevails, and it would appear that the mother rather than the
father influences the physical characteristics. This province of Quebec
excepted, the Gael in Canada has lost but comparatively few of his old
national traits.
If the Dominion offers a
hospitable home to the Highlander today, it is because Highland soldiers
practically won Canada for Britain from the French years ago. The
Highland broadsword went before the ploughshare. At Louisburg the
Highland regiments covered themselves with glory, but at Quebec—the key
to the country—it is questionable whether Wolfe could have got within
reach of Montcalm at all, were it not for the coolness of Captain Simon
Fraser, younger of Balnain, who afterwards, as Brigadier-General, fell
at Saratoga, in answering the challenge of the French sentry, as the
Heights were being reached from the river. As related by Smollet, the
story is as follows: "The first boat that contained the British troops
being questioned, a Captain in Fraser's regiment, who had served in
Holland, and who was perfectly well acquainted with the French language
and customs, answered without hesitation to 'Qui vive?' the challenging
word, 'La France.' Nor was he at a loss to answer the second question,
which was more particular and difficult. When the sentinel demanded—'A
quel regiment?' the Captain replied, 'De la reine?' which he knew by
accident to be one of those that composed the body commanded by
Bougainyule. . . In the same manner the other sentries were deceived,
though one, more wary than the rest, came running down to the water's
edge, and called, ' Pourquoi est cc que vous ne parlez pas haut?' ('Why
don't you speak with an audible voice?') To this interrogation, which
implied doubt, the Captain answered, with admirable presence of mind, in
a soft tone of voice, 'Tai toi nous serens entendues!' ('Hush, we shall
be overheard and discovered.') The sentry retired without further
altercation." If the sentries had not been thus deceived the troops
could not have effected a landing, much less have succeeded in scaling
the precipitous heights, and had the British failed in doing that, then
Quebec, the key to Canada, would have remained in the hands of France.
The "Plains of Abraham," on which this fateful battle was fought, were
named after a Highlander, Abraham Martin, a Perthshire man, who owned
the land, and whose name figures often in the annals of that time. The
end of brave Simon Fraser, whose tact gave the Highlanders a landing,
was a sad one, although his death was glorious. He was second in command
of the British forces, under General Burgoyne, during the Revolutionary
War, and was an officer of great ability. His skill in tactics was
conspicuous at Saratoga, at which battle his management of the army
baffled every attempt of the enemy to carry the day. This was the more
noticeable, as it was evident that General Burgoyne had lost his grip of
the situation. General Morgan, on the American side, observed Burgoyne's
blunders, and how they were retrieved by Brigadier- General Fraser. He
called two of his best riflemen, and said, "You see that fine fellow on
the white horse? It goes against my heart to do it, but you must pick
him off, or we lose the battle." The riflemen watched their opportunity,
and it was not long before Simon Fraser fell mortally wounded. It was an
easy victory then for the Americans.
[The Macdonalds claim
that the officer who rendered this signal service was Captain Donald
Macdonald of Clanranald, who was undoubtedly an accomplished officer,
and most useful to the officer commanding. I have been unable to clear
the point from doubt to my own satisfaction. In the Aird the tradition
favours Captain Simon Fraser. In Quebec the same opinion holds. Indeed,
so far as I have been able to find out, the general opinion of
Highlanders is in favour of Captain Fraser. I have, therefore, adhered
to it in this paper. At the same time, the question is worthy of, and
admits of; further investigation. I believe some correspondence, which
passed between soldiers of Fraser's Highlanders, has been deposited in
the Canadian archives, and interesting information may be forthcoming
when it shall have been examined.]
As already noted, many of
these Highland soldiers, drawn largely from Inverness-shire, settled in
Canada, on the Lower St. Lawrence and in Nova Scotia. They were heard of
again as the 84th Royal Highland Emigrant Regiment in the Revolutionary
War. This may be taken as the beginning of Highland colonisation in
Canada. Afterwards came the settlement of Glengarry, that of Nova
Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton, then the Selkirk Colonies.
To a later, or intermediate period, belong the Argyleshire and
SutherIandshire Colonies, which settled in Western and Northern Ontario.
It would be interesting
to trace a stream of emigration from its source to its destination. A
large number of Highlanders from Glengarry, Knoydart and adjoining
places settled in the beautiful Mohawk Valley in the Province of New
York, under the leadership of the Macdonells of Aberchalder, Leek,
Scotas and Collachie. Their lands were about thirty miles from Albany,
and were under the protection of Sir William Johnson of Indian fame.
When hostilities broke out between Great Britain and the American
Colonies in 1775, these Highlanders remained loyal, and about two
hundred of them crossed country to Montreal, and formed the nucleus of
the King's Royal Regiment of New York, with Sir John Johnson, son of
General Sir William Johnson, as Colonel. The list of officers contains
the names of the following gentlemen, who afterwards settled in
Glengarry, Canada: Captains Alexander MacDonell (Aberchalder), Angus
MacDonell, John MacDonell (Scotas), Archibald MacDonell (Leek);
Lieutenant Hugh MacDonell (Aberchalder); Ensign Miles MacDonell (Scotas);
and of the second battalion of the same regiment: Captain James
MacDonell, Lieutenant Ranald MacDonell (Leek). In the famous corps known
as Butler's Rangers the following MacDonells held rank : Captain John
MacDonell (Aberchalder), First Lieutenant Alexander MacDonell (Collachie),
Second Lieutenant Chichester MacDonell (Aberchalder). These names are of
singular interest, not only as those of the pioneers of Highland
emigration, but of men who, being men of standing and substance in
Inverness-shire, were among the first victims of the evictor there. In
Dr. Fraser-Mackintosh's "Antiquarian Notes," second series, p. 125, is
the following reference to their eviction. Describing the conduct of
Duncan MacDonell of Glengarry and of Marjory Grant, his wife, he says
"The first step was to
give notice to the wadsetters, every one of whom it would have been
noticed were Macdonells, and connected more or less with the chief.
Being of old date, and prices advancing rapidly, their position was
excellent, for it may be taken as certain that, besides sitting in their
own personal occupancies free, the interest of the wadset moneys was
more than paid by their numerous subtenants, crofters and cottars.
Further, being men of education with an assured position in the country,
it was galling for them to think of subsiding into the new position of
tenants, burdened with a large increase of rent, and hence they nearly
all emigrated, taking along with them the choicest of their followers.
The emigration, which was to the New England States, was the wisest step
for them to pursue, and proved beneficial to them; but it drained the
cream of manhood of Glengarry, to the great detriment of the district."
Here we see how these
Macdonells came to leave their native land, and we see also that loyalty
to that land and to the British Crown was not left behind, but that the
people who gathered to the Jacobite standard in 1745 drew the sword in
America for the house of Hanover in 1775, and in consequence suffered
hardships at the hands of the United States as severe as were endured by
their fathers after Culloden, at the hands of Cumberland.
We have seen that the
Royal Highland Emigrant Regiment was composed largely of the veterans of
Fraser's and Montgomerie's Highlanders and of the Black Watch, who
settled on the Lower St. Lawrence and in Nova Scotia. That regiment bore
a distinguished part in the Revolutionary War, the 1st Battalion under
the command of Lieut.-Col. Allan Maclean, and the 2nd Battalion under
Major- Commandant John Small. Colonel Maclean with his Highlanders
defended the citadel of Quebec from the attacks and siege by the
American General, Arnold, and saved the stronghold from falling into the
hands of the Americans. And here, again, it is to be noted that to the
Highlander is due the credit of saving Canada from the Americans, as of
previously winning it from the French. The 2nd Battalion settled, in
1784, in Nova Scotia, and the 1st in Quebec. Many of the men who settled
in Nova Scotia moved westwards, eventually settling in Glengarry, above
Montreal. Although soldiers, they had acquired a rare experience of such
life as was suited to the forest wilds of an unopened country. They were
hardy Sons of the hills, seasoned by the winters and wars of Quebec, and
inured to the toils of pioneer life in Nova Scotia, at a time when the
tomahawk and musket were as necessary in the field as the spade and the
plough. They travelled long distances to their new homes, through
trackless forests, swamps, and rough broken land. The Nova Scotians vent
through the fastnesses of New Brunswick to the St. Lawrence, and by its
waters up to Montreal. Some came from the Carolinas—Skyemen, men from
Lochbroom and Kintail—for, ear- her than to Canada, Highlanders settled
in South Carolina. As Murdo Macleod's song has it—
The mode of travel
varied. The people from the South—such as those from Carolina -
travelled mostly in covered vans, driving their cattle before them;
those from Nova Scotia had no waggon paths, and had to use pack horses
and oxen. Referring to the difficulties of travelling in those days, the
late Sheriff Mackellar, of Hamilton, Ontario, had this anecdote to
relate: "Among the settlers in Glengarry were some not conversant with
Scripture, one of whom listened with incredulous astonishment to the
story of the children of Israel's wanderings through the wilderness. At
the close of the service he taxed the minister with drawing the long
bow. Being assured that the Israelites took forty years to reach
Palestine, he warmly exclaimed: 'Cha robh anti am Maois ach an t-amadan;
threoraich mise cuideachd de mhnathan agus chloinn bho Halifax gu
Glinne-Garaidh, troimh choilitean 'us swampaichean gun chunntais, anti
an sé seachdain 's cha do chaill mi ceann no cas diu.'" He alluded to
the parties of women and children that were conducted from Nova Scotia
to Glengarry after the war. In many cases the women and children had to
be left behind, and they endured persecution and cruelties almost
incredible at the hands of the victorious Americans. Petitions are on
file from soldiers who had served in the Highland regiments, and
afterwards in the Royal Highland Emigrant Regiment, to the British
authorities, imploring protection for the helpless families held as
prisoners by the United States Government. One of these petitions is
from John and Alexander MacDonell, captains in the King's Royal Regiment
of New York, who complain that the former's family are detained by the
Americans, destitute of every support except such as they receive from a
few friends. The family was thus held from 1777 until 1779. Another
petition is signed by twenty-four soldiers of the same regiment, whose
families were similarly treated for several years. A letter of more than
ordinary interest was written by John Fraser to General Haldimand, dated
31st May, 1734, reporting the ill-treatment of his sister-in-law's
family in the United States, in consequence of their loyalty to Britain.
John Fraser, the writer of the letter referred to, was of the Frasers of
Guisachan, Strathglass. His mother was Margaret, daughter of John
MacDonell of Ardnabi, and grand-daughter of Glengarry. It was she who
possessed the manuscript of Gaelic poetry that figures in the Ossianic
controversy.
While the Revolutionary
War was in progress, and while the Highland regiments were contributing
so much to the strength of the British army, the Highland people were
being driven off the lands of their fathers, and matters coming to a
head on the Glengarry estates in 1786, a second colony hived off, under
the guidance of a notable man, Alexander MacDonell, of the Scotos
family, a priest, whose ministrations extended beyond things spiritual.
About five hundred and fifty people comprised this party, which
naturally made for Glengarry, attracted by the first settlement there of
their countrymen. The name of the ship they sailed on from Greenock was
Macdonald. Their leader, Rev. Alexander MacDonell, was one of the
earliest priests in Upper Canada. He was the founder of the parish of
St. Raphael, Glengarry, where he built the first church in what is
to-day Ontario, viz., the Blue Chapel of St. Raphael, on the site now
occupied by the Cathedral Church of the diocese of Alexandria, built by
Bishop Alexander MacDonell, even a greater pioneer than he of Scotos.
This year (1786)
witnessed also the arrival in Canada of another man of note, whose
lifework will not be forgotten among the Gael of Canada. Rev. Dr. James
Macgregor, the Gaelic hymnist, was born in 1759, at Portmore, in
Perthshire. Having been appointed missionary to Nova Scotia, he sailed
for Halifax in 1786 and settled at Pictou among the Highlanders, to whom
he preached in Gaelic. The people were chiefly from Lochbroom, which
they had left in 1773 in the ship Hector. Dr. Macgregor thus describes
his early experience as a Canadian minister: "In November I received the
first money for preaching in Pictou, a part of the first year's stipend.
I lived a year and a quarter here without receiving a shilling, and
almost without giving any. I ought to have received forty pounds of cash
for the preceding year, with forty pounds' worth of produce, but
twenty-seven were all that I received. The truth is, it could not be
gotten. The price of wheat was then six shillings, and some of them
offered wheat at three shillings to make up their share of the stipend,
but could not obtain it. Almost all the twenty- seven pounds were due by
me to some necessary engagement of charity which I was under. My board,
which was my chief expense, was paid from the produce part of the
stipend, which was not so difficult to be obtained as the cash part. But
even of the produce part there was nigh ten pounds deficient. I plainly
saw that I need never expect my stipend to be punctually paid; indeed,
scarcely anything is punctually paid in this part of the world. It is a
bad habit, ill to forego. But my mind was now so knit to them by the
hope of doing good to their souls, that I resolved to be content with
what they could give." A contingent of emigrants from Dumfriesshire
settled at Pictou, and intermarriages between the Gaelic- speaking
people and the Lowland Scotch were frequent. But Dr. Macgregor made it a
rule at the marriages to speak only in one language, according as a
preference was indicated. One exception to this rule he thus refers to:
"In one instance only of marriage had I to speak in both languages,
telling the man his duties and engagements in English, and the woman
hers in Gaelic. How they managed to court or to converse afterwards, I
know not; but they declared to me, and the neighbors confirmed it, that
they could hardly speak a single word of each other's language." But
love laughs at language as at locksmiths, and the difficulty referred to
by Dr. Macgregor exists in many cases where people of different
nationalities meet, in our own day. Dr. Macgregor's hymns have been
popular in Canada, and copies of them may yet be found in the homes of
Highlanders who can read Gaelic.
The settlements above
referred to were practically all that took place down to the close of
the last century, with the exception of one of three hundred
Highlanders, led by an Irish priest named McKenna, who settled in Upper
Canada in 1776. Whence they came I have not been able to trace. They may
have been from Carolina, but more likely direct from Scotland, as they
reached Upper Canada from Montreal after the outbreak of the war, which
made it very dangerous for fugitives to travel in large bodies on
American soil.
The beginning of the
present century found emigration active, notwithstanding the restrictive
measures against it taken by the Government on representations by
Highland landlords, who operated to a great extent by means of the
Gaelic Society of London.
Twenty years had almost
passed away since the war, when an event happened which marks an
historic era in Upper Canada, and may be ranked as the most remarkable
in the annals of Highland emigration. I refer to the raising and
emigration of the Glengarry Fencibles. An emigrant ship which had sailed
from Barra with emigrants, had been wrecked, and put into Greenock,
landing her passengers in a most helpless condition. It was in the
spring of 1792. Alexander MacDonell, a native of Inshiaggan (the Bishop
MacDonell above referred to), then a priest in the Braes of Lochaber,
repaired to their aid, and succeeded in obtaining employment for them
from manufacturers in Glasgow. He became their priest, and his
experiences as such in Glasgow were quite interesting. The factories
had, in the course of two years, to be closed on account of the war
between Great Britain and France, and the Highlanders were once
more shelterless. Their priest conceived the idea of forming them into a
Catholic regiment, with MacDonell, of Glengarry, as Colonel. He, with
unusual address, procured a Letter of Service, and the Glengarry
Fencibles were soon embodied, the priest becoming chaplain. In 1802 it
was disbanded, and the men were left in as helpless a condition as ever.
The resourceful chaplain then conceived the idea of settling the corps
in Upper Canada. His negotiations with the government of the day might
be read with profit by everyone interested in the Highland clearances.
Briefly, he succeeded in obtaining an order from the Secretary of the
Colonies for a grant of two hundred acres of land to every one of his
Highlanders who should arrive in the Province. The Highland landlords
then opposed the project, and a hot agitation arose over the whole
question of emigration: The Prince of Wales offered waste lands in
Cornwall, England, to the Highlanders to keep them at home. An Act of
Parliament was passed, placing restrictions on emigration. The Glengarry
Fencibles, however, had got away before the bill became law. With them
came a number of people from Glenelg and Kin- tail, and other parts of
the West Highlands. There were in all about eleven hundred emigrants in
the party, and after a voyage of four months they reached Canada in 1804
and settled in Glengarry. Their leader was a remarkable man. He attended
to the material welfare of his people, and was probably the most
powerful force in public life in his Province for many years.
To last century also
belongs the Canadian work of the intrepid and famous explorer, Sir
Alexander Mackenzie. He was born in the Island of Lewis in 1755, and
early in life settled in Montreal, making a connection with a firm of
merchants engaged in the North-West fur trade. He became a partner in
the business, with headquarters on Lake Athabasca, and from that
advanced post began the explorations which resulted in the discovery of
the Mackenzie River and the North-west passage, a problem of interest to
the prospector and capitalist now as it was in 1789. An undertaking of
greater danger was the finding of a route vest- ward by the Peace River
to the Pacific coast. This he accomplished in 1793, the journey taking
eleven months. He inscribed on a rock facing the sea: "Alexander
Mackenzie, from Canada by land, July 22nd, 1793." In i8oi he published
an account of his travels of 1789 and 1793, and produced a book not only
of interest but of scientific value. He was knighted as a reward for his
explorations and for services rendered to H.R.H. the Duke of Kent while
the latter was travelling in America. Sir Alexander did not make Canada
his home, but returning with well-earned wealth, bought the estate of
Avoch, and died in the Old Land.
Restricting this article
mainly to the last century settlements, Earl Selkirk's interesting work
as a colonizer does not fall within its scope.
A census lately taken by
Clerks of Presbyteries and others, computes the number of
Gaelic-speaking people in the Dominion of Canada at more than a quarter
of a million; 250 congregations require the services of Gaelic- speaking
priests and ministers for preaching Gaelic each Sabbath, and seventy
more for visiting and pastoral purposes. The Gaelic language is spoken
in daily life in many sections of the country. The music and dance of
Caledonia —the bagpipes and Highland Fling—are heard and seen at
Scottish gatherings throughout the land, and there are a few Gaelic
societies in a flourishing condition. |
