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Force Emigration From the writings of Edith Ham, July 1935 |
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It is a well known history that the old ties of clan kinship were cruelly snapped by the rigidly repressive set of 1746 and in 1748 when a determined attempt was made to destroy the feudal power of the Highland Chiefs by a set to establish heritable jurisdiction. The clan system, in the old familiar sense, was shattered by those drastic measures. The clansmen were forbidden to wear the tartans or carry arms. The oppressed Highlanders silently endured their wrongs. They brooded upon the loss of their ancient heritage, but were powerless to reclaim their privileges. The wings of their martial ardour had been completely clipped at Culloden, and in the words of the ballad, "The clans were all away, away." This in a very literal sense was seen to be. Their pride humbled. their hopes blasted, strangers almost in the land of their birth, the men of the glens and bens at last removed themselves from their ancestral seil and sailed with their wives and families across the broad Atlantic. Between 1763 and 1775, not less than 20,000 Highlanders found a refuge in |
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| America. Another great flood of immigration began to flow freely westward in the opening years of the 19th century. Canada received many of them and a new Celtic race sprang up to nourish their children on the tradition that the pilgrims had brought with them overseas. Though exiled, "The Children of the mist,", knowing that the pioneers had gone to their rest, had a look behind them and still cast a longing look toward the old clan country from which they drew their origin. | |
History
of
one McLeod Family in Ontario