Last week the topic of the blog was on the Scottish Emigration to the Wilmington, North Carolina area. This is a region of the USA that had and still has many people with Scots-Irish ancestors.
This week the focus of the blog is shifted to the area associated with the beginnings of the global Leslie family. This blog is based on an article Emigration From North East Scotland in the Nineteenth Century written by Marjory Harper, instructor of the course titled The Scottish Diaspora.
Unlike the factors of poverty and starvation that prompted the population of Western Scotland to leave in the 1700s, the Northeast of Scotland escaped the worst of the situation. At the beginning of the 1800s and after the Napoleonic Wars, the British government wished to populate its colonies with useful settlers, especially in Canada. Also, unlike the tenant farmers of the south and western highlands, people emigrating from the Northeast (Aberdeenshire, Moray, Banffshire) had the financial means to emigrate. While these people in people worked farms, there was a movement to consolidate farms in NE Scotland, therefore opportunity to own land became less likely for them and their children.
The article suggests that the persons seeking to emigrate had become restless and had lost their “prospects” of becoming independent landowners. They were interested in opportunities for themselves and their children through land ownership. The emigration was prompted by more of a “pull” toward opportunity, than a “push” out of desperation. Much of the emigration in the Northeast was also fueled by correspondence from family and friends who had already made the move out of Scotland to join them in a land of opportunity.
In the early 1800s, Canada was the primary destination of persons from NE Scotland. It was a less expensive passage costing about £4 in steerage. Furthermore, Canada provided a more familiar environment, surrounded by countrymen.
As we consider the Scottish Diaspora across the 1700s and 1800s, it would be interesting to know the extent of Leslie emigration out of Scotland, especially NE Scotland. In reading the book Historical Records of the Family of Leslie from 1067 to 1868-1869, by Col. Charles Leslie there is little mention of Leslies emigrating to other countries. It is likely that the people mentioned in the books were invested in remaining in Scotland.
What about the untold stories of Leslies who emigrated from Scotland?
Are their stories of emigration important?
If so, who will tell their story?
4 responses to “Week 3: Northeast Scotland Emigration”
This distinction between the desperate people leaving Scotland and the skilled people leaving Scotland is important when researching the family trees of the Leslies.
Chris
That is very true. Unfortunately, While we know about landowning Leslies and their pedigrees, little has been researched and recorded about the Leslies not written about in the few Leslie books available.
Once we start using social media in both Aberdeenshire and North Carolina we will find a great deal more stories emerge on this wonderful link to North America. That is why we are a Diaspora!
This 19c NE Scotland emigration profile fits my family’s story!
My Grandfather John Leslie left Aberdeen in the 1890s to come to North America. In the 1880s his father Alexander Leslie had lost their farm in Meikle Falla because he signed as the second signature on a loan for someone more wealthy who was borrowing the money. The wealthy person failed to be able to make loan payments and they took his land and farm.
My Grandfather who was oldest of 10 children and had been displaced to the city of Aberdeen then emigrated to Montreal then traveled to Michigan where a cousin was living. For work he became involved in the quarrying and then construction of buildings with granite.
He worked on the Montreal Train station, Lincoln memorial, and Freer gallery in Washington DC. St John the Divine NYC , Rockefeller estate garden Tarrytown NY, West Point -General Washington sculpture base, and many more buildings in NY city.
My grandfather was responsible for bringing over 7 of his 9 siblings. Once here they were in the US they would work together to bring the next sibling over to the US. He delayed his marriage for 10 years till all the Leslie siblings here in the US.