Corncrake Body 1

Can any gifted reader suggest the easiest way for readers to download "The Corncrake", so as to be able to peruse it off-line? It seems to easy enough to just print it off, but then there is a danger of losing the odd line at the foot of each page. By the way, the current issue is a bit light… partly because of little news, partly because the Editor has to rush away for a week. In the absence of news, it is good to be able to report magnificent weather, Snowdrops everywhere and spring in the air.

Pied Piper Needed

In recent months there have been a number of reports to suggest that the local rat population is either bolder or larger. Various theories abound - birds are doing well, so extra eggs and young provided more food and led to more rat families. Or, the birds are doing well because some of the feral cats seem to have disappeared - thus reducing rat predation. Or the EEC says we cannot burn our rubbish, so more food sources are available to scavengers. Or there is an increased incidence of fallen stock, again producing food opportunities. It may be a combination of factors, or it may simply reflect the increased digging, delving, draining and general building activity, which has displaced resident colonies.

Anyway, Dr. John Currie has been in touch with the relevant department and a proper assessment is to be carried out. Going by national averages, there should be about 150 of the furry fiends in Colonsay; any in excess of that number will presumably be identified and re-located. It is understood that Lochgilphead is to be the nerve-centre of the new Argyll Environmental Plan.

Sunday Herald, 4 February 2001

An article that appeared in the Sunday Herald suggested that the proposed air-service for Colonsay is running into serious difficulties. According to the article, access to adequate funding for the project will not be forthcoming unless the development agencies are able to purchase the freehold of the landing strip. The strip is currently in private ownership and the owner is reluctant to sell; the owner is prepared to make it available on a long lease, but seemingly this is insufficient to meet the case.

The Sunday Herald article informs readers that "The impasse, which may result in the abandonment of the development, is being used by land campaigners to press for strengthening land reform legislation due before the Scottish parliament this month."

This is the latest development in a rather sad and convoluted story. The inhabitants of Colonsay expressed a desire for enhanced communications with the mainland, partly to permit schoolchildren to come home at weekends and partly in a general move to foster social inclusion. The authorities suggested an air service, as having greater flexibility and lower costs than additional ferry services; and the community agreed to suspend its campaign whilst practical proposals could be developed.

As a result, Colonsay accepted inadequate communications for the winter of 1999/2000 and again for 2000/2001. The island was informed that technical difficulties precluded the introduction of a promised air-service in the summer of 2001, and so the community has perforce to accept a mere lifeline level of service once again, for the coming winter of 2001/2002. The original children in question are already in long-trousers - some are at university; and now the spectre of an additional wrangle has been raised.

There may well be another way forward - perhaps the landowner is just bluffing, perhaps the authorities can use a flying-boat or a helicopter. But it will be more than disappointing if the Sunday Herald is right, because the development of the community has already been suspended for four years. The article concluded with a comment suggesting that government is still committed to the scheme, but it all sounds a bit confrontational:

"Alasdair Morrison MSP, Minister for the Highlands and Islands, said the situation was a "living and breathing example" of the need to strengthen land reform legislation. Morrison said: "I was impressed by the spirit of renewal coursing through the island when I visited last year. The laird gave me an assurance then that he would not stand in the way of development. I hope he does not renege on that. There's no way one man can stand in the way of the community's legitimate right to a proper transport service.""

Perhaps it is time for some dialogue.

Progress on Angela's house at 8th February

Estate "Open Meeting"

At a public meeting in the Hall on Wednesday 7th February, Alex and Jane outlined the priorities of the Estate in the near future. They indicated that their immediate concerns were in two areas, one being the general management of the estate and its resources and the other being the further development of the holiday cottage and related activities. There is a certain overlap between the two, and from a financial point of view the holiday business must be seen as crucial.

The estate no longer sees itself as a primary provider of housing to long-term residents, recognising that many people wish to be independent. The estate will, of course, continue to provide for its existing tenants and is about to embark on an upgrading of the housing stock. It intends to complement this activity by assisting persons who are seeking plots for self-build, and has already worked closely with the authorities in supplying sites for agency housing. It is actively exploring a proposal to transfer houses to a public agency on a longterm basis, so that the agency can upgrade the properties to its own specifications and itself become the immediate landlord of the tenants concerned. No change will affect any existing tenant without their full consultation and approval.

A rolling programme to upgrade various properties is planned, starting with Sgredan. The idea is to bring in a construction team to thoroughly overhaul and restore one building at a time. If successful, this project will roll along, affecting three or four houses per year; cost is expected to run to Ł50,000 - Ł60,000 per property. Because it is easier to work with empty buildings, the immediate targets include Hall Cottage, Pondside and Garvard. Tenants for at least two of these properties have already been identified and active consideration is being given to the third.

The estate is keen to continue with its own programme of Ponticum eradication, and is actively engaged in Woodland Regeneration in partnership with Nigel. Underplanting of cleared areas, as around the Mill Loch, will be by native wildflowers rather than exotic species.

The question of the airstrip arose, in the light of the Sunday Herald article mentioned above. The estate is said to have every intention of developing the airstrip in its own right, and expresses itself as very keen to work with the authorities towards the provision of a regular air service. Alex made it clear that, whilst he is admittedly unwilling to sell the strip, he has not refused to sell it, and has not received any sort of formal approach. He felt that the article was unhelpful and in many respects factually incorrect. The exact level of investment required to upgrade the strip is apparently uncertain, but the estate would be prepared to step aside if the proposed expenditure was beyond its own resources.

Snippets

Audrey Thompson and her three youngest have been home from Canada for a brief visit; Archie's dog has died (the one that used to spend its time barking at the waves); George missed the ferry, had to charter a boat; spare a thought for Rena, making good progress and very positive but not back home yet; CalMac was 150 years old on 10 February and gave us all a yellow woolly toy; an application by the Binnie's to build at Drumclach was in the Oban Times; Oransay is advertising for a seasonal gardener; the Community Company has advertised a secretarial and administrative post; a Hen Harrier is thought to have eaten Irene's Mallard; the roof of front lounge of the hotel is in the process of being renewed; an otter was on view whilst the ferry berthed on Wednesday.

Top quality produce from both ends of our linked Parish shared a spotlight at the International Boat Show. You too can enjoy Colonsay produce - order from our webpage links.

Book Review: "The Buildings of Scotland - Argyll & Bute"

By Frank Arneil Walker Penguin Books in Association with The Buildings of Scotland Trust 014 071079 5 Ł35

Published almost exactly a year ago, this is a hugely important new reference book about the buildings and monuments of our part of Scotland. It takes the form of a gazeteer moving through the towns and villages describing in detail the churches, castles, streets and cottages of each. Although this is not a history book we are given a great amount of historical information wherever it is available through the names and dates of the builders, the architects and the people who lived and worked in these buildings. While the glories of the mansions and follies of the very rich are of course detailed, here we have also the mills, limekilns and furnaces of mainland Argyll and its islands.

With this book you could see and discover all sorts of new things about Oban; enough to fill one of those "lost" days when the ferry has failed to take you home to Colonsay. Have you ever visited St Columba's, the Catholic Cathedral designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott? (He also designed Battersea and Bankside Power stations; Bankside is now the Tate Modern Gallery.) Or, even more extraordinary, because tucked away behind an ordinary street front, the Episcopal Cathedral of St John the Divine? The descriptions of the more humble villas and houses that make up the individual streets are even more fascinating and I was glad to read that the Corran Halls have a "Brutally horizontal affront to the front"!

Colonsay and Oronsay both have several pages devoted to them with, not unexpectedly, considerable attention given to our important ruins especially those of an ecclesiastical nature and various well-known duns and standing stones. It is particularly nice to know that the fine jointing of the masonry on the slip, the mole and the harbour steps (by Joseph Mitchell) has not gone unnoticed.

(NB This book is one of the Pevsner Architectural Guides of which the Scottish architect Colin McWilliam was a founding editor. He was the father of the Scottish author Candia McWilliam - who is familiar to many in Colonsay as Claude!) Georgina Hobhouse

Nooks and Crannies: Tobar Fuar

The well beside the Clay Pigeon trap at Machrins ("The Cold Well")was noted for its especially refreshing water, and that entire strand is named in its honour. It was overwhelmed by weed and sand in a storm about fifteen years ago, but some enterprising person might yet restore it. Somebody with a larger than usual bucket and spade?

The Magazine Section

The Colonsay-Canada Connection, by John W. Sheets

The full title of this essay is "National Culture of Mobility": The Colonsay-Canada Connection, and it is reproduced, with kind permission of the publishers, from "Transatlantic Studies", Will Kaufman and Heidi Slettedahl Macpherson ISBN 0 7618 17905 (University Press of America, Inc., 2000). The book can be ordered online at www.univpress.com

John Sheets has an extensive academic and personal knowledge of Colonsay, built up through some thirty years of research; he has kindly prepared a list of all his publications (given elsewhere in this issue) as a reference aid to our readers. Professor Sheets asks that we add the following personal note to the on-line publication, as it would normally appear as part of the preamble to his various publications: "I acknowledge the permission of the Registrar-General for Scotland to consult documents at New Register House, Edinburgh."

Part 4, of 4 instalments.

In a 1990-91 Scottish historical Studies Seminar about "Scottish Emigration and Scottish Society" held at Strathclyde University, T.M.Devine, Malcolm Gray, and E.J.Cowan offered examples and analysis of a "national culture of mobility." Despite Colonsay's tiny size and remote location, its lairds and emigrants exemplify, if not extend, aspects of their presentations. After all, John McNeill (son of the "Old Laird"), as chairman of the board to supervise Scotland's poor Law, and his nephew Malcolm McNeill (1839-1919), as Poor Law inspector for the Highlands and Islands, promoted emigration to solve rural poverty. By 1800 the attraction of higher wages and cheap land in Prince Edward Island convinced some tenants and laborers to leave Colonsay despite its prosperity; perhaps the opportunities at home were not equal for all. These early emigrants braved a long voyage, the Maritime wilderness, extreme climate, and slow adjustments to forge a point of entry, settlement or replenishment for later people from Colonsay. Like other Scots abroad, they wrote to family and friends. A Gaelic letter of April 7, 1822 by Malcolm Munn in Kilchattan conveys all the ambiguity and hesitation of a potential emigrant:

"[T]here are many letters arriving here from others who went over, who do not tell the truth - some are praising it while others criticize and complain…. I am not too anxious to go to that place to work. It would not look good to me, when strong people with indifferent attitudes come home and have left…"

Gray captures the essence and spirit of Gaels making the momentous decision to leave their crofts, cottages, and hearths:

"It is people carefully planning to join earlier emigrants because of family and neighbourhood links who sustain the continuity. This is to be seen most clearly in the rural context…. The family, in fact, was the common unit of planning and it is a particular characteristic of Scottish emigration that families were held together. Emigrant parties would contain representatives from all age groups from the young to the elderly."

Colonsay emigrants aboard the Spencer in 1806 and the Clarendon in 1808, or Professor Donald Mackinnon's father's siblings gone to Upper Canada in 1831, surely fit this description.

The emigrant groups faced the shock of arrival and the challenges of those first years. They survived in social networks going from their Gaelic village to a ship, to shore and to settlement in a "chain of migration" from Prince Edward Island through Ontario. There were trees to cut, fields to plow, animals to buy, cabins to build, and above all, the winters to fear. In Erin and Elderslie the land available far exceeded any acreage in Colonsay, often ten or twenty times the size of a croft in Kilchattan. The displaced, disoriented islanders did well to clear and cultivate a few acres each year, given the hazards of accident, weather, and disease. Tuberculosis plagued the young adults in Elderslie. Forty-five of the Rusk grave inscriptions between 1860 and 1910 - about 20% - record 25 men and 20 women dying between 15 and 35 years old. Of Colonsay's 280 registered deaths for 1860 - 1910, approximately 18% were young adults aged between 15 and 35; a common cause of death was "Phthisis pulmonalis." Families had abandoned their crowded, damp cottages in Colonsay to build and inhabit crowded, damp cabins in Bruce County, with similar consequences. Even Professor Mackinnon in Edinburgh realized the comparisons (and contrasts), which he conveyed to the Gaelic Society of Inverness in 1887:

"A shrewd observant Highland colonist once informed me that where Celt and Saxon farmer live together on the shores of Lake Huron, the Highlander's "concession" frequently stands first, and is always a good second; but, in a community of Highlanders, one not infrequently comes upon broken fences, open gates, and that general air of negligence and abandon so charming to the artistic instinct, but so destructive of good husbandry, which one meets with too often in the old country."

Another irreversible, transatlantic force permeated the emigrants' Gaelic language and culture. Like people of the Scottish Borders transplanted to southern Ontario whose "self-conscious awareness of belonging to a Scottish community seldom extended beyond a generation", the Colonsay emigrants to Bruce County also encountered linguistically diverse groups of people. Elderslie was an early conglomeration of English, German, Irish, and Scottish enclaves which later dissolved into a mixed population of English speakers, truly a mosaic of its settlement history. "McLugash" from Colonsay changed to "McDougal" in Elderslie, due to the nearly identical Gaelic derivations for "son of Douglas" and "son of Dougal". The families heard both Gaelic and English in church but they read English in school and English on official documents. Learning English in rural Ontario proved difficult for the children of Colonsay parents. Angus Currie McNeill entered "S.S. No. 8, Elderslie" in 1868-69. Over 60 years later, Angus still remembered his Gaelic-to-English trauma:

"When my schooling began I could not speak English, and I will never forget the trials I had. If I gave a word the wrong pronunciation, which quite often happened, some scholar would make fun of me, and that was like drawing the red blood from my heart, and any boy who took my part was a friend for life. My heart goes out to any child who is sent to school before he or she can talk the language of the community…."

Rusk's cemetery also exhibits this language shift. When the children buried their parents, or descendants later erected a stone, they often inscribed "Native of Colonsay" on the marker, yet omitted any Gaelic notation so common on the cemetery stones in Colonsay.

Cowan regrets that "the Scottish emigrant experience is still somewhat imperfectly understood because comparatively few historians have tried to trace the process across the Atlantic." However, Catherine Wilson at the University of Guelph has studied Scotch-Irish emigration from Northern Ireland to Amherst Island, Ontario, during 1820-1860. Like the Colonsay people, they traveled in extended families and "yearned for people and places back in Ireland." Unlike them, they left 20-acre farms to rent 50-100 acres from Irish landlords "even when they could afford to buy". A port of arrival seldom became the Gaelic emigrant's final destination, and records were not always kept on an expanding frontier; the "official statistics of upper Canada" started in 1825. But the emigrants' children and grandchildren, separated from Colonsay by a generation or two, lived in a New World where they excelled as farmers, wives, husbands, parents, merchants, teachers, preachers, doctors, and lawyers. For them, Colonsay modified through time into a cherished, collective memory.

To learn about those "left behind" in Colonsay, visit the cemetery at Kilchattan where Professor Mackinnon is buried under a Gaelic notation. To witness the same social cohesion among those who departed Colonsay, visit Rusk's cemetery in Elderslie; or visit Wood Islands Pioneer Cemetery, Prince Edward Island, where siblings Angus, James, and Ann Munn, late aboard the "Spencer" in 1806, rest near many of their descendants. Or visit Coningsby cemetery between Ospringe and Erin in rural Wellington County. Buried almost side by side are Donald, John, Lachlan, and Sarah McKinnon from the Ross of Mull and Colonsay, together in death as they always were in life. As their nephew, Professor Donald Mackinnon, said seven years before his election to Edinburgh's Celtic Chair: "We consider it a misfortune both for the country and for the people that our Highland peasantry, in order to find a fair field in which they may be able to benefit themselves and their fellowmen, must seek other lands."

This case study of the Colonsay-Canada migrations demonstrates the extent to which Transatlantic Studies is defined by its association with "cultures of mobility". Moreover, the historical figures discussed here share significant patterns of thought and behaviour with figures disccussed elsewhere in this collection. The propensity to view the transatlantic as a site of conflicting dynamics - of opportunity and loss, home and away, self and other - appears in this story of the Mackinnons and their fellow emigrants, just as it does in other transatlantic engagements in politics, the arts, the social sciences, and the law. In this regard, the transatlantic itself is truly "a fair field" for exploration.

Article concludes

Sunrise on Jura, from Scalasaig

Colonsay's Architecture

We hope to have an article about local architectural features some day, and it has been noticed that Edinburgh University's on-line catalogue mentions the following item, which might be of help. Is any reader in a position to check the reference and let us know what is in it?

MS 2490: Printed material (e.g. guidebooks) relating to Lorimer's work. Letter from Lady Strathcona to Mr Paul, dated 15 January [1937] on alterations at Colonsay House, and three work diaries: one for 1913 headed "Sir R. Rowand Anderson" and one for 1913 and for 1914, headed "A.F. Balfour Paul".

We would also welcome any information about Sir Basil Spence's contribution to Colonsay's built environment.

Website to Explore: CELTS

It is difficult to know how many readers make use of this feature of "The Corncrake", but the selection of sites is deliberately fairly wide-ranging. Usually the site has a direct significance for Colonsay folk, but sometimes it is merely useful - this week's offering combines the best of both worlds, and happens to lead to one of the most amazing resources anywhere on the web. Have you ever wished you had a private copy of "The Annals of the Four Masters"? Wondered what really happened to the husband of "the richest woman in the world", (whose widow lived briefly in Balnahard)? The "Annals" and other priceless texts are available at CELT (Corpus Electronic Texts):

http://www.ucc.ie/celt/

The following extract is a nice little example which is thought to relate to Colonsay, since Colla Uais is said to have spent his exile in Balerominmore:

Annal M323
M323.0
The Age of Christ, 323.
M323.1
The first year of Colla Uais, son of Eochaidh Doimhlen, as king over Ireland.
Annal M326
M326.0
The Age of Christ, 326.
M326.1
The fourth year of Colla Uais, in the sovereignty of Ireland, when Muireadhach Tireach expelled him and his brothers into Alba Scotland with three hundred along with them.
Annal M327
M327.0
The Age of Christ, 327.
M327.1
The first year of Muireadhach Tireach in the sovereignty of Ireland.
M327.2
At the end of this year the three Collas came to Ireland; and there lived not of their forces but thrice nine persons only. They then went to Muireadhach, having been instructed by a druid. And they scolded at him, and expressed evil words, that he might kill them, and that it might be on him the curse of the finghal should alight. As he did not oppose them, they tarried with him, and were faithful to him.
Annal M331
M331.0
The Age of Christ, 331.
M331.1
The fifth year of Muireadhach.
M331.2
The battle of Achadh Leithdheirg, in Fearnmhagh, was fought by the three Collas against the Ulstermen, in which fell Fearghus Fogha, son of Fraechar Foirtriun, the last king of Ulster, who resided at Eamhain. They afterwards burned Eamhain, and the Ulstermen did not dwell therein since. They also took from the Ulstermen that part of the province extending from the Righe and Loch nEathach westwards. Colla Meann fell in this battle.

Catherine Johnson

Does anyone have any biographical information on Catherine Johnson (also known as Kate Johnston), who is thought to have died on 1 April 1927? Her mother was Mary McNeill who died 1 May 1911, and Mary had another daughter, Mary McPhee (died 26 December 1918). It is thought to Kate (b. 1864) lived at Sgreadan, and was a "female servant".

Looking at my own records, Kate was the grand-daughter of "Torkill McNeill" and his wife Ann; Torquil was alive in 1861, 50 yrs of age - and he had two daughter, Mary and Catherine. By 1871, Ann was widowed and her unmarried daughters were still living at home, together with two grandchildren, Catherine Johnstone and Neil McPhee. By 1881, Neil's father Donald (born in Jura) had appeared and amassed 60 acres, a huge holding. Katherine Johnstone was by then staying as a "visitor" with Murdoch McNeill and his family at Kiloran.

It is fairly clear that either Kate or her aunt was the eponymous "Katey Thorquil" who drowned in the well at Kilchattan. It would be good to know which one it was, and to have any further information that might help her great-niece, Sylvia McPhee.

Regulars

Readers Write

This section seems to be growing; perhaps some sort of editing will be needed soon, but for the moment it is good to enjoy the spontaneity of correspondence. We start with more information about Sir John Carstairs McNeill VC, from Greg IK McNeill, who has received replies from around the world following his message in "The Corncrake":

Q: Moari weaponry?
A: http://www.ta.co.nz/local-info/history/earlyhx.shtml - muskets!

Q: what the heck is Te Awamutu like now?
A: The rose-growing centre of NZ. The visitor-centre manager in Te Awamutu (where Sir John McNeill VC was headed) is one LIZ MCNEILL! http://www.teawamutu.co.nz/local-info/amenities/infocentre.shtml and there is even a picture of Liz!

Q: What is Ohanpu like?
A: No idea, the web let me down - but Liz might know - who is going to ask her?

At the regimental site there is stuff about all the Sussex regiments' VC holders and information about their museum in Eastboune. Sussex regiment: http://www.eastbournemuseums.co.uk/redoubt/rsxvc.htm

On the same subject we can share a note he received from Mary MacKay:

Dear Greg,
I read with interest your comment in the Jan. Corncrake about Sir John McNeill's V.C. You will see an obit for a grandson and granddaughter of the Old Laird in the latest Corncrake. I also have a newspaper item about a"cousin" John McNeill who came to visit on Feb.14,1889.
"Mr.John McNeill, cousin of A. McNeill M.P. was in town last week having obtained short furlough from the North West Mounted Police to which he has belonged for the last eight years."
I'd like to know who he is. The mention of 'Red River' made me think there might be some connection because that's where the Mounted Police were.

And we have a message direct from Mary herself:

Hello Kevin,
Thank you for you interest and kind words about our Rusk Cemetery project in the last Corncrake. I am working very hard to complete my part of the bargain which is to research all the families and write a book. I am donating all proceeds from it to help with the costs.
Would you please put a notice in the Corncrake that I would like to hear from any descendents of families who came to Elderslie or Arran Township either directly or by way of P.E.I.
I am currently working on the Lachlan McNeill family (Baptist Church minister).
Mary MacKay jms.mackay@bmts.com

Mary has offered to send a proof before printing, in case there may be additional information that can be included. I am most grateful to Alastair Scouller who has kindly prepared a very full response to a query in our last issue and allows us to copy it here:

Dear Glen,
I was interested - and challenged - to read your letter in the latest issue of "The Corncrake". I have been able to locate your ancestor John Buie or Bowie (the two forms are used interchangeably) in both the 1841 and 1851 Censuses of Colonsay. In 1851 he appears with his wife "Jennet", children Mary (8), Alex (2) and Margaret (3 months) living with Jennet's sister Catherine "McFaddion" at Balerominmore, in the south-eastern corner of Colonsay. His age is noted as 23, which would tie in with his having been born around 1818-19. I am afraid his occupation is given, rather unflatteringly, as "Drains". Interestingly, my own great-great-great-grandfather Malcolm McNeill (who featured largely in the account of the Baptist Church on Colonsay in recent issues of "The Corncrake") was also living at Balerominmore at the time.
In 1841 a John Bowie is listed living with his parents Donald and "Katrine" Bowie, brother Hector and sister Flora, also at Balerominmore, so it is likely this is the same family, which answers your question about his parentage. By 1851 Donald was a widower, and living with Hector and his wife Hester on Oronsay. There is no trace of John Buie in 1861, so I think you are right in suggesting that he emigrated around this time. Both Hector and Flora continued to live on Colonsay, where Hector had a croft in Kilchattan, on the west side of the island in the Censuses of 1861, 1871 and 1881. He and Hester ("Esther" in some records) had children Catherine, Archibald, Donald, Murdoch, John, Peggy and Flory. I have not been able to follow them all up, but Murdoch Buie (born c. 1860) was the farmer at Baleromindubh, the next farm to Balerominmore, in 1891, and is still remembered by the older people on Colonsay.
John and Hector's sister Flora appears to have left the island after 1841, but reappears in 1881 as Flora Thomson, a widow, living with Hector, now also widowed, in Kilchattan. By 1891 Hector appears to have died, and Flora is recorded as living with her grand-daughter Maggie in the cottage at Scalasaig which is still known as "Maggie Thomson's".
Alastair M. Scouller scouller@colonsay.org.uk

Things are getting better and better - Blake McNeill has sent the following very encouraging letter; it is excellent to hear that we have been able to be of help.

With the help of Jeanne and Doug MacDonald we have obtained a copy of Hugh McNeill's marriage record which states the names of his parents and his birthplace as Colonsay Scotland. Hugh's parents were John and Marrion (Sarah) McNeill who are listed in your 1841 Census. There are a number of children including James, Duncan, Catherine, Hugh, and Mary. We know the histories of Hugh and Duncan McNeill and now will start looking for descendents of James, Catherine, and Mary McNeill.
Doug MacDonald also gave us the names of Hugh McNeill's grandparents. John McNeill parents were Duncan McNeill and Mary Bell. Marrion McNeill's parents were Dugald McNeill and Flory Galbraith. Thanks to the Colonsay web page and yourself we now have been able to add a significant piece to our genealogy and history and have gained a number of leads in our search for extended family.

Thanks Blake McNeill

More about Rusk:

I noted with interest your Corncrake note about the restoration of Rusk Cemetery in Ontario. I have attached a picture of the cemetery entrance area that I took during a visit about 3 years ago. The Mary Blue, shown as age 30 in the 1841 census at Risk Buie, is my great-great-grandmother (I am age 70 and live in Vancouver BC). She, with some of her children (including Duncan age 3 in 1841 who is my great-grandfather) moved to Bruce County Ontario Canada in 1852, and the family lived for generations in a village there named Paisley. Please add this information to your site register together with my email address theblues@direct.ca and I would be happy to hear from any interested family descendants. Regards, Douglas Blue

Rusk Cemetery, where Mary Blue is at rest.

One of the most extraordinary messages this issue came as a great surprise; perhaps it is easiest to reproduce the exchanges and then see if anybody can make a further contribution? At first glance it was quite startling, but it looks as if somebody needs to devote some time to tracing and checking the original source. Perhaps the Clan Society could make it a project in advance of this summer's gathering in Argyll? Note the coincidental dates, with Malcolm's birth in 1570 coinciding with that of Colla Ciotach in Ireland; and Malcolm having married in 1609, whilst Colla married his beloved cousin Mary some short time after her repudiation in 1603 by Ranald MacDonald of Clanranald.

From: Travis McAfee
Hello, My name is Travis S. McAfee. I am writing because I found this entry in my family tree. Do you have any info or records of such a man? If so I would appriciate a response, any info would be of interest, thank you very much.

Name: Malcolm McAfee
* Sex: M
* Birth: 1570 in Island of Colonsay, Scotland

Father: ? McAfee b: 1540 in Island of Colonsay, Scotland
Mother: ? b: 1540 in Island of Colonsay, Scotland
Marriage 1 ? b: ABT. 1582 in Glasgow, Scotland

* Married: 1609 in Island of Colonsay, Scotland
Children
1. John McAfee b: 1610 in Edinburgh/Glasgow, Scotland

Reply by Kevin Byrne:

Good Morning Travis - and thank you for your message. I do not know if you are pulling my leg - in which case congratulations, you have certainly enlivened a wintry morning - or if you are possibly the victim. Anyway, there is always the hope that your message stacks up... in which case it is of outstanding importance and solves a mystery which has attracted a lot of interest.

In a nutshell, I will be able to give you a lot of information on Malcolm - He is recognised as having been the last chieftain of his clan, incidentally had red whiskers, was active in the 1616 rising of the MacDonald's and subsequently gave himself up. After a few years in Edinburgh, he returned to Colonsay, was eventually executed with a couple of sons and nephews by Colla Ciotach MacDonald (his feudal superior) and the exact history of his descent was lost sight of. I know that family members remained in Colonsay, also Islay and Jura, but there is a persistent tale that a significant branch made their way to Ireland (possibly a few miles outside Armagh town) and c. 1695 or soon after, crossed to the New World. Another important branch were in SW Scotland.

Even if your Malcolm is not "the" Malcolm, he would be very close. The family is of great interest - there is doubt as to whether it is Pictish, Norse or (as I believe) Irish in origin, and I have no doubt that DNA will shortly solve the problem. The family is very important historically and culturally, and is at the heart of a huge web of traditional tales.

Reply by Travis:

Wow, sounds very interesting. Currently I live on the island of Maui Hawaii but I was born in southern California. I was researching my Genealogy on www.ancestry.com and found a link from my Great Great Great Grandfather, Elijah Christenburry McAfee, from Georgia. According to Ancestry.com, I am a desendant of the Malcolm McAfee in question. I am not sure where the web site got the information or how, but if you would like to check it out yourself, try the www.ancestry.com search for either Elijah McAfee or Malcolm McAfee. I know for a fact that my family has always claimed to be Scotch-Irish but we never had linked back to Colonsay until now. Let me know if it sounds authentic, the site lists all his descendents. I also got help from a Carolyn McAfee who is an expert on this family tree.

Second response from Kevin Byrne:

Hello again Travis - and many thanks for the additional information. I had not heard of that posting and I think that it might be worthwhile to run a brief piece about it all in the next "Corncrake", to see what else emerges. I have noticed quite a few Old Testament McAfee names over recent months, and wonder if Elijah could be the common factor. The Georgia connection is also intriguing... at the very least, it should be possible to check the story out and see how much is quite definite. In the meantime, you can be quite confident that McAfee = Colonsay between about 1250 and 1625, and that a collateral branch has survived here to the present….

We will be happy to receive more letters and, as always, the editor would like to hear from anyone who might wish to contribute. Individual articles on news or local events will always be welcome.
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