Loading ...For centuries , there were no deeds in the highlands and the serfs ( crofters ) had allegiance to their local clan chiefs . They paid a portion of their yield to the chieftain for protection from marauders . When deeding became the law , the Lairds ( Land Lords ) became the legal owners of their lands . This was around the time that Scotland , England , Wales and Ireland came under the rule of a single king in London , under a Stewart king from Scotland .
It was a time of high level stakes card games in high society . Many of these Lairds were given to drinking to excess and risk taking . Many of their lands then fell into the hands of English landlords eventually . This was compounded by the Stewart lineage being removed from the throne of the United Kingdom , and an attempt to break up the UK failed in 1745 at Culloden ( led by Bonnie Prince Charlie Stewart , who was raised in France ). That was the final blow to the Stewart claims to the throne .
Around that time , the Lairds decided they didn’t need whiskey , turnips and chickens from the crofters as much as real income from the lands of the crofters , and a weather resistant strain of sheep had been developed which were ideally suited to the cold wet weather of the highlands of Scotland . This was also an era when textile mills were crying for wool , so the Lairds had the crofters removed from their lands in the Highland Clearances which continued into the early 1800’s . Many came to Canada as well as Australia and New Zealand . When I was still in high school in the mid-1950’s I would say that over half of my schoolmates had Scottish surnames . Since then , immigration has had a huge effect on Canada’s ethnic makeup , so names tracing back to Scotland are now a minority , I am sure .
Concentrations of Scottish settlements were in Nova Scotia and the eastern counties of Ontario . Loyalists to the crown of England ( considered traitors after the Revolution ) left the 13 colonies ( particularly Mohawk Valley , NY ) to emigrate northward to British North America ( Canada ) and were given lands in Eastern Ontario . I have two of the land grant documents in my possession , signed and sealed by the governor general – the representative of King George III .