By Linus Joseph Dewald Jr., Editor
Winter 1999 and Revised 30 Dec 2010
George and Jane Prentice sailed from South Uist,Scotland, then Glasgow, on 17 Aug 1848 aboard the ship, Lulan, a barque of 472 tons, George McKenzie, Master. The joint owners of the ship were the captain, George McKenzie of New Glasgow, and James Carmichael.
They arrived in Pictou, Nova Scotia safely, but their journey graphically illustrated the troubles that many immigrants faced in those days.
The passenters came from the island of South Uist in Scotland. The arrangements were to have been that they would be shipped free to Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island. They were first put on a steamer to the Clyde River, and then onto a ship bound for the United States. The mistake was discovered in time, and they were put off at Glasgow. Finally, more than 150 of them were put on the Lulan. 30 of the familes were miners coming over to work at Albion Mines (now Stellarton) for the General Mining Company.
Small pox broke out; three died on the voyage over, and one died soon afterward in the harbour. The people were taken off the ship at the quarantine ground. The cabin passengers and miners were separated from the rest. The small pox patients were put in hospital; the healthy were housed in sheds.
Before September had ended, 90 of them had small pox. By the middle of November, 24 had died, about 5 were still ill, and 97 were declared "disease free" by the Board of Health. Vessels were hired at public expense to take them to Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island, as the emigrants were penniless.
Sir John Harvey requested Prince Edward Island to not make the emigrants pay the P.E.I head tax, but P.E.I. refused, and the Nova Scotia treasury had to pay the money, about 100 pounds.
Hector Publishing, 1954, p 115-118.
Contributed by: Sue Swiggum and The Chignecto Project
If you have any information about the folks mentioned in this article, please send your information to us at the Prentice Newsletter. Be sure to give the full title and date of this article in the Subject line of the email.
Caution: If you don't use the above email link, your email to us may be rejected as spam by our email filter.
No comments