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Donald Macqueen, [Among
other members of the family two brothers, John and Angus, remained in
Skye.] of Skye, and his wife Christina MacLeod, daughter of Malcolm
MacLeod of Skye (later of Glashvin, Pinette), emigrated on the "Polly."
After living for a few years near Macaulay's Wharf, Glashvin, Pinette,
Donald Macqueen died, and was buried in the French cemetery, Belfast,
P.E.I. About 1815,
the brave mother, with her six helpless children, moved to Orwell and took
up a hundred acre farm on the north bank of the river. This was later
divided between her two sons, Angus, who took the half fronting on the
river, and John, who took the north half. Widow Macqueen died about 1864,
aged over eighty, and was buried in the Belfast cemetery.
They had the following children:
I. CHRISTINA, b. in Skye, about 1802, wife of her cousin, John MacLeod,
with issue, among others: William (Sengie) MacLeod, and Donald MacLeod;
II. MALCOLM, b. February 18, 1804, d. Oct. 29,
1886, married on Feb. 2, 1830, Margaret Martin, of Newtown, b. 1806, d.
Nov. 5, 1892, with issue:
I. DONALD, b. March 5, 1832, d. 1915, unmarried;
2. SARAH CATHERINE, b. Sept. 8, 1834, d. Sept., 1895, wife of William
Ferguson, miller, Cardigan, d. 1907, with issue, among others: Peter,
married Minnie Macaulay, with issue; Marion Adelle, wife of Kimpton
McGrath, Lorne Valley; William Henry, Margaret May, Elsie Catherine, wife
of Munro McGrath, Lorne Valley; John Thomas, Robert Elliot, Minnie
Florence, Winnifred Matilda;
3. JOHN ANGUS, b. March 10, 1836, d. May 25, 1918. On May 5, 1871, married
Isabella Nicholson, b. 1845, d. July 3, 1926, with issue surviving:
a. JAMES, b. July 3, 1873;
b. MATILDA BROWN, b. Mar. 17, 1877, wife of Walter D. Ross, Kinross, with
issue;
c. MALCOLM ALEXANDER, b. Dec. 8, 1878, married Harriet Murgatroyd Riley,
Winnipeg;
d. PETER ISAAC, b. Dec. 15, 1880, married Bella Irene Ross, Kinross;
Margaret Alice, Marion Munro, Cyrus, George Franklin, Christina and John
Angus all died in youth unmarried;
4. CHRISTINA, b. July 17, 1839, d. June 16, 1913, wife of Malcolm Dockerty,
Cardigan, d. Oct. 4, 1896, with issue :
a. KATE, unmarried;
b. ROBERT, married Adelaide Birt, Mount Stewart, with issue; Malcolm Birt,
b. Sept. 19, 1909; Stuart Mills, b. Feb. 20, 1911 ; Cyrus Alexander, b.
Nov. 4, 1914;
c. MARGARET, wife of Jonathan E. Birt, Mount Stewart, with issue: Barbara,
Gladys, Ida, and Chester;
d. ANNE, wife of James McEachern, Cardigan, with issue Christina and
Florence;
e. OLIVER, married Laura Vionette, Lunenburg, N.S.;
f. JEAN, wife of George Jardine, with issue: George S;
5. PETER ALEXANDER, b. March 26, 1842, now living in Townsville,
Australia, married Elizabeth Parnham Marshall Neilsen, daughter of James
Neilsen, with issue;
a. PETER ANGUS, married Ethel Cruckshank, with issue, among others:
Cedric, Dulcie and Elizabeth; b. JESSIE MARSHALL;
c. ISABELLA BURT, wife of Mr. Cruckshank, Townsville, with issue:
Reginald, Nancy, Leslie, Ronald;
d. MALCOLM TOWERS, Aus. Exp. Forces, died in Australia of wounds received
in action, Flanders;
e. LEILA;
f. ORWELL, Aus. Exp. Forces, killed in action in Flanders;
g. ADELAIDE;
6. ALEXANDER ROBERT, b. Nov. 26, 1845, d. May, 1910, New Glasgow, married
Nellie Williams, Cardigan, with issue: Georgina Gertrude, wife of John
Goodwill Macphail, C.E., Ottawa, with issue: Andrew and Catherine;
Herbert, married Anne Barbara Logan.
III. JOHN, b. 1806, d. Nov. 5, 1879, Orwell
North, married, March 10, 1836, Katherine MacLean, Montague River, b.
1819, in Uig, Skye, d. 1915, with issue:
1. DONALD, d. April 1, 1886, aged 46, married Anne Shaw, Uigg, with issue:
Katherine; John D., Uigg; and Margaret, married Mr. Grant with issue;
2. WILLIAM, Butte, Montana, unmarried;
3. ALEXANDER, married Elizabeth Steele, St. John, N.B., with issue:
Arthur, William, Grace and Janet;
4. MALCOLM, b. 1844, d. 1912, married Sarah MacKinnon, with issue,
Hamilton, N.Y. ; and second Katherine Nicholson, Orwell Cove, with issue:
Willard and Louise;
5. MARY, b. 1853, d. 1917, unmarried;
6. JOHN, b. 1856, d. 1901, unmarried;
7. HUGH, b. 1858, d. 1912, unmarried;
8. MARGARET, b. 1846, unmarried;
9. CHRISTINE, unmarried;
IV. FLORA, b. 1808, wife of Donald Lamont,
Lorne Valley, with issue, among others: Christy, wife of John Johnson,
Lorne Valley, with issue: George;
V. ANGUS, Orwell, d. June 6, 1876, aged 67,
married, Margaret (Kinloch) Macdonald, d. April 10, 1903, aged 88, with
issue:
I . JOHN, Victoria Cross, married Lois Mellish, with issue: Frederick;
Angus; and Laura;
2. DANIEL, married Miss Hay, St. John, N.B., with issue: Verna ;
3. ALEXANDER, Calgary, unmarried;
4. DANIEL, JR., d. 1927, unmarried;
5. MARGARET, wife of Mr. Fraser, San Franscisco, without issue;
6. WILLIAM;
7. ANGUS, b. 1853, d. Jan. 7, 1911, Orwell, unmarried;
8. MARY, wife of Neil MacNeill, Wood Islands, with issue: Angus; Alberta,
married, with issue; Cassie, wife of James A. Campbell, C. E., Oakland,
Cal., with issue: Roderick, Malcolm, Daniel, Margaret, William, Minnie;
VI. CATHERINE, d. Mar. 31, 1871, aged 57, wife
of Donald Shaw, Uigg, d. Jan., 1883, son of Allan Shaw, Flat River, with
issue:
1. DONALD A., d. July 12, 1874, aged 32, married Miss Masters, Vernon
River, with issue: Catherine, wife of Angus Martin, Glen Martin ;
2. ANNE, d. 1915, wife of Donald Macqueen, Uigg, with issue;
3. KATHERINE, wife of D. Shaw, High Bank;
4. CHRISTY, wife of Mr. MacLean, Dundas;
5. ALLAN, Uigg, d. Feb. 3, 1915, aged 74, married Flora Shaw, High Bank,
d. April 12, 1906, aged 52, with issue surviving: John Ernest, Uigg,
married Murdina MacLeod, Newtown, with issue: John Allan, and Catherine;
Florence, wife of George Johnstone, Lorne Valley.
Malcolm Macqueen was one of the first children
born in Belfast. After living with his widowed mother on the river farm
until about 1833, he leased, and afterwards purchased from Louisa Augusta,
Lady Wood, wife of Sir Gabriel Wood, and Maria Matilda Fanning, daughters
of Governor Fanning, the homestead fronting on Fletcher's road, a short
distance east of Orwell cross-roads. To this new farm he moved, across the
frozen Nicholson marsh, the frame dwelling house, which was used until
1859, when a nine-room house was built. This was the home of the family
until in 1895 it was replaced by the one now in use.
Of average height, he was a man of powerful
physique. In an age when books were possessed by the few, memory was
cultivated to a degree that is not thought necessary today. In this
respect he was a marked man. There was stored in unusual measure in his
retentive memory the folklore of the distant Highlands, as well as a
complete knowledge of his native Belfast. He was as true a Highland
Seannachie as if he had been born and lived in Skye.
His wife, Margaret Martin, of Newtown, was a
woman of delicate body, and refined intelligent mind. Fortunately
refinement of mind and manner is not confined to those living in luxurious
surroundings. Mrs. Albert Jenkins recently spoke of her and others of her
neighbors, who were born in an age when wants were few, as possessing
innate refinement and gentility of manner to a degree equalling, if not
surpassing, that aimed at in modern ladies' schools.
Their son, John Angus, was born on the old
homestead on which he died, near Orwell cross-roads. He was even more
characteristically Highland than his father. In a community where honesty
was as common a quality as chastity, he was distinguished for it to a
degree that made business relations with him a thing of mathematical
exactitude. He was outspoken and uncompromisingly honest. No act
inconsistent with the strictest integrity was ever imputed to him. In all
his relations with his fellow men he was distinguished by a virtue,
defined as "punctuality." Four generations came and went and he was still
in the same place. He is reported never, in that time, to have missed a
Sunday in church, and never to have been late for service. The regularity
of his life made him an unchanging and continuing institution in the
district. If there
was any announcement to be made in church that was omitted from the
minister's agenda, he would calmly arise in his pew, and facing the
audience amend the omission in an unembarrassed tone. He knew the Bible
from cover to cover, and was satisfied with nothing less than a Scriptural
sermon. One day he became impatient at the wanderings of a clergyman into
politics, and is reported to have rebuked him, almost in the words of
Queen Elizabeth, who "when the Dean of Saint Paul's, at a public sermon,
enunciated some observation that displeased her, threw open the window of
her private closet, in which she always worshipped, and shouted to him
`leave that ungodly digression and return to your text.' "
To him character was the one and only test of
worth and position. He recognized no other ground for social distinction.
Possessing the variable Highland temperament,
he would pass from brooding melancholy to Highland gaiety with electric
speed. The changing moods of the elements awoke in him a ready response,
and he watched the varying phases of wind and sky, foretelling with
mystifying accuracy what the elements had in store. In an age of
superstition, living among people who inherited and believed in it, he was
practical to an unusual degree, and scorned what he could not demonstrate
from actual experience.
Order was a passion with him, and the child
who failed to return to its designated place any instrument or tool, was
the recipient of a well earned rebuke. Deceit and dissimulation were
entirely foreign to his nature. No one was ever left in doubt as to his
estimate of him. It seemed perfectly natural and proper to disclose
frankly his likes and dislikes. One possessed of so many virtues is
usually austere and uncompromising by nature. For their virtues such men
are respected, to a certain extent feared, and to a less extent loved. His
physical strength was great almost to the end. In all his long life he was
never treated by a physician. At seventy-eight his striking pale blue eyes
could detect an open rowboat at Point Prim seven miles from where he
stood. His wife,
Isabella Nicholson, had an insatiable appetite for the things of the mind.
With the ardor for education that characterises the Scottish people, she
engaged in the daily tasks, not infrequently with an open book or
newspaper clipping beside her, to be perused at every favorable
opportunity. Her knowledge of history, and of the involved inter-relations
of families, not only in her native province, but among the great in
foreign lands, was so intimate that she was known among her friends as the
"historian." The death of five of her children after reaching maturity
failed to crush her indomitable will; each recurring blow of fortune
seemed to strengthen her power to meet the one to follow. With her own
temper in complete subjection, she was wont to rebuke the ill tempered and
passionate in the words, "greater is he that controlleth his temper than
he that taketh a city." |
