BACK TO HISTORY/FAMILIES

St. James Area History

6 Dec 2000
The following information is courtesy of Ralph Hannan, 77 Haverhill Street, North Reading, MA 01864

My research starts in 1803 with the emigration of Scots from Sutherlandshire who eventually settled Scotch Ridge, Pomeroy Ridge, Basswood Ridge and Little Ridge in St. James Parish. My data also includes information on the several loyalist families who also settled on adjacent lands and eventually intermarried with the Scots. The Scots were predominantly former members of the Reay Fencible Regiment who were recruited by Lord Reay during the 1790s and served the crown during the uprisings in Ireland. Returning home to severe economic times, they and their families boarded two ships in 1803, the Fortitude and Nelly, and set out for America, the Fortitude to North Carolina, and the Nelly apparently to Digby. In mid ocean the Fortitude passengers learned of fever outbreaks in the Carolinas and set sail for Boston. Their troubles had only begun, for it took them another year to finally land in St.Stephen via Boston, Thomaston, Nova Scotia and St. Andrews. Most of the Scots emigrants settled on the Chiputneticook Ridge North and West of the town of Scoodic (St. Stephen) ca. 10 miles and bordering on the St. Croix River. This area was set off from St. Stephen Parish and unassigned lands in 1823 and named St. James Parish. Pomeroy Ridge was named for Ben Pomeroy and members of his Loyalist family. The Scots settled in each of these ridges but built their own Gaelic Kirk in Scotch Ridge and gave the region its Presbyterian character. In the early days the only ministers available to the area were the itinerant preachers, most notably the noted Methodist Duncan McColl. Eventually Pomeroy Ridge would hava a strong Methodist following.The Scots intermarried with the loyalist families and settled into a century of farming, although social and economic pressures caused many of the young men to move to the states of Michigan and Wisconsin to answer the call for loggers, and to the west of Canada, while others answered the call of gold in the 40s and 50s. In the next generation many moved south to the Boston area, including my ancestors.

My data includes among other things:

• Immigration lists
• My transcription of the 1871 census for St. James, Part 2, with an alphabetical index by name to family number in the original census. This is predominantly Scotch, Pomeroy and Little Ridge.
• An index to the Scotch Ridge Cemetery
• Baptismal register for the Scotch Ridge Presbyterian Church starting in 1833
• A marriage database of that same church and early family structures going back to the immigration of 1804 from Sutherlandshire.
• Family genealogies or family group sheets of the prominent early families including: Morrison, MacLeod, MacKay, Matheson, Sinclair, MacKenzie, Pomeroy, Thornton, Hannan, Smith, Babb, Campbell, Dewar, Weatherby, etc.
• A collection of documents provided by people around the US documenting their branches of "exiles"
• A book entitled "An old Highland Fencible Corps, the history of the Reay Fencible Highland Regiment of Foot, or Mackay's Highlanders, etc. 1794 - 1802" This book includes descriptionof the daily routines of the regiment and enlistment lists, officer lists, mustering out lists and samples of the discharge papers
• Memoirs of Duncan McColl from the 1840s publications
• A copy of the Appendix to Memoirs of Rev. James MacGregor, published in 1859 describing his visit, " 1815. I was at different times petitioned and importuned to visit and aid, as I could a settlement of Highlanders, near Scoodic River, on the very borders of the United States..." His preaching was in Gaelic and English.

  BACK TO HISTORY/FAMILIES