Author Topic: Kildonan Mackenzies  (Read 26320 times)

Offline carly

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 26
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #18 on: Tuesday 26 July 11 22:17 BST (UK) »
Have sent you a pm

Offline hofhine68

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 3
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #19 on: Monday 19 September 11 17:26 BST (UK) »
Murdoch McKenzie was my great-great-great grandfather. I would love to share/trade information.

Murdoch's (b 1774) daughter Janet (b 1833) was the mother of Murdoch Makenzie Allan (b 1864 - my great grandfather) who came to Canada in 1888.

In a family tree created by Ethel Jack it is noted that Murdoch (b. 1864) was married to a Margaret McKenzie (no date information provided) and then remarried to Elizabeth Ramsay.

His daughter Lillian Elizabeth Allan (b 1895 to Elizabeth Ramsay) was my grandmother - she married Pierre Alexander Boudreau (b 1896) in Montreal in 1920.

Kirstin

Allan, Boudreau, Goetze, Zander

Offline carly

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 26
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #20 on: Monday 19 September 11 18:05 BST (UK) »
Hi Kirstin,

Will send you a pm.



Carly

Offline aspin

  • RootsChat Aristocrat
  • ******
  • Posts: 2,590
  • What a Lad What a miss
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #21 on: Monday 19 September 11 18:37 BST (UK) »
Welcome Hofhine68

Although I am a Mckenzie myself ( my maiden name at that )and my folks came from Helmsdale
May I welcome you to rootschat

Carly not sure but i think Hohine68 has to make another two posting to receive a PM 3 in all


Happy hunting

Elizabeth
McKenzie,Helmsdale.,Mackay's,Gordon's,Polsons,Sutherland's,Loth & N/Z .Watson ,Munro,Pitsligo.Black. Harle ,East Hollywell.Black,and Short East Hollywell.Northumberland Gair, Amble,Douglas,Amble,Mitchell ,Fettercairns,Lyall, Brechin .Mearns Brechin.Thompson's ,Spittal. Maghie,Young .Raey Cumberland & Newcastle & Glasgow .Gilroy, Northumberland. Stark's Kyloe & Tweedmouth .Skeen's Tweedmouth.Gregsons Northumberland & America. Andrew Farmer Turnbull Berwick , Pool and Black Hull.Lounton Tweedmouth


Offline aspin

  • RootsChat Aristocrat
  • ******
  • Posts: 2,590
  • What a Lad What a miss
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #22 on: Monday 19 September 11 18:37 BST (UK) »
Welcome Hofhine68

Although I am a Mckenzie myself ( my maiden name at that )and my folks came from Helmsdale
May I welcome you to rootschat

Carly not sure but i think Hofhine68 has to make another two posting to receive a PM 3 in all


Happy hunting

Elizabeth
McKenzie,Helmsdale.,Mackay's,Gordon's,Polsons,Sutherland's,Loth & N/Z .Watson ,Munro,Pitsligo.Black. Harle ,East Hollywell.Black,and Short East Hollywell.Northumberland Gair, Amble,Douglas,Amble,Mitchell ,Fettercairns,Lyall, Brechin .Mearns Brechin.Thompson's ,Spittal. Maghie,Young .Raey Cumberland & Newcastle & Glasgow .Gilroy, Northumberland. Stark's Kyloe & Tweedmouth .Skeen's Tweedmouth.Gregsons Northumberland & America. Andrew Farmer Turnbull Berwick , Pool and Black Hull.Lounton Tweedmouth

Offline carly

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 26
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #23 on: Monday 19 September 11 18:44 BST (UK) »
Thanks for that, hope Hofehine 68 sees that message.

Offline hofhine68

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 3
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #24 on: Tuesday 20 September 11 00:21 BST (UK) »
Hi there - just saw the post that I need to post a few more times in order to get a PM - is that private message? Thank you!
Allan, Boudreau, Goetze, Zander

Offline hofhine68

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 3
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #25 on: Tuesday 20 September 11 01:05 BST (UK) »
The notation on the back of a photograph I have indicates that the man second from the far right (at the controls) is Donald Allan.

I have three more photos of the same scene and I think they are all from Allan and Sons Threshing Company. I will share them. Maybe you can help me identify the people in the photos?

Kirstin
Allan, Boudreau, Goetze, Zander

Offline Rick H

  • RootsChat Extra
  • **
  • Posts: 2
  • Census information Crown Copyright, from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk
    • View Profile
Re: Kildonan Mackenzies
« Reply #26 on: Wednesday 19 November 14 02:15 GMT (UK) »
It's very likely that "Kildonan" means different places in different contexts.  One Kildonan is at the inland end of Little Loch Broom, and these days is an area of ruined cottages etc, barely visible on the slopes above the flats at the end of the loch near Dundonnell - see http://graveyardsofscotland.wordpress.com/2014/01/08/abandoned-graves-kildonan-little-loch-broom

This Kildonan is definitely Mackenzie territory. Two useful resources are (1) The book JR Baldwin (ed.) Peoples and Settlement in North-West Ross; chapters on the Mackenzies of Dundonnell and the Mackenzies of Keppoch and Kildonan ; and (2) Stirnet tree 'Mackenzie03'.

Kildonan was in the hands of the families Baldwin describes as “Mackenzies of Keppoch and Kildonan” until 1775, “Mackenzies of Dundonnell” from 1775 until 1834, and Murdoch Mackenzie (formely of Ardross) from 1834 until (presumably) after 1840.  According to the website I quoted, Mackenzie of Ardross owned the land and evicted the people of Kildonan in 1840.
(A)   Until 1775
The Stirnet tree appears to relates to the Baldwin chapter “Mackenzies of Keppoch and Kildonan” (last paragraph), which mentions
-   iii  James Mackenzie of Keppoch (dying) – though the book claims James was married twice and gives Anne as the widow and mother of Simon, not Isabella
-   b.  Simon Mackenzie of Keppoch – the book says “Of Kildonan” (or Scoraig)
-   d.  Colin Mackenzie of Jamaica – who “borrowed money from Peter Mackenzie, a younger son of the Earl of Cromartie and therefore a distant relative, ‘to Outrigg him for Jamaica’. According to Mackenzie of Dundonnell it appeared ‘very plain that the young Man was much straitened for money for his voyage’ for his father ‘left no Subject or funds that ever I heard of’.
-   (1) Alexander Mackenzie of Kildonan, son of Simon;  Alexander, “who succeeded his father on the death of his elder brother James, sold his lands to Mackenzie of Dundonnell in 1775”   [ref] 207  SRO E746/72/3; Dl 97/4 f363-64; RS38/13 ff.236-38; Macgill, W. Old Ross-shire and Scotland. 1909. nos. 236 & 805.
The book and the tree seem to disagree on James, the book (as you see) claiming him as an elder son of Simon, whereas as the tree shows James as the son of Simon’s brother George Mackenzie of Kildonan.
Even though this branch of the Mackenzies was apparently not particularly productive – many are annotated dsp = decesit sine prole = died without issue – the tree only goes effectively until the late 1700s, so it is unclear how prolific descendants have been.
(B)   1775 to 1834
The book covers Dundonnell until 1834, and states that the “Mackenzie of Dundonnell” who purchased Kildonan in 1775 was the second Kenneth, son of the “first of the family” , who appeared 'among his Neighbours as the full moon among the stars in a frosty night’.  He had a large family, including 7 sons. The eldest, George, managed Dundonnell (including Kildonan) until his death in 1816, then being “the only resident landlord in the parish of Lochbroom”.   George’s son Kenneth caused the downfall, with things degenerating into dispute and chaos by 1826-28 with the Dundonnell Atrocities, and finally the sale in 1834.  (I have not found a Stirnet tree for this family.)
When an estate is inherited by one son, who has many siblings, it seems to me the possibility exists that those not inheriting, and choosing not to relocate or emigrate, would usually end up in straitened circumstances – tenant crofters scraping a meagre living.  When we walked around the ruins of Kildonan, there were many rubble piles and low walls that must once have been houses, so the population was, I guess, substantial.   Perhaps census records might tell us more?  Elsewhere in this thread populations before and after were given, but those numbers seem to me large enough to refer to the Strath of Kildonan on the far side of Scotland near Helmsdale, where (I understand) Gunns, Mathesons, Mackays, Macbeths and Sutherlands were cleared 1813-1819.
So perhaps remnants of the earlier family were also still around in the early 1800s – I don’t know much about them after 1775.  The intermarriages among Mackenzies of course complicate matters, and link these two families closely:  in the tree, which as I said relates to the pre-1775 family, two daughters of “Kenneth Mackenzie of Dundonnell” married into the family (in roughly the mid 1700s) – Sibella and Isabella.  Their respective fathers were either the ‘first of the family” or the “full moon”.
(C)   1834 to 1840
Presumably Murdoch Mackenzie of Ardross held the estate during and after this period.
(D)   After eviction in 1840, I don't know where the crofter population from little Loch Broom was cleared to. We also don’t know how long they would live in this new area.  Caithness was mentioned elsewhere in this thread, but does this refer to the Little Loch Broom Mackenzies?