Tough times in Canada

Jim Henderson continues his story of the Arran people who went to Megantic County in Canada in 1829.

The first winter was awful. Because the authorities had been slow to deal with the ship-load of immigrants who arrived in the summer, many of them had no proper accommodation to shelter from the cold. As autumn came, followed quickly by winter, many of them were still living in makeshift tents. Earlier settlers who had more solid living places in and around the centre they called Inverness helped them as much as they could – but the most practical assistance came from the local Abenari Indians. These indigenous people gave the newcomers valuable knowledge about how to cope with the fiercely cold weather conditions and how to provide themselves with basic food supplies.

The Indians taught the men from Sannox – a place unimaginable to them – how to hunt the local game and showed them which herbs and berries they could collect and eat. They also taught them how to erect shelters to protect them from the Canadian winter. Without this help, the immigrants might have starved, for as the men-folk toiled to build what homes they could and broke the ground to raise next year’s crops, the women often only had a meagre supply of potatoes or milk to feed the many hungry mouths. But all of them were hard workers, skilled in practical trades, and with the help of the Indians, they started to equip the group with homes, work-places, a school for the children and a place of worship.

The first log cabins they build were basic structures, approximately 6 metres square in size, divided into 2 or 3 sections by partitions made of bark. The floors were constructed with split logs to offer an even surface. The logs were notched at the corners and any gaps between them were filled with a mixture of clay and moss. The roof was clad with strips of bark. They left openings for doors and windows, but having no glass, they made shutters to close them, but of course these could not stop the wind and cold weather from penetrating the building. A stone flag base was used as a hearth so that a fire could be lit for warmth and preparing food, 
but there was no chimney. A small hole was left in the roof, but often smoke filled the cabin, making conditions unbearable. As a makeshift refuge, the men sometimes excavated a small cellar under or beside the houses, but it must have been a hard choice between the smoke or the cold. During that first winter several of the Arran settlers died through illness or hypothermia.

Spring of 1830 brought better conditions and gave the settlers new heart. They set about building better accommodation, preparing ground to raise crops and herding cattle. The men often worked from first light until darkness fell, quite early in the first months of the year, which perhaps explains why the average family had a large number of children. Bed was the warmest place when there was still snow and ice outside. Often the temperatures dropped so low that the metal containers used to hold drinking water burst, and there were many mornings when people woke to find their bedding covered in frost and scraps left on the table frozen hard to its surface. Two men lost their big toes through frostbite. Another was caught during a snowstorm and could not find his way home. Sadly, he was found lying dead, frozen by the roadside only a short distance from the settlement. Others managed to survive through extraordinary toughness.On New Years Day 1830 Dugald McKenzie set out to get flour for his family, which meant he had to ford the river. He stripped naked so as to keep his clothes dry, and although the crossing was short he was so chilled that his numbed hands could not = put his clothes back on again, so he ran for a distance to generate some heat. On his return journey he could not face the icy water again, so he walked upstream with his burden of flour until he came to a place where the river was frozen solid and would bear his weight.

Next week, Jim gives more detail of the settlers’ first year, and lists their names – many of them still well-known on Arran to this day.