It was still troubled times in the middle of the 19th Century in the Highlands and rural backwaters of Scotland.
One hundred years earlier at the battle of Culloden, the aspirations of the Scottish peoples were destroyed when the predominantly English forces defeated the Jacobite army of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. The persecution that followed finally brought down the old clan system, where the Clan chieftain or “Laird” was father and protector of his extended “family”.
In the decades following Culloden and certainly by the 1840’s most of the new generations of laird were more interested in making money than looking after their tenants. The Cheviot sheep could be grazed on lands far too valuable for the poor subsistence farmers who had held it for generations on the sufferance of the laird. This was the time of "the Clearances" - people were forced off the land and into the already overcrowded cities, or forced into emigration to Canada, South Africa or Australia.
With the failure of successive potato crops (the great highland potato blight between 1846 and 1851), hunger and famine were endemic among the peasant farming communities. The small cottage farms could not support the large family groupings that were common in this age. The farm was generally passed on to the eldest son, with other sons having to find their own place to work. During this tumultuous time, in the rural backwater of Glengairn in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, Gregor McGregor was a tenant farmer, growing meager crops and running dairy cattle. The four-roomed cottage known as “Auchnerran” - the place of wild grain was home to the widowed Gregor, now in his 80’s, his two sons Lewis and William together with their families. By 1851 some 17 people lived on the farm in what must have been very crowded and quite desperate conditions.
What made William, the youngest of Gregor's sons, decide to emigrate is unknown. It may have been all of the previously mentioned conditions, or it may have been the lure of the rumours of gold in the streams and valleys of Ballarat. Whatever the cause, William (49), described in the passenger list as "a ploughman", with wife Helen (34) along with daughter Helen (12), sons James (10), John (7), William (5) and baby daughter Elizabeth (16 months) together with an Anne McGregor (19) "spinster", left Aberdeen Harbour aboard the brig "Jane Geary” on September 29, 1852.
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Main: A square-rigged brig believed to be of similar configuration & tonnage to that of the Jane Geary.
Inset: Representation of the Jane Geary from an 1845 newspaper advertisement.
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It was a voyage into a great unknown. A terrible voyage for a farming family who probably had not even seen the sea until making the 40+ mile trip from “Auchnerran” to Aberdeen. It gives a sense of the hopeless desperation that was undoubted felt by these people to risk everything and start a new life halfway around the world, in a country even then known for its harsh way of life. It would have been like being banished for life from home, family and friends; for there was virtually no prospect for a return.
The nearly four month (114 days) voyage would have been a living hell. As farmers, there would have been nothing to prepare them for shipboard life. At 203 tons the “Jane Geary” was one of the smallest ships to ply the route between England to Australia, yet aboard were 76 passengers and some dozen or more crew. As the ship began its voyage, the passengers would have been struck down by the awful sickness that afflicts most non-sailors. Unable to eat or keep food down and wretched with fear the parents would have been unable to care for the children, the children unable to look after themselves and mothers too weak to breast-feed the babies. The below decks were probably awash with vomit, human waste and seawater before the vessel had even cleared English waters. The bedding fouled, the rations (generally of poor quality to start off with) inedible and insufficient, made life at sea one of great discomfort and at worst an abject misery.
Also confronting the emigrant was the prospect of shipwreck, drowning, icebergs (in the far southern ocean run), disease: cholera, dysentery, smallpox), fire (passengers were often expected to do their own cooking), lice, the fear and uncertainty of the unknown, as well as the terrible desolation of homesickness. For those not affected by the months of debilitating seasickness, there was the tending to of those family members rendered helpless.
For the emigrating McGregors it can only be assumed that they fared no better or worse than others. Baby Elizabeth was probably still being breast-fed and if her mother Helen had been laid low, unable to eat, her milk would have dried up. With no breast-milk baby Elizabeth may have been forced into trying to eat the ships rations. This may not have been able to be kept down. If so, then the infant’s health may have deteriorated and she would be susceptible to disease.
The McGregors were not alone. A search of the passenger list from the Jane Geary confirms that also on board and emigrating to Australia were Charles and Helen Grant, brother and sister-in-law to Helen, wife of William McGregor.
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Public Records Office - Index to Inward Passenger Lists.
Passenger List for the Jane Geary arrived Jan 1853
* Brother and Sister-in-law to Helen (Grant) McGregor
** Elizabeth Galt married James McGregor some years later
once families established
in became acquainted with the McGregors once aboard ship headed for
*** Ann and Eliza Craigmyle appear to be related to
#Eliza (Craigmyle?) Galt, but this
has not been verified. |
On the 20th of January 1853, the “Jane Geary’s” master, James Joss, brought the vessel into Port Phillip Bay, flying the yellow flag. This meant that sickness was on board the ship. It hove to at Red Bluff, the first Quarantine Station in the colony of Victoria, and the sick passengers were put ashore. Elizabeth was the ill member of the McGregor family.
Within 3 months of landing, on the 1st day of May 1853, the young Elizabeth died and was buried the next day. She lies in an unmarked grave in the little cemetery of St. Andrews’ church in Brighton, Victoria. Her Death Certificate states that she was 2 years and 2 months old when she died. The original church was burnt down and all records were lost.
William, Helen and the rest of the family at some stage moved to Campbells Creek (near Castlemaine), to work on the Victorian goldfields, then to Avoca, and back again to Castlemaine. They then settled at Green Hill near Kyneton where in 1857 a 120 acre farm was bought (for £4 per acre) and this is where the family lived for some 66 years. Ultimately the McGregors settled in rural Victoria to resume a life as farmers, well removed from their Scottish homeland, but with greater prospects for the future of the children and those who would come after.
At Red Bluff, site of the old Quarantine Station, there is now a Memorial commemorating those early pioneers who made the long and arduous voyage out, but did not live to experience the excitement and hope of a new land.
As a postscript on the "Jane Geary", the following advertisement was featured in The Melbourne Argus newspaper: Saturday, 30th July, 1853
A similarly worded Sales by Auction notice was again published in The Argus on Wednesday, August 3rd, being the day of auction. There is no further information on whether the vessel was in fact sold and if so, to whom and what became of her. It is to be suspected that the vessel was sold and the new owners would have renamed her. Whether she then left Australian waters or plied the local transport routes is not known.
