Info Request For New Project, Canadian Cousins
Anita Steele
Canadian Cousins
Touler
Cuthbert Cumming - A Canadian Touler
A simple white stone in Trinity Church graveyard, Colbourne, Norrthumberland, Ontario, Canada is inscribed “ Sacred to the memory of CUTHBERT CUMMING ESQ, late chief trader of the Hon. Hudson Bay Company, BORN OCTOBER 1787 DIED APRIL 1870.
It is only recently that I found Cuthbert was an expat Touler. The first mention of him is in the Kirkmichael parish register which says he was baptised 27th November 1786. This entry also tells us that his father was George Cumming and his mother Helen MacAlpine but it doesn’t give any indication of where the couple were living. Two older sisters also appear in the registers for this couple; Margaret, baptised 8 August 1784 and Barbara baptised 28 September 1785. Their mother’s family remains a complete mystery at present but perhaps some reader will know better?. Cuthbert’s father, George, was also baptised in Kirkmichael in November 1760. He was the middle child in a family of seven children born to John Cumming and Henret Farquharson. So far neither of these parents can be identified further though there could be a connection with the Farquharsons of Achriachan or Croughly and they may have been Catholic. Whilst the family is diffcult to trace here in Scotland there is ample material for his life in Canada where he merits a full entry in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography.
There were other members of families in Strathavon and Glenlivet who had already become Canadian merchant adventurers, like the Camerons of Ballinlish, the Grants of Inverlochy and of Blairfindy. it is not yet known, however, who invited and financed Cuthbert to emigrate and to join the North West Company. However in 1804 he was registered at Fort Dauphin on the Swan River as an NWC clerk, the lowest rank of the officers in the fur trade. Like most of the Nor’Westers he took a “country wife” Susette Mackie and had a family with her who have descendents today and who continued to intermarry with many of the leaders in the country of Scottish descent though also with the French and indigenous peoples who still tended to be called “Indians” whilst their children became labelled as “metis” or “half-breeds”. Sadly these terms all too quickly took on derogatory associations through notions of racial blood distinctions and superiority. Country marriages at the time were seen as immensely valuable to both sides of the contracts though disapproved of by some Christian clergy. Whilst Cuthbert took good care of his wife and children life became more diffcult for them when the NWC and HBC combined in 1821 because the London based HBC company disapproved of women on their premises and seemed to imagine their emplyees could live a kind of “military monasticism” entirely focussed on company profit. As they tried to move westwards however they, like the Nor’ Westers before them, began to realise just how much their very survival depended on “country wives” and to allow employees to form long-term partnerships.
Sylvia Van Kirk in her very readable study of such relationships called Many Tender Ties believes that, after 10 years of enforced separation from her husband after merger, Susette returned to her tribe and married again whilst Cuthbert married Jane McMurray. He could be very proud of the children from both of his families but perhaps it was tactful not to mention either wives or their offspring on his tombstone. His delightful family home in Cramahe is now a heritage site and can be seen on in...@heritagecramahe.ca
If anyone has any family links with Cuthbert Cumming or knowledge of his life here in Scotland I should be most grateful if they could be in touch as it is hoped he will feature in a celebration of our Scottish Candian Cousins in 2020. Thank you for reading this and I look forward to hearing from anyone who would like their own Canadian Cousins to be celebrated here in 2020 or would like to help in the researches and preparations. Eileen Stewart e3...@btinternet.com
Thistledown
Canadian Cousins:
One of the most enigmatic characters to try to make his fortune in Canada in the early 19th century must surely be William Grant of Blairfindy. By purchase he could soon style himself Seigneur of St Roch. As a property speculator he apparently made a vast fortune at the time of increased European settlement. Then through a most astute marriage he joined the family of the Barons of Longeuil. Yet he died owing vast sums of money. Was he merely a gambler caught in his own addiction, a socialite conman, a genuine business man whose luck ran out, a victim of the counter-ambitions of others? These are the sort of questions that will be posed during a celebration in 2020 of our Scottish Canadian Cousins. William Grant was not the only one who went from this part of Scotland and gave of their skills as they sought a better life. Peter Grant, for example, who emigrated in 1869 took on a vital job as a railway engineer as the country was expanding its all important communications structures right across the continent.
If anyone would like to offer information or help with researches, presentation of material or be part of this celebration in any way please would they be kind enough to contact Eileen Stewart e3...@btinternet.com. Thank you for your interest.