Stewart in Morell, Comrie, Perthshire, Scotland

The Stewart family in Morell in Easter Glentarken were Jacobites, loyal to the Royal Stewart line, because they were descended from the Royal Stewarts. Robert Stewart’s ancestry is as follows:

1. Robert Stewart, King Robert II of Scots
2. Robert Stewart, Duke of Albany
3. Murdoch Stewart, 2nd Duke of Albany
4. Sir James Mhor Stewart, of Albany
5. James Beag Stewart, 1st of Baldorran and Royal Baillie of Balquhidder
6. Sir William Stewart, 2nd of Baldorran and Royal Baillie of Balquhidder
7. Walter Stewart, 3rd of Baldorran and Royal Baillie of Balquhidder
8. James Mhor Stewart, 4th of Baldorran and Balquhidder
9. Alexander Stewart, 1st of Ardvorlich
10. Maj. James Beag Stewart, 2nd of Ardvorlich
11. John Dubh Mhor Stewart, of Dalveich
12. Alexander Stewart in Dalveich
13. Robert Stewart in Ardveich (a Jacobite who died at the Battle of Culloden)
14. John Stewart in Easter Glentarken
15. Robert Stewart in Morell in Easter Glentarken

The Jacobite Rising of 1715 – The Beginning of the End of Highland Culture

In the early 1700s, around Loch Earn, Gaelic was still the dominant language of the people. However, the old Highland ways had been gradually being eroded by encroaching Anglo culture since the 12^th century when King David I of Scots brought Norman feudalism to Scotland.

Changes in agricultural legislation at the end of the 17^th century were eroding the old communal farm lifestyle. The introduction of early public education through the Scottish Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge in 1709, introduced English-based education for Gaelic-speaking children in the Highlands.

The Glorious Revolution of 1688 saw the end of the Stewart/Stuart dynasty on the joint thrones of England and Scotland and the coming to power of the King William III & II. Scottish patriots resented the imposition of a Dutch King on Scotland. The Jacobite Rising of 1715 sent a signal to King William that the Highlands were more loyal to the deposed Stuarts than they were to him. The Highlands were seen as a threat.

The Society for the Improving of Agriculture, founded in 1723, brought new improvements to farming such that fewer people were needed to cultivate the land. The old Highland communal farm culture was becoming economically unsustainable.

The Jacobite Rising of 1745 – The Final Nail in the Coffin of Highland Culture

A generation later, the Jacobites rose again, and lost again. The defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie and the Jacobites at the Battle of Culloden in April 1746 brought harsh retribution to the Highlands. “Ethnic cleansing” would be an accurate description of the measures that followed. Many of the Jacobite leaders were executed and their lands were forfeited. Their surviving family members were often forced to flee. The carrying of weapons in the Highlands was banished. Even their traditional clothing was outlawed. Yes, it was illegal to wear a kilt. The penalty for a first offence was six months in prison. A second offence meant mandatory “transportation” overseas to one of the colonies to live as an indentured servant (one step above slavery). A statistical report from 1755 indicates that these draconian laws had been effective – the people of Comrie parish were no longer wearing traditional clothing.

Increased Lawlessness and the Thefts at Ardveich

One of the many consequences of the failure of the 1745 Jacobite Rising, was the loss of heritable jurisdictions in 1747. This was the clan-based system of justice that allowed clan chiefs to have responsibility for local law and order. With its abolition, laws were enforced by government magistrates. The closest magistrate court was located in the village of Crieff, 12 miles east of Loch Earn. Since most travel was by foot as the roads were too narrow and poor for carriage travel, and few people were wealthy enough to even own a horse, let alone a carriage, it meant the magistrate was less accessible than the clan chiefs had been.

A report from the time notes that there was a sharp increase in “depredations and thefts” in the interim years after the land forfeitures and before government appointment estate managers were put in place. It specifically notes that the two farms of Easter and Wester Ardveich, where John was born, “suffered greatly” and “were almost ruined by having their effects stolen from them.” The government estate manager “after a great deal of trouble, recovered some of the effects stolen from them…the other parts of these effects have not, nor ever will be, recovered.”

Further Erosion of Highland Culture

The loss of heritable jurisdiction further accelerated the cultural shift of clan chiefs away from “benevolent parent” to “landlord.” Chiefs were forced to become more concerned about earning money from the land.

Among those named in the Statistics from the Annexed Estates (1755-56) were Duncan Stewart and James Stewart in Wester Ardveich, cousins of John’s father. Also named in Easter Glentarken were Patrick McLaren (possibly John’s father-in-law) and Duncan MacNab (possibly John’s uncle).

By this time, Gaelic was still the dominant language in much Comrie parish, though most people would have been bilingual, and some spoke only English. The minister at the local parish church preached half of the time in Gaelic and half in English. There was a parish school established at Comrie and two charity schools, including one at Little Port (the future St. Fillans village). Scottish education was actually quite high quality, they were not only schooled in Gaelic and English, but also Latin, Greek and French.

Archaeologists suggest that the ruins of the buildings still visible in Easter Glentarken today were likely built in the mid-1700s. (Morrison) John Stewart very likely participated in their construction.

The Economic Impact of the Napoleonic Wars on Glen Tarken, 1792-1815

In 1792, War broke out against France. Soldiering was dangerous, but provided a reliable income. Many able-bodied men from Comrie went off to war. War also meant an increased need for linen and canvas products, like uniforms and ships’ sails, which kept the weavers of Glen Tarken busy for a generation. Family incomes improved somewhat. However, the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815 brought an economic crash to Comrie parish. The linen market dried up. Soldiers were returning home to find few jobs. Most of the fields had long been cleared of stones, major public bridges had all been completed by the end of the 18^th century, so even general labour jobs were few. Then, to top it off, the agricultural market crashed, making farming a difficult proposition. Financial desperation surged.

The Comrie Old Parish Register is fairly consistent in spelling our family’s residence as “Moril”. It also shows our family residing in Easter Glentarken a generation earlier. Moril and Morell are clearly two different spellings for the same location from an era when spellings were not standardized.

Stobie’s map in 1783 (shown above) shows a settlement named “Moral” near Dundurn. I have found no other reference to this settlement. I previously (mistakenly) identified the location of Morell to be that of Moral.

Pont’s map (ca. 1600) does not show Moral, Moril or Morell at all, but shows “Mewy” at the same location, near Dundurn. This is likely the same place as Movy, shown on Stobie’s map just east of Dundurn.

Either Moril/Morell and Moral are two different places with similar names or Moral is another variant spelling and Stobie’s map has the location of Moral in the wrong place.

James Carron from the Courier places Morell in Easter Glentarken. Local historian, Peter McNaughton, FSA (Scot), who grew up in Comrie, also supports that Morell was located in Glen Tarken and that it was one of the residences specifically comprising Easter Glentarken. When I enquired with Peter personally as to the contradiction with Stobie, he indicated that Stobie was not always accurate and that the knowledge of local historians should be preferred to Stobie. I’m inclined to agree.

However, to add further confusion, the The Reports of the Annexed Estates-1755-69, refers to this Moral as “Morrell” and lists it between St. Fillans and Dundurn.

No More Landlords! (The Incentive to Immigrate to Canada)

Meanwhile, overseas in Canada, the British government was just recovering from having barely won the War of 1812, after American troops had attempted to invade Canada. Had the British government not been successful in forming alliances with local indigenous peoples, they may have lost Canada to the United States. They realized they needed to quickly increase the British population in the Canadian provinces in order to bolster defences against any future invasions. As such, free land grants were offered to encourage British settlers to move to Canada. Plots of 100 acres of free land were available with the only conditions being that the future owners must occupy and clear the land themselves and begin productive use of the land within five years in order to claim ownership. (This was to deter absentee landlords.) Settlers would never have to pay rent again! It sounded good, but it was hard work and they had to endure some of the harshest winters anywhere in the British Empire. Thousands of Scots jumped at the opportunity.

The Highland Clearances in Comrie

Residents of Comrie parish faced a bleak economic future forever paying increasing rents to greedy landlords without the prospect of ever owning their own home, while those same landlords were discovering that they could earn more income from raising sheep on their land rather than having rent-paying tenants. This was the time known as the Highland Clearances.

There was a significant population increase in the Highlands in the late 18^th very early 19^th centuries. While we lament the massive depopulation that followed, the reality was that there were more people in places like Glen Tarken than the land could support. While many greedy landlords’ solutions were inhumane, it’s also true that the existing way of life was unsustainable. (Morrison)

“The Havoc of Drummond-Burrell” – The Emptying of Glen Tarken and the Founding of St. Fillans, 1817

In 1817, the landlord of Glen Tarken was Peter Robert Drummond-Burrell, 2nd Baron Gwydyr. He began a systematic emptying of Glen Tarken, moving the tenants to the nearby village of Portmore which he renamed St. Fillans.

“I mentioned to you before, the havoc that was done by Burrel-Drummond on the north side of Lochearn. Some McLarens there were dispossessed, whose ancestors had been in that place for upwards of 400 years!” (Stewarts of the South, ca. 1818-1820)

(The McLarens were dispossessed from the properties of Ardveich, Derry and Glen Tarken, all on the north shore of Loch Earn. Our Stewarts shared Ardveich and Glen Tarken with their McLaren kin.)

“The village of St Fillans…has only borne that name since the first feus along the margin of the loch, and by the river side, were granted in 1817. In olden days what might be called a clachan existed on the hill side at the entrance to Glen Tarken, but life on that exposed site was found both inconvenient and uncomfortable. Accordingly, the families were removed to more salubrious surroundings at the foot of the loch, and the cottages in Glen Tarken were allowed to fall into ruins. …the first feus of the village were given off at an almost nominal feu-duty.” (Porteous, 1912)

The Move from Morell to St. Fillans

According to Stewarts of the South (ca. 1818-1820), Robert Stewart was one of those residents of Glen Tarken who accepted the nominal feu purchase in 1817. However, his children are still recorded as being born in Morell in Easter Glentarken as late as 1824. How do we account for this discrepancy? The homes in Glen Tarken were not torn down, they were simply abandoned and left to fall into ruin. The occupants were not forced to leave. We know one Carmichael family continued to reside at Wester Glentarken as late as 1834. So, Robert Stewart may have held on to both residences simultaneously.

Robert Stewart must have had at least enough financial means to be able to purchase the feu rights to the property in St. Fillans, as nominal as the fee was. Evidence from the later Carmichael letters (discussed below) suggests the possibility that Robert’s father, John, was still alive at the time of the move to St. Fillans and that he may be the one who purchased the feu rights to the home in St. Fillans, and then died shortly thereafter just prior to the writing of Stewarts of the South. In which case, Robert likely inherited, rather than purchased, the feu in St. Fillans. The feu in St. Fillans was not a farm, but merely a “villa” house with a garden in front. This may also explain why Robert Stewart may have held on to both residences.

The Pull and Push to Leave Scotland for Canada

For those who had fewer resources, prospects were bleak. There was a significant impetus, both a push and a pull, to leave Upper Strathearn and move permanently to Canada: the push to leave behind economic hardship and the pull to acquire free land. One could either starve on an acre or two of land in their ancestral home, and be forever beholden to a landlord, or move to a foreign land where they could b given 100 acres of their own land and be beholden to no one. The choice sounds like a no-brainer to us today, but it had to be emotionally gut-wrenching to them. And the life they were coming to was harsh.

The First Wave of Comrie Emigrants, 1818

In 1818, a major expedition left Comrie Parish bound for Canada. Dozens of local families gathered in Comrie village and walked the long distance to the port of Greenock, west of Glasgow, to board the ships, Curlew, Sophie and Jane, bound for the town of Quebec in Lower Canada. Among those families were most of the tenants of Wester Glentarken, including a family of Carmichaels, who will shortly become crucial to our narrative.

The emigrants from Comrie travelled six weeks by sea to Quebec, where they hired river boats or walked west to Montreal. From there they travelled by shallow drafted bateaux up the Ottawa River and portaged the fierce rapids at St Andrews East to eventually settle in Carleton Place, Upper Canada (Ontario), about 45 km southwest of the present-day city of Ottawa. (McNaughton)

The Depopulation of Comrie

The author of Stewarts of the South tells us that, by 1820, the depopulation of Comrie and Balquhidder tenants had reached 90%!

“To conclude, in the Parish of Balquhidder where at one time lived between four and five hundred tenants it now scarcely contains fifty. It is said Comrie parish contained five hundred and upwards, while it now has only about forty tenants. I am told [Stewart of] Ardvorlich your friend had once twenty tenants and twenty cottars on his property and now has only one.”

Letters from the New World (The Carmichael Letters, 1831-1834)

From their new homes in distant lands, the former residents of Upper Strathearn wrote letters back home to their friends and relatives who stayed behind, telling them of life on the frontier in Canada and elsewhere.

Fortunately, some of those letters have survived, including from a family of Carmichaels from Wester Glentarken who sailed on the Curlew in 1818 and settled in “New London” (the future city of London, Ontario, Canada, where this author grew up). In a letter from John Carmichael in London, writing to his brother Archibald Carmichael back in Wester Glentarken on 1 June 1831, he writes of their good experiences in the new world and refers to his father-in-law, Malcolm McNaughton, whom we now know was a distant cousin of Robert Stewart’s wife, Catharine McNaughtan.

Life in Comrie Gets Harsher, 1831-1834

If life back in Comrie parish wasn’t already harsh enough, there were outbreaks of influenza in 1831, chincough (whooping cough) in 1832, measles in 1833, scarlet fever and smallpox in 1834. Poverty breeds disease.

At this time, rent for farmland was going for £1/year per acre, while the average income was only £12/year. A report from that era indicates that while wages had doubled since the last statistical report, rents had quadrupled and pauperism and quadrupled. The small farms were disappearing. Even the Gaelic language was dwindling, with English becoming the dominant language in the growing villages and Gaelic becoming increasingly a rural language only.

Preparing to Leave for Canada, 1834 (The Carmichael Letters)

In a letter from Archibald Carmichael in Glen Tarken to his brother John Carmichael in Canada, dated 24 March 1834, now in somewhat damaged condition, we find an unclear reference to the family of a “son of John Stuart* from Lochearnside” who were preparing to leave for Canada. Modern research allows us to confirm that there were only two families in Comrie parish who fit that description and that Archibald Carmichael was most likely referring to the family of Robert Stewart in Morell and latterly in St. Fillans, son of John Stewart in Easter Glen Tarken. (*The spelling of “Stuart” is inconsequential as variant spellings were common then.)

John Stewart was certainly dead by 1834, but he may very well have been still alive in 1818 when John Carmichael left Glen Tarken. Both John Carmichael and John Stewart were married to McLaren wives from Glen Tarken which suggests they may have been related. This may be why Archibald Carmichael referred to the family as “the son of John Stewart of Lochearnside” as that would be the last head of the Stewart family that John Carmichael would have remembered.

Mrs. Thomson Bound for Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Another tantalizing hint comes from a letter from Archibald Carmichael, dated the following day, 25 March 1834, in which he refers to a Mrs. Thomson from Comrie “who is going out from this place to the District of Gore.” The District of Gore was the old name for the region now known as the City of Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, precisely the destination of Robert Stewart’s family. It was also the home of Sir Allan Napier MacNab, whose uncle lived at Dundurn in Comrie parish, just east of St. Fillans. Our Stewarts were closely enough affiliated with MacNab’s family to call upon him for aid upon their arrival.

The 1842 Canadian Census shows a Thomas Thomson residing on York Street, in the same block as Robert’s second son, Duncan Stewart, and nearby to Robert’s eldest son, John Stewart, and Robert’s married daughter, Margaret McCallum. The census shows that Thomas Thomson was from England, but this could be an error. He had a household of two adults and two children. Significantly, his landlord was listed as “Sir A. N. McNab.” He is the only person on the same census page whose landlord is Sir Allan MacNab. Thomas Thomson has not been located in any later census records. Nothing more is known of him.

Departing for Canada, Spring 1834

Sources conflict over exactly when our Stewarts left Scotland and when they arrived. We have no record of when they sailed or what ship they sailed on. Ships records for that era are frustratingly incomplete, often just listing numbers of passengers with no names. We know that our Stewarts were still in Scotland in January 1833, when Robert’s granddaughter, Catharine Stewart (daughter of Duncan Stewart) was born in Comrie. And we know they were in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada no later than November 1834 when Robert’s granddaughter, Margaret McCallum, was born in Hamilton, as we know the entire extended family travelled together.

The Carmichael letters suggest that our Stewarts were likely preparing to leave in March 1834, which fits the rest of the evidence. They would have travelled by sea for six weeks to arrive in Quebec. It could have taken them a week or two to travel from Quebec to Toronto where they stayed for three weeks before completing their journey to the Gore District (Hamilton). This would have put them in Hamilton sometime in the summer of 1834 where they were quarantined until “the next fall,” according to the recollection of Robert’s 14-year-old son, Peter Stewart. Standard quarantine for the Hamilton epidemic in 1832 had been 15-30 days, so we may presume that Peter’s recollection is slightly exaggerated, and they may have been in quarantine until September. That would have given them about two months before the first snows and would also explain the younger party’s hasty construction of a lean-to for their first winter in Puslinch.

The descendants of Catharine’s son, Duncan Stewart, recalled that the family left Scotland because taxes were raised too high. (More likely it was rents that were raised.) We also know that in 1817, their landlord, Peter Robert Drummond-Burrell, 2nd Baron Gwydyr, began removing and relocating the tenants from Glen Tarken to the nearby village of St. Fillans (previously known as Portmore.) Catharine’s husband, Robert, died sometime around 1830. His exact date of death is unknown. 

In the spring of 1834, Catharine McNaughtan Stewart along with her eleven children (some adult and already married with children of their own) left Scotland by boat. A typical journey from Scotland to Canada often took about six weeks, usually in the hold of the ship crammed with peasants with no facilities and few supplies.

When Catherine and her family docked in Quebec, Canada, the country was not yet a country, it was still a British colony. It would be another 30 years before Canada would become a country of its own and Lower and Upper Canada would become known as the provinces of Quebec and Ontario.

On the journey across the Atlantic, one of Catharine’s sons-in-law contracted cholera and died in Montreal. (Duncan’s descendants recalled that it was the husband of the eldest daughter, however that is incorrect.)

According to son, Peter’s journal, the family travelled from Montreal to Toronto, Upper Canada (Ontario) by French Canadian oxen-pulled river boats (bateaux). At one point their boat wrecked on the rocks of a rapids. All their possessions sank to the bottom. and the family had to cling to the rock all night until morning before being rescued. They lost everything.

(This story is remarkably similar in detail to the account of the Carmichael family who migrated from Glen Tarken to London, Ontario, Canada in 1818, stopping first for a while in Carleton Place (see map below), including getting into trouble at a major river rapids. The Carmichael letter identifies the rapids as St. Andrew’s East on the Ottawa River just outside of Montreal. It’s possible, if not probable, that the St. Andrews East Rapids and the unidentified rapids in Peter Stewart’s account are the same rapids. Although Duncan Stewart’s second-hand account says the family travelled via the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario, I’m not aware of any major rapids on the St. Lawrence River, which suggests the Stewarts may have followed the same route as the 1818 party. As Duncan’s later account is second-hand, given by his grand-daughter, it seems possible that the identification of the St. Lawrence route is a later embellishment.)

They stayed three weeks in Toronto (possibly staying with an as yet undiscovered relative), then on to Hamilton where they were quarantined until the fall of 1834, due to the one case of cholera back in Quebec.

In March 1832, future Prime Minister Allan Napier MacNab (not yet knighted), a local lawyer and then aspiring politician, whose family came from Dundurn near St. Fillans in Comrie parish, Perthshire, Scotland, and whose grandfather had been a neighbour to our Stewarts, sought “to promote the location and settlement of our fellow subjects the emigrants in this province.” He petitioned for the use of a vacant barn-like building on the former Beasley estate on Burlington Heights in Hamilton “to be fitted up for their temporary accommodation on landing at the Head of the Lake.” (Hamilton) “The barrack was refitted for the annual summer influx of immigrants and the boats began to reach the Head of the Lake with weary, frightened passengers.”

On August 3rd, 1832, Allan MacNab entered into negotiations to purchase the Beasley property on Burlington Heights where the immigrants were being housed. “And then disaster struck…. Cholera broke out in the overcrowded shed on Burlington Heights where the wretched conditions and the pitiful lack of resources swelled the calamity to epidemic proportions.” MacNab and others fled the city in panic until the epidemic subsided with the return of cooler weather in the fall. MacNab started construction on Burlington Heights of his dreamed estate home later to be called Dundurn Castle, after his family home in Upper Strathearn.

When our Stewarts arrived in Hamilton in 1834, the fear of another cholera outbreak was still prevalent. Anyone who was even suspected of having been in contact with a cholera case was locked up and quarantined until it could be determined for certain that they were safe. The standard length of quarantine was 15-30 days. Of course, they were locked up with known cholera cases and many who did NOT have cholera before they were quarantined contracted it because of the quarantine.

The Historical Atlas of Wellington County, 1904, entry for Peter Stewart indicates the family arrived in Hamilton in 1832 and moved to Puslinch in 1833 (sic), whereas the 1901 census gives their date of immigration as 1834. Catharine had a granddaughter, Margaret McCallum (daughter of Margaret Stewart) who was born in Hamilton in November 1834, so we know the family was in Hamilton by that time. The Carmichael letters suggest the left in the spring of 1834.

Following the family’s release from quarantine, they appealed to their distant cousin, Sir Allan Napier MacNab, latterly of Dundurn Castle, future premier of the Canadian provinces. Sir Allan MacNab named his Hamilton residence, Dundurn, after his family’s ancestral home of Dundurn in Comrie, just a mile east of St. Fillans. Thus, Sir Allan’s uncle, Robert MacNab of Dundurn would have been a neighbour to our Stewarts. Catharine’s mother, Elizabeth MacNab, was likely a distant cousin of Sir Allan MacNab. Sir Allan gave the family at least one house to live in on York Street in Hamilton, across from Dundurn Castle. According to Duncan Stewart’s descendants, he also gave Duncan a job. It’s likely he would also have helped the other Stewart brothers find employment.

Several of the older adult children (Margaret, Jean, John, and Duncan) remained in the growing city of Hamilton, while widow Catharine and her younger children (Robert, Catharine, Peter and William) moved north to Puslinch, near the town of Guelph where they had a plot of land awaiting them. The road from Hamilton to Guelph was little better than a track that went by way of Cambridge, so it may have taken them a couple of days to reach their new home in Puslinch, Wellington, Ontario, Canada.

The whereabouts of the remaining three daughters (Elisabeth, Mary, Ann) after immigration is unknown.

Catharine’s second son, Duncan, moved with his family to Bayham township in Elgin County, Ontario, where they became settler farmers. While Widow Catharine herself, along with her younger children, were among the earliest settlers in Puslinch, Wellington, Ontario, Canada. They occupied concession 3, lot 19-rear, while their in-laws, the Gillespies, initially occupied the front of the same lot. According to son Peter’s journal they initially lived in a shanty “without any door but an old country blanket hung over.”

Between February 1848 and January 1849 Widow Catharine, her son Robert Jr., and his wife Mary Gillespie, all died presumably from smallpox (as there was a local smallpox outbreak at the time), leaving their four children orphaned. The Stewart farm passed to Catharine’s next son, Peter, who, together with his sister, Catherine, raised Robert and Mary’s orphans.

Catharine’s youngest son, William, lived on the farm in Puslinch until sometime in the 1860s when he married and moved to Hamilton.

Catharine and her family were among the founding members of Duff’s Presbyterian Church in Puslinch. Duff’s church initially held worship services only in Gaelic for the first 30 years of its existence. Catharine and her family would have spoken Gaelic as their first language, as was the case with most of the early Highland settlers.

Catharine is buried in Crown cemetery, Puslinch, along with her son Robert Jr and his wife, Mary Gillespie, with the following inscription: “Catharine, relict of the late Robert Stewart, died Sept. 18, 1848, age 70 years.” Peter and Catherine’s graves are nearby.

The above narrative draws upon the following sources:

• Stewarts of the South (c/o my partner site, stewartsofbalquhidder.com)
• The Reports of the Annexed Estates-1755-69
• “I’ve a Boat to Catch,” by Peter McNaughton, highlandstrathearn.com
• Ship’s List for the Curlew, 1818
• Statistical Account for the Parish of Comrie, 1838 (c/o highlandstrathearn.com)
• Letters from the Distant Past (c/o highlandstrathearn.com)
• Annals of St. Fillans, by Alexander Porteous, F.S.A., Scot, 1912
• A Picture of Strathearn in Perthshire, by John Brown, 1823
• Old Parish Register for Comrie and Balquhidder parishes (c/o stewartsofbalquhidder.com)
• Canadian Census 1842, 1851, 1861, 1871, 1881, 1891, 1901, 1911. 1921 (ancestry.ca)
• Ontario birth, marriage and death records (ancestry.ca)
• The account of Peter Stewart as recorded in the McPhatter letters. (Puslinch Historical Society)
• The account of Duncan Stewart as recorded by his granddaughter, Leah Moore Hatch (personal correspondence)
• “The Carmichael Letters” as presented in The Carmichael Family History by Jim McAndless et al.