Joyce,
You ask about Scottish emigration to teh US between 1790 and 1820.
Most sailings took place from Greenock (on teh Clyde) and Aberdeen (in the
NE) for the US and Canada, but there were some emigrant ships arranged by
landowners from off the coast of the Highlands and Islands to save people
haveing to travel overland to those ports - one Hebridean port was Stornoway
in the Lewes (Isle of Lewis) and others sailed from Skye - which was not a
port but people went out to the ships in rowing boats.
The severest period of forced emigration was after 1815 when - with the end
of the Napoleonic Wars and government purchase of food for the armies - the
agricultural economy collapsed and climaxed in the 1840s with the potato
famine due to a blight which came over from Ireland and destroyed what had
become the staple crop for many in place of oats - a change of staple which
had gradually taken place in the Highlands and Islands during the second
half of the 18th century.
Not much forced emigration took place from Argyll because many with
initiative and some means had left for the Argyle Colony in NC and the
Argyle Patent in NY state during the 1730s to 50s. One advisor to the Duke
of Argyll (3rd) in the 1730s (Campbell of Knockbuy) wrote that if conditions
were not improved, the whole population might have left if reports of 'the
fever' (malaria) from the Carolinas had not made some more cautions about
leaving.
On the whole, until the starving times in the 1840s, the main reason for
leaving was the hope of changing from being a tenant on poor land in
Argyll - or the other parts of the Highlands and Islands - to becoming a
landowner yourself on better soil. Some senior tenants even paid for their
sub tenants to go with them, but did not understand the new style emerging
in North America where everyone was independent of eachother and so their
dreams of having tenants of theor own often evaporated a few years after
arrival. They also tended to become Loyalists and to move to Canada in the
Revolution due to not wanting to suffer again after the experience of
1745-46.
The system of indenture had ended with the revolution, resulting in a
massive build up of people with petty convictions (and not so petty) on the
former warships (dismasted 'hulks') moored on the Thames in London. One
Duncan Campbell had the contract for providing the supplies for the hulks
and would later arrange for the transportation of poeple to Austraila which
they got too full and the government finally acted. Even in the late 18th
century he and his Scots colleagues in London met and did business while
playing golf on Black Heath.
So for your dates you do not need to look for indentures I suspect. (nothing
to do with false teeth).
Others can advise better as to where to find ships passenger lists on line.
Good luck, Diarmid Campbell
----- Original Message -----
From: <Joycelr(a)aol.com>
To: <Campbell-L(a)genealogy.org>
Sent: Sunday, September 26, 1999 2:16 PM
Subject: Scottish emigration to Delaware Co., NY, c. 1800,
I've found out that 2 of my ancestors, a Campbell and a Stewart,
emigrated
from somewhere in Scotland to Stamford, Delaware Co., NY, some time
between
1790 and 1820. Does anyone know what location in Scotland was most
likely
and/or how I would identify the likely ships for that period of time? All
suggestions most appreciated.
Joyce