| Notes |
- 1. Thomas1 McDonald was born presumably in Ireland and died in Cape Breton, NS. He married Marie Hill. She was born about 1727.
When a missionary priest, Fr. Charles Bailly, revalidated the marriage of their son Edward in 1771, he listed Thomas' wife as Marie Hell. Stephen White of the Centre D'?tudes Acadiennes at the Universit? de Moncton, New Brunswick, suggests that she might be a member of the Hill family. That family traveled back and forth between Cape Breton and Cape Ray, Newfoundland. There was a Marie Hill who was born about 1727, daughter of Jean [John] and Marie (Carmel) Hill dit Montagne. No proof has yet been found that this Marie Hill was the wife of Thomas McDonald, but the probability exists.
It is known that Thomas McDonald was in Newfoundland about 1747/8, as his son Edward was born there at that time. There is however no record of why or when Thomas McDonald came to Newfoundland. In his book The Irish in Newfoundland 1623 - 1800 (St. John's, 1982), Michael J. McCarthy states that during that period most Irish came to Newfoundland as "Irish Youngsters", meaning generally unmarried men who arrived as servants, usually for two summers and one winter. Irish also came as convicts and soldiers. By the mid-eighteenth century the Irish had strongholds on the Avalon Peninsula, Trinity, Bonavista and Fogo. Although the Irish outnumbered the English by fifty percent in the major Newfoundland communities, they were not in political control and suffered at the hands of the English. This is evident in a 1764 order by Governor Hugh Palliser designed to decrease the number of 'idle persons,' on the island, especially Irish Catholics. The orders read in part:
...That no Papist servants, man or woman shall remain at any place where they do not fish or serve during the summer preceeding.
That not more than two Papist men shall dwell in one house during the winter except such as have a protestant master.
That no Papist shall keep a public house or vend liquor by retail....
In his Uniacke's Sketches of Cape Breton (Halifax: 1958) C. Bruce Fergusson notes that in 1767 Governor Palliser ordered:
To The Magistrates of St. John's:
Whereas a great number of hutts are erected, possessed and inhabited by Irish Roman Catholics in the Harbour... You are hereby authorized and directed immediately to pull down such hutts or houses and suffer no more to be erected.
The Irish continued to live in Newfoundland regardless of these edicts. It wasn't until 1784 when they were granted the right to practice the religion of their choice.
These facts may have contributed to Thomas leaving Newfoundland, or if his wife was indeed French, he may have moved to Cape Breton with her family. In any event, by the mid 1760s they were living in Cape Breton.
In 1768 Lt. Gov. Francklin of Nova Scotia reported on a number of settlers in Cape Breton who were living on and who had made improvements on lands to which they held no title. In the list of those at Gabarus, near the ruins of the French fortress of Louisbourg on the southern coast of Cape Breton, were "Richard Collins, Edward and Thomas McDonald, John Clewly [Clory?], Francis Joice [Josse], Peter Jervois [Girroir], John Perry, and ----- Curdo [Guillaume Cordeau], who had built dwelling-houses and stages," Uniacke's Sketches of Cape Breton (Halifax, 1958). There is no record of the McDonalds receiving title to their lands, so it seems they moved on to settle in D'Escousse on Isle Madame where Edward received a grant from the Crown in 1790.
Children of Thomas McDonald and Marie Hill:
2.
i.
Edward2 McDonald b. abt. 1747 in Newfoundland
3.
ii.
Rose McDonald
b. 27 Jul 1755; m. Charles Poirier
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1730 - Abt 1768 (48 years)