Person Page - 154

Hugh MacGillivray (Big)¹

• Father: Alexander MacGillivray² b. c 1740
• Mother: Mary MacIsaac²

• Relationship: 1st cousin 5 times removed of Donald James MacFarlane

The ancestry chart of Archibald MacFarlane (ID # 34) is presented because he unites the ancestry of both his parents. If an individual appears more than once in Archibald's chart this indicates descent from the individual in more than one line. By clicking on the each instance (i.e. Ancestry of Archibald MacFarlane (#5)) each line of descent will be shown.

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• Name-Gaelic: Hugh MacGillivray (Big) was also known in Gaelic as Eoghan Mor.³
• Name Variation: Hugh MacGillivray (Big) was also known as Hugh McGillivary.¹
• Birth*: He was born circa 1804 in Dunmaglass, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada.^1,3,4
• Marriage*: He married Janet MacFarlane, daughter of Patrick MacFarlane and Catherine Murphy, circa 1834 in St. Andrews, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada.^1,5,4
• Death*: Hugh MacGillivray (Big) died on 5 June 1862 in St. Andrews, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada.⁴
• Burial*: He was buried after 5 June 1862 in MacFarlane Cemetery, St. Andrews, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada.⁴
• Biography*: To quote William Cameron in Drummer on Foot:
  
  “Four sons of Alexander by the second marriage, - Hugh (Eoghan Mor), Archibald, Augustine (Uiestrean), Andrew, and, I believe, three sisters, came from Dunmaglass in the year 1819, and settled at the Middle South River on a tract of land lying between the property of Red John Cameron on the North, and that of the McPherson’s on the South. As their parents (Alexander and the McIsaac woman) were married in 1803 and their children came to the South River in 1819, it will be seen that they were quite young when they were placed on homes of their own to make their own living. They came here to make their living, at about the age that their descendants to-day and the descendants of others as well, move to the United States and Western Canada, and are, as a rule, lost to our country. We may note here also the wise, provident, and paternal care of the good old pioneers in placing their families on homes of their own at an early age. True, it was easier then, for land was more easily available, but it seems to me the same area of land is still here with probably less than half the population in the place.
       The farms are too large, and could be subdivided, many of them, into four homes, with just as good prospect for a comfortable living as on these two or three hundred acre farms three-fourths of which their owners hardly ever see, much less cultivate. By introducing their sons to sub-divisions thus made at as early an age as given above, and before they have had a taste of “pay day,” abroad, parents could have the pleasure, consolation and comfort of having their children settled around them in their old age, instead of being left, as is the case in too many instances to-day, with a large farm, unable to work it, and not a son or a daughter, perhaps, within hundreds or thousands of miles of them.
       It seems to me there is a strange contrast between the disposition of the first parents here and that of later parents, with respect to their families. The modern pater familias doesn’t seem to have confidence enough in the son to entrust him with anything in his own legal right. He expects him to work on the place like any other servant, always under his direction, just for his food and clothing; but he mustn’t look for any ownership or authority. The “old folks” hold on to the ownership, and it is only when convinced that death is surely at hand that they consent to make a Will.
       In the meantime the sons lose confidence in the parent; they leave the paternal home, try to provide for themselves, and, in many cases, in the end the homes pass into the hands of strangers. Many parents will say and say truly that their sons will not come home on the farms. Not once they have experienced conditions abroad, are vigorous and healthy, and draw a handsome cheque every pay-day, they will not return. But when they have grown old and at least ninety per cent of them yet without homes, they would willingly return to the home and to the old farm, but it is too late. To the parent who pleads that he can not induce a son or sons to come back to the farm, I would say that if he caught them early, as “Alasdair” and others did and place them on their own homes at that early age he would not now be calling them back, to his sorrow, without avail. This, strictly speaking, is not genealogy, but it is history.
       These young settlers, the eldest could only be about fifteen, - lived for the first few years together in the one home, but in due time each one settled on a division allotted to himself. Hugh and Archibald were located, side by side, on the front of the lot; Augustine immediately to the rear of this, and Andrew on the extreme eastern part, now known as Lower Springfield.”.²