From Hull to Nova Scotia - John Rushton
Before the railways reached the coast in 1845, the
Yorkshire emigrant seeking fresh opportunities in
Canada or the new United States of America , sailed
from Whitby, Scarborough or Hull. Emigration agents
advertised in the York Chronicle of January 1774. A
Malton man sought bookings for the good ship ":Two
Friends", which he described as a "prime sailor". well
accommodated for goods and passengers. The ship would
leave Hull at the latter end of February for Fort
Cumberland in Nova Scotia. Household goods cost £4 a
ton but sucking children travelled gratis. The
Fawcett family left Hovingham to join 103 on board.
The brigantine Albion, 150 tons, with a crew of
nine, commanded by Thomas Perrot , sailed from the
port of Hull. on March 11th. She carried a cargo of
woollens,linens, and ironmonger's ware. There were 188
passengers, all from Yorkshire ,mostly the North
Riding, their destination Nova Scotia. Lancelot
Chapman, a tenant farmer went from Stebanthwaite farm,
Hawnby, near Helmsley , aged 49 with his wife
Frances, three sons, and five daughters . He said it
was "on account of their rents being raised by the
Duke of Rutland,so that they could not live".His
brother William Chapman took his wife Mary, five
sons and four daughters
A well to do Hutton Rudby paper maker, Charles Dixon
had gone earlier for Nova Scotia with sixty two in
the brigantine Duke of York. He bought 2000 acres of
land including a two hundred acre farm with its
stock, for £260 .Most emigrants went with far less,
lured by the prospect of earning enough to acquire
some land of their own in the new world . On arrival,
the women sailed on coastal schooners to Fort
Cumberland. The men trekked across land to Windsor ,
took a small boat over the basin and walked to the
fort. They wrote home, describing lush marshland which
would yield two tons of hay to the acre. A gallon of
cream gave as much butter as two gallons in England.
The rum was cheap but the winters were hard.
John Rushton
OTHER ARTICLES
• The Yorkshire smuggler - the smuggling of contraband
• The port of Scarborough in the late 15th Century
• The national RNLI and the Scarborough lifeboat of 1861.
• Scarborough ships in the baltic - an article by John Rushton
• Thomas Crimlisk - First of the Crimlisks
• Seabathing in scarborough - an article by John Rushton
• The early years of the Scarborough Lifeboat
• When the Colliers came to Scarborough
• Shipping Ironstone down the coast by John Rushton
• Havens on the North Yorkshire coast. An article on scarboroughs maritime history by John Rushton
• Stories of human interest from the sea port of Scarborough
• The 200 year history of scarboroughs RNLI
• Harwood Brierleys description of Scarborough harbour at the opening of the 20th century
• Shipbuilding at Scarborough - the wooden barques and schooners
• The Borough of Scarborough formed in the 12th Century
• Coastal erosion in the 19th Century around the North Bay and Scarborough Castle area
• Filey and the gales of 1860,1867,1869 AND 1880
• Stories from Robin Hood's Bay and Whitby
• Robin Hood's Bay - The Storm family website
HOW TO HELP THIS WEBSITE: Google rates pages posted on Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites very highly. So if you have found this site useful please post it using the buttons below.
Tweet