Emigration to Nova Scotia and Canada

Nova Scotia was incorporated by charter of King James VI of Scotland and I of England in 1621, but was abandoned to the French in 1632. After the Union of 1707, the Hudson’s Bay Company started to use Stromness, on Orkney, as a staging post and had an agent there from 1791. In 1799 it employed 530 men at York Factory, its port on Hudson Bay; 416 of them were from Orkney. 

The Red River Colony, or Selkirk Settlement, was a colonisation project set up by the 5th Earl of Selkirk in 1811, and became the basis for modern Manitoba. Many Scots settled here after the Clearances.

Scots today are the third biggest national grouping in Canada. The two longest-serving Canadian prime ministers were Scots: Sir John Macdonald (1815-91) and William Mackenzie King (1871-1950).

Scottish fiddlers took their music to Canada. Cape Breton music from Nova Scotia is widely seen as a stronghold where Scottish fiddle music traditions have been preserved.

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