an episode in the Highland Clearance

[MacBean]

This is a touchy subject. My various antecedents came over to the US long before the clearances, and rather before there was a US. I think this is true of many if not most Scots here, so it isn't common that we really have a stake in this abuse. Some thoughts that have come to me as I pondered the story:

I was glad to hear that those being evicted fought back.

As for their faring better for having been cleared, the same has been said of enslaved Africans.

How many Scots left their homeland and why?

Who now owns the land? (Have the original problems been resolved?) (Should we come back?)

[Lallans]

This is a touchy subject. My various antecedents came over to the US long before the clearances, and rather before there was a US. I think this is true of many if not most Scots here, so it isn't common that we really have a stake in this abuse. Some thoughts that have come to me as I pondered the story:

I was glad to hear that those being evicted fought back.

As for their faring better for having been cleared, the same has been said of enslaved Africans.

How many Scots left their homeland and why?

Who now owns the land? (Have the original problems been resolved?) (Should we come back?)

A lot of the Clearance Scots came to Canada, esp to Nova Scotia and Manitoba. Although this was not a direct family experience, I was raised on tales of how Canadian schools forcibly prohibited Scots schoolkids' use of Gaelic and how the government of the day did their best to suppress the identity generally. Despite all that, I think it can be said that Highlander descendants in Canda (and the USA) are typically if distantly loyal to their clan lairds in the UK and to the British generally- at least that is my observation. We Ulster Scots and Scots-Irish now, that is indeed another question.