This website sets out to record my progress and findings in pursuit of my ancestral roots in the Highlands of Scotland

I started my genealogical research in 2006, with the initial objective of determining the ancestry of my maternal great, great, grandfather, Duncan Stuart MacDonald (b 1803 d 20/11/1885). All I knew, at the outset, was that he had been the owner of the Wallilabou* sugar plantation in St Vincent in the late 1800s.

After discovering that he had been buried at St Patrick’s Church at Barrouallie, St Vincent; finding some references and photographs of his sons and making contact with John Kirton**, whose ancestors had owned the neighbouring Kearton plantation (which was purchased by Duncan MacDonald in 1864), I put a posting on the ancestry.com forum seeking any further information about Duncan’s family background.

Having received no replies for 18 months, I was amazed to receive a message out of the blue from Robert Russell, in Sydney, who had discovered a reference to a Duncan MacDonald, Plantation Owner St Vincent, in an 1851 Urray Parish census, while researching his MacGregor heritage. It transpired that Duncan was visiting his sister in law's family and that Robert and I were distantly related.

Robert had already conducted meticulous research into his MacGregor roots, leading back to William MacGregor and his wife Helen Gillanders. Robert soon discovered that Duncan MacDonald had also married in Urray and that the parish registry entry showed him as having been born in Ullapool.

I had the opportunity to visit Ullapool a few months later, in 2008, and was able to go along to the Ullapool Museum and genealogical centre. I was very warmly received and given full access to their records, which consisted of a card index and files of family trees and associated correspondence. The first index card that I pulled up, on the subject of ‘customs’, brought up letters from Anne Passaportis with a copy of her family tree.

This tree showed Duncan as being one of the sons of John MacDonald HEICS (Honorable East India Company), who had been Comptroller of Customs in Ullapool – a post which he had been awarded by the Duke of York, after serving with distinction during military campaigns in India against Hyde Ali and Tippo Sahib. John had apparently joined the army, with his cousin (the second son of the laird of Dundonnell - possibly Capt Alexander MacKenzie of 73rd Regiment (d1783) https://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=11HWTG84166MK9N https://electricscotland.com/history/scotreg/macleod/1777.htm), at the age of 18 and spent 18 years abroad.

His son, Duncan Stewart MacDonald, was reported to have gone to school in Stornoway and stayed with the schoolmaster, Mr Pollock. Duncan was then said to have married his cousin, Margaret MacGregor, at the age of 50. After the birth of their first two children, they travelled out to St Vincent to join his uncle, in around 1850. ***

Ann Passaportis’ family tree also showed that William MacGregor (Duncan’s father in law) was allegedly descended from Rob Roy MacGregor, via his grandson Rorie Buidhe (fair haired). Rorie had reputedly escaped with his father, James Mohr (Rob Roy’s eldest son), after the Battle of Culloden (1746) and subsequently married a MacKenzie widow, who was reported to be a niece of the laird of the Mackenzies of Dundonnell.

This intriguing information set me on the path of trying to corroborate these claims.

* Not to be confused with Wallibo, which was further north.

** via the now defunct svgancestry.com website

*** Two other MacDonalds (Hon Archibald MacDonald, 3^rd son of Lord MacDonald of Slate, Co Antrim b 21/5/1777 - descendants of MacDonalds of Sleat, Isle of Skye and Reginald D MacDonald) were subsequently identified as having estates in St Vincent but no links could be established between the two families.