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Archiver > CAN-NS-ANTIGONISH > 2005-01 > 1106762477
From: "J.Simon" <>
Subject: MacGregorLandGrantsRe: [NS-CB-L] Fw: [Antigonish] MacGregor, Donald 1892 Death Certificate Sought Plus the Legal Requirements Besides Money to Secure It
Date: Wed, 26 Jan 2005 12:02:38 -0600
References: <FHEFKPPIMOHKNEIMIPDHCEICDNAA.geoffgmartin@shaw.ca> <003301c5039c$86b641c0$f7efde18@noble>
Thank you, Richard Noble, for your informative reply. My great-grandfather
Deacon Donald MacGregor's Goshen Baptist church record only said "dead", and
his "Messenger & Visitor" obituary, page 8, dated 4 May 1892, mentioned his
parents, but didn't give his parents' names. So, I guess that's a dead end,
as far as information pertinent to his death goes. Maybe some day I'll be
able to find the correct Donald MacGregor, or Donald McGregor's (Mc as
original spelling) petition for his land grant, amongst other Donald
McGregors' petitions, and glean something from that. His sister Ishbel
McGregor (maiden lady) surely petitioned for the land grant for her farm
beside his. Not too promising. I was told once that there were 7 Donald
McGregor land grants, or petitions for land grants. I should have applied
for all 7 of them at the time, for the price was probably cheap then.
However, my husband and I were raising a family at the time, so I didn't
want to spend the money then. Perhaps if I traveled to the Land Management
source in Nova Scotia, I could possibly distinguish which land petition or
land grant was my Donald McGregor's, in South River Lake, Antigonish County,
Nova Scotia. The very small rear right corner of Ishbel McGregor's land
grant was in Guysborough Co., but 95% of her land was in Antigonish County.
I think one of those Church? 1873? maps of land grants or farms around South
River Lake labeled Ishbel McGregor's land as "Miss McGregor's". I wonder if
I should apply for her land grant or petition info as Miss McGregor, Ishbel
McGregor, or Isabel McGregor, or even Essabella McGregor. The name
Essabella appears, I believe, on 19th century censuses as "Essabella" M[a]c
Gregor for both her and her niece, my great aunt, "Auntie Belle" (later the
2nd Mrs. Alexander Hattie also of South River Lake), or she also Essabella
McGregor (the junior one and a daughter of my great-grandfather, Baptist
Deacon Donald M[a]cGregor). Family oral tradition maintains that Baptist
Deacon Donald McGregor's parents were Donald Ruadh (or Red-haired Donald)
McGregor and wife, nee Margaret McGregor. "Auntie Belle" wrote my father,
Dr. Judson Stewart MacGregor, in the 1920's that Baptist Deacon Donald
McGregor's parents did come to Nova Scotia from Scotland, but no one today
knows what happened to them. That could mean possibly that one of those
land petitions or land grants was made by Baptist Deacon Donald MacGregor's
parents, another Donald McGregor! I suspect that these parents were the
very couple who returned to Scotland, rather than stay in Nova Scotia,
because the wife of one of those early immigrant-to-Canada MacGregor
relatives was "disturbed", obviously didn't like Nova Scotia, so they
returned to Scotland. I think it must have been the Baptist Deacon Donald
McGregor's parents who returned to Nova Scotia, because Baptist Deacon
Donald McGregor was born in 1806 in Perthshire (Loch Rannoch says tradition)
Scotland, so his mother, at least, had to have been in Scotland to give
birth to him there. I think no one remembers what happened to Baptist
Deacon Donald McGregor's parents, because they were the ones who returned to
Scotland. Also, Baptist Deacon Donald McGregor came to Nova Scotia in 1832,
and his McGregor cousins in Springfield, Antigonish County, Nova Scotia,
called him, consequently, "New Donald" McGregor. (New Donald, versus the
old Donald who must have been his father.) The Springfield, NS MacGregor
cousins' immediate family, of whom Margaret nee MacGregor, Baptist Deacon
Donald MacGregor's mother, was a member, had come to Nova Scotia "around
the turn of the century", around 1800, obviously plus or minus. This
scenario seems to make sense to me.
Listers, do you have any helpful suggestions about how to distinguish
Baptist Deacon Donald McGregor's land grant or land petition from those of
other Donald McGregors' land grants or petitions?
Granted, any land petition or land grant made before 1832 would not be his!
Jean (MacGregor) Simon
Huntsville, Alabama
- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Noble" <>
To: <>
Sent: Wednesday, January 26, 2005 5:45 AM
Subject: Re: [NS-CB-L] Fw: [Antigonish] MacGregor, Donald 1892 Death
Certificate Sought Plus the Legal Requirements Besides Money to Secure It
> There was no civil registration of deaths in 1892.
>
> Births and deaths were recorded in Nova Scotia from 1864-1877.
> There was some kind of funding problem, so they stopped in 1877 and did
not
> start again until 1908.
>
> Your only chance is to find a newspaper or church record.
>
>
> ==== NS-CAPE-BRETON Mailing List ====
> Visit the associated Canada GenWeb site for counties of Cape Breton at
> http://www.rootsweb.com/~nscpbret/cbgenwb.html
>
>
>
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