- Title
- 'The Canny Scot' Rev. John Dunmore Lang and the Largs controversy
- Creator
- Morrison, Tessa
- Relation
- Celts and Their Cultures at Home and Abroad: A Festschrift for Malcolm Broun p. 213-227
- Relation
- Sydney Series in Celtic Studies 15
- Relation
- http://sydney.edu.au/arts/celtic_studies/about/publications.shtml
- Publisher
- The Celtic Studies Foundation University of Sydney
- Resource Type
- book chapter
- Date
- 2013
- Description
- In the late 1830s, Highland immigrants who were sent to the colony of New South Wales had their passage paid by the Colonial Office. In return they were to be hired out to the settlers and landholders as labourers, servants or farmhands, particularly since transportation of convicts was slowing down and eventually stopping in New South Wales in 1840, which resulted in an acute shortage of labour. An emigrant ship, Midlothian, led by the Minister Rev. William Mclntyre, arrived in Sydney from the Isle of Skye and they had been encouraged by Rev. Dr John Dunmore Lang to immigrate. The majority of these immigrants could only speak Gaelic. The immigrants eventually settled on Lang's brother's property in the Hunter Valley and became tenants, and not servants. The township in the Hunter Valley became known as Largs, named after the Lang family's home town in Ayrshire, Scotland. Gaelic was the initial language of the town and church services were originally conducted in Gaelic. The Sydney papers were outraged and the Sydney Monitor stated, 'We want them [the Highlanders] only as servants: and wanting them as servants we cannot want them as tenants.' However, the immigrants remained in Largs and built a small thriving community. This paper looks at the controversy and establishment of the Gaelic community at Largs.
- Subject
- Largs; Hunter Valley; Gaelic; colonial history; Australia
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1342302
- Identifier
- uon:28940
- Identifier
- ISBN:9781742103280
- Language
- eng
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