Author: Prof. John Sheets
Like many places in the Hebrides, tiny and remote Colonsay, with the southern tidal isle of Oronsay, recorded its largest population toward the middle of the 19th century: 979 in 1841. And, like so many places, it seems a simple story of growth after the 18th century then a precipitous decline into the 20th century.
When Martin Martin toured the “Western Isles of Scotland” at the dawn of the 18th century, he did not count the people in Colonsay but described them: “The inhabitants are generally well proportioned, and of a black complexion; they speak only the Irish [Gaelic] tongue, and use the habit, diet, etc that is used in the Western Isles.” In 1701, Malcolm McNeill of Crear purchased Colonsay (and Oronsay) from the 10th Earl (and later 1st Duke) of Argyll, and commenced two centuries of McNeill lairds over their unrelated McNeill tenants. Within decades some islanders could not resist the temptation of a New World and trans-Atlantic emigration, often to the “Argyll County” of North Carolina.
