Description

While most early immigration to
Prince Edward Island involved
groups of new arrivals, over the years
the Island was also the destination of a
number of individuals and individual
families, mainly from Scotland. Although
the bulk of the newcomers
sought to farm, many were skilled
tradesmen and artisans, impelled to
depart their homeland by economic
difficulties and the lure of landowning.
One such immigrant was Thomas Halliday,
a stonemason from Edinburgh.
Unlike the vast majority of his fellow
immigrants, Halliday has left us an
account of his experiences, preserved
in his own inimitable language in the
Selkirk Papers at the Public Archives
of Canada.