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Settlement schemes offered land grants to Scots willing to emigrate to Canada, and the fur trade gave a man the chance to make his fortune in just a few years.
Making the voyage to the New World was only the first step of the journey. Many Scots arrived in Canada with little or no money. Some had arranged a job before they left Scotland, while others crowded in the main seaports to find work as labourers or to sign on with fur trade companies.
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Many Scots, lured across the ocean by the promise of free land grants, discovered that the new settlements were still more than a thousand miles away. New arrivals, some from small Scots islands, simply could not conceive of a distance so vast. Many set out on long. difficult journeys with poor provisions and no idea of how long the trek across the wilderness would take.
Scots in Canada encountered all sorts of strange animals they had never seen before. The Canadian wilderness was full of hidden dangers including bears, cougars, wolverines, lynx, wolves and coyotes. The mountains, forests and plains were home to moose, buffalo, stags, caribou, elk, wild horses, mountain goats and beaver.
New Scots settlers were often afraid of the people of the First Nations. In Europe, the Indigenous People of North America were described as 'Red Indians', as savages, and tales of scalping and Wild West massacres were well known.
In reality, many Native tribes had become accustomed to trading with Europeans. Although some groups were hostile to white encroachment on their traditional hunting territories, relations between immigrants and First Nation peoples were generally peaceful.
We often complain about the weather in Scotland. Winters are wet, cold and dark. The Scots that emigrated to Canada faced harsher weather than they had ever experienced. The temperature could drop to a freezing minus 50 degrees Celsius and a vast amount of snow fell, covering the ground for months.
Scots had to build a home in this wilderness. They had to cut down trees and build a house, while making sure they had enough provisions to survive in the wilds.
The images used above are licensed under Creative Commons on Flickr by the following photographers: Byron and Tamara, Manitoba Historical Maps, Mistr.John, swisscan and ViaMoi.
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