Hebrideans, in common with most Celtic peoples, set great store on relationships, and just because this family knowledge was not written down, it does not follow that no records were kept. Oral tradition, which was very strong in the Islands, preserved the knowledge of relationships and patronymics, and as recently as thirty or forty years ago, it was a poor person who did not know his or her sloinneadh (or patronymic) for at least five generations, and a knowledge of seven generations was not at all uncommon.
Most -- if not all -- of the Ferguson families in Cape Breton appear to have originated in the Hebrides, arriving in the nineteenth century from North Uist, South Uist, Benbecula, Harris and Skye. They were Gaelic speakers, but the records pertaining to their arrival and settlement are in English. Sorting out the families among the multitude of Rodericks, Margarets, Donalds, Malcolms, Johns and Floras is a difficult task, and maybe an impossible one.
The aim of this website is to gather in one place as much information as possible about these people, beginning with censuses and historical vital statistics. It is an ongoing project, and will never be complete. I have taken care with sources and footnotes, but (sadly) you should expect to find mistakes and inconsistencies. Please let me know if something doesn't look right, or if you have additional information.
Names: For clarity and indexing, names beginning with 'Mc' have been expanded to 'Mac'. As Blair MacAulay has written, 'It is another ... misconception that there is a distinction between 'Mc' and 'Mac'. There is no distinction whatsoever. Both are attempts to translate the Gaelic 'mhic' (meaning 'son of') into English. Thus 'Iain mhic Iomhair' (John son of Iver) became John MacIver (or John McIver). 'Ferguson', which appears in various censuses as 'Fergusson', 'Furguson', 'Forgeson, etc., has been entered as 'Ferguson'. Names like Catherine and Elizabeth have been entered in a standard format, with the informal form (as it appears on official documents and in the censuses) following in parentheses. For example, Catherine (Katy), or Euphemia (Effy).
Place names without a qualifying extension (e.g. Cow Bay) are assumed to be in Cape Breton. Otherwise the location is noted, as for the 'Cow Bay' near Halifax, which is entered as 'Cow Bay, Nova Scotia'.
Abbreviations: aft (after), b (born), bfr (before), ca (circa, or 'about'), d (died), m (married), n.d. (no date), pp. (pages), ed. (Gord Ripley, editor). Months are abbreviated as follows: Jan, Feb Mar, Apr, May, Jun Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov Dec.
Drawings and photographs are indicated by the 
symbol. Click on the symbol to display the illustration.
Hyperlinks: Underlined (dotted) names are hyperlinks. Click on them to move forward or backward within families, or to reveal a note. Example:
64. Neil Ronald Ferguson [Angus2nd, John1st], b ca 1837
| + | 102. | i. | Ann (Annie) Ferguson, b ca 1861. |
| + | 103. | ii. | Margaret Ferguson, b Jan 21, 1864 |
| + | 104. | iii. | Sarah F. Ferguson, b ca 1865. |
| — | iv. | Malcolm Ferguson, b Dec 30, 1866 at Port Morien (Cow Bay). |
Clicking on 'Angus' (2nd generation) will take you backwards to Neil Ronald's parents. Clicking on any of the numerals in square brackets will take you to a footnote. Clicking on 'Ann (Annie) Ferguson' will take you forward to the Annie's family.
Note: In order to respect the privacy of living persons, individuals born after 1923 are not included in the database.
Gord Ripley, Teeswater, Ontario
Notes
Please refer to Bibliographical Notes for a list of sources ...
1. https://globalgenealogy.com/globalgazette/gazbl/gazbl8.htm
This work is licensed by G. M. Ripley under a
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.