“Ranold McDonell” Lived on Johnson Hall Lands

by Wanda Burch

Johnstown, NY: Highlanders were "men bred in the rough bounds", living off the fish they caught in the lochs, the deer they hunted in the hills, and the herds they tended to in strachan and glen or raided from their Lowland neighbours. They were a hardy, intrepid race with all the attributes needed to make good soldiers: courage, endurance, self-reliance and above all, loyalty to one's leader and comrades. Scots had served as mercenaries abroad since the days of the Romans when the British government in 1725 finally recognized the age-old adage that "it took a thief to catch a thief". [McCulloch, Lieutenant Colonel Ian Macpherson, "Men Bred in the Rough Bounds": The Scottish Military Tradition in Canada (article in The Beaver: Exploring Canada's History, Volume 73/4 August/September 1993.)]



Sir William Johnson won an important victory for the British government against the French at Lake George in 1755 , receiving for his efforts a baronetcy and a grant of one hundred thousand acres of land north of the Mohawk and Schoharie Rivers . This patent, known as the Kingsborough, included parcels in Johnstown and present day Gloversville , Tryon (now Fulton) county.

Johnson had settled his lands around the perimeter of Johnson Hall and needed tenants for the colonization of the Kingsborough Patent. He looked toward the Scots Highlanders, who were pouring into America at such a rate between 1770 and the American Revolution that landlords in Scotland were afraid that the Highlands might be emptied, and thus deprive them of their supply of cheap labor and military recruits. The Jacobite Rising of 1745, decades earlier, had the unexpected effect of suggesting that Highlanders could be valuable assets in the British Army when the British Empire was rapidly expanding in North America . For their roles in 1745, many prominent Highland families had lost estates and lost their clan chiefs who literally lost their heads. Descendants often went to extraordinary lengths to distance themselves from their Jacobite past in order to recover some part of their family heritage. They believed they could gain favor with the London government by a conspicuous demonstration of their loyalty in military service.

Johnson took advantage of the Scots’ desire for land, their desire to mend their fortunes shattered in the battles for the Pretender, and their desire for a demonstration of loyalty to the British government. He advertised lease land on the Kingsborough Patent, via his New York City agents, and induced 400 Scots of the Highland Clan MacDonnell to settle on his lands. Many of the MacDonnells were Jacobites and some of them had seen service at Culloden Moor . One of those who responded to Johnson’s invitation, Alexander MacDonell, had been on Bonnie Prince Charlie’s personal staff. These men and their families had no love of Hanoverians. They embarked for America during the month of August, 1773 .

The Gentleman's Magazine, a popular 18th century news source, noted in the September 30, 1773 issue, the departure of the MacDonells from four districts in Scotland: "Three gentlemen of the name of MacDonnell , with their families, and four hundred Highlanders from the counties [districts] of Glengarry , Glenmorison , Urquhart , and Strathglass , lately embarked for America , having obtained a grant of land in Albany." They arrived in New York City , on The Pearl; the Gentleman’s Magazine entry appearing to have been copied from an August 28th edition of a newspaper, the Courant, which had also noted the Highlanders’ embarkation for America .

The arrival in America and specifically to Johnson’s lands in the Mohawk Valley was a complete transplantation, the Highland families going out under four chiefs, the MacDonnells of Aberchalder, Leek, Collachie and Scotas. Tracts varying from one to five hundred acres were granted to the families, all according to a feudal pattern, with tenants grouped around the lord of the manor. A period of improvements was allowed, the first rent due the Johnson family on September 25, 1780. The settlement was made in and about the present town of Gloversville , and the new tenants soon became deeply attached to the interests of Sir William Johnson and his family.

The Rent Roll of the Kingsborough Patent lists “Ranold McDonell” on Lot #72. Ranold was probably Ranold McDonell of Ardnabee, leader of the immigrant clans and brother-in-law to the three “gentlemen,” all brothers, referenced in the August issue of the Gentleman’s Magazine. The brothers were John of Leek, Alexander of Aberchalder, and Allen of Collachie. Ranold had a long military career extending nearly forty years. In North America, he was 6 1⁄2 years in the 17th NY Regiment; 12 years in the 60th (Royal Americans), 8 years and 4 months in the 84th, 5 years and 9 months in the 2nd Battalion, Royal Canadian Volunteers. He was called “an old man when he emigrated,” which probably indicated he had returned to Scotland after the French and Indian War and returned with the party on the “ Pearl ” in 1773. He had three sons, and three daughters.

Sir William died only one year after the arrival of his Scots Highland tenants. The emigrants hardly settled into their new property before they were drawn into the American Revolution. After Sir William’s death, Ranold joined the Scots Highland tenants in declaring their loyalty to Sir William’s son Sir John Johnson. Sir John was now commandant of the militia of the Province of New York and, in his new position, annoyed the local Committee of Safety when he and other area residents signed a document disapproving of the actions of the people of Boston for the “outrageous and unjustifiable act on the private property of the India Company," and of their resolution "to bear faith and true allegiance to their lawful Sovereign King George the Third." [Am. Archives, Fourth Series, Vol. II. p. 151.]

In the summer of 1775, Col. Allan MacLean, a Scots officer in the English army, aided by Col. Guy Johnson, Sir John’s brother-in-law, raised a Mohawk Valley regiment known as the Royal Highland Emigrants, which he took to Canada . In the spring of 1776 Sir John received word that the revolutionary authorities had determined on his arrest.

The Gaels took pride in their hardiness and for their ability to make long marches through inhospitable country, bearing severe heat and cold. [Virginia Gazette of July 30, 1767]. This pride and hardiness would prove invaluable to Sir John Johnson, whose actions in support of the King forced him to flee Johnstown , following additional armed threats in 1776. Ranold, alongside 300 Scots tenants, followed Sir John into exile through the forests of the colony of New York, into Canada, and thus into the American Revolution, serving in the battalion of the King’s Royal Regiment of New York, known locally as “Johnson’s Greens” and more commonly as the “Royal Yorkers.” The Royal Yorkers successfully battled the Americans at Oriskany during the Saratoga campaign in 1776 and participated on several notable raids into their old neighbourhood, the Mohawk Valley . The Royal Yorkers’ final stand occurred in October, 1781, just one mile from Johnson Hall, on property now bordering Johnson Avenue .

Stories of bravery and hardship abound in the MacDonell annals of fighting for Sir John Johnson. After the termination of the Revolutionary War, they once again lost their lands and their hope for prosperity in a new country. Uprooted., the Highland retainers of Sir John Johnson were granted lands in Canada by the British government. They settled in districts of Ontario , which still remain intensely Gaelic. The officers and men of the first battalion, including Ranold and his family, settled in a body at Glengarry, Ontario , occupying the first five townships west of the boundary line of Quebec province, being the present townships of Lancaster , Charlottenburgh , Cornwall, Osnabruck , and Williamsburgh . Those of the second battalion removed farther west to the Bay of Quinte , settling in the counties of Lennox and Prince Edward . They were joined in the month of September, 1786 , by five hundred of their kinsfolk from Knoydart who had sailed with the Rev. Alexander MacDonnell from Greenock , in the ship MacDonald. Sir John named the village of Williamstown in Glengarry in memory of his father, Sir William Johnson. Ranold and his family never returned to the Mohawk Valley .



References: Duncan Fraser’s research on the Rent Roll of the Kingsborough Patent, transcribed by Wanda Burch; 1904 Ontario Archives, p. 1057; p. 371; W.L. Scott, “the McDonells of Leek, Collachie, and Aberchalder”; on the McDonells, and Duncan Fraser’s private correspondence with Lt. Colonel Hugh M. Wallis, Sonneville, Quebec.