| Notes |
1 - Surname, Forename Parents/ Other Details Gender Date Parish Number Ref Parish
MCFARLAN, THOMAS
WILLIAM MCFARLAN/ELIZABETH LOCK FR780 (FR780)
M
15/04/1770
644/1
150 187
Glasgow
(Scotlands People]
2 - 1841 Scotland Census (living with son William & his family)
Name: Thomas Mcfarlane
Age: 70
Estimated birth year: abt 1771
Gender: Male
Where born: Scotland
Civil Parish: Cumbernauld
County: Dunbartonshire
Address: Candorat
Occupation: H L W [Hand Loom Weaver]
3 - The Radical War, also known as the Scottish Insurrection of 1820, was a week of strikes and unrest, a culmination of Radical demands for reform in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland which had become prominent in the early years o
f the French Revolution, but had then been repressed during the long Napoleonic Wars.
An economic downturn after the wars ended brought increasing unrest. Artisan workers, particularly weavers in Scotland, sought action to reform an uncaring government, gentry, fearing revolutionary horrors recruited militia and the government dep loyed an apparatus of spies, informers and agents provocateurs to stamp out the trouble.
A Committee of Organisation for Forming a Provisional Government put placards around the streets of Glasgow late on Saturday 1 April, calling for an immediate national strike. On Monday 3 April work stopped in a wide area of central Scotland an d in a swirl of disorderly events a small group marched towards the Carron Company ironworks to seize weapons, but while stopped at Bonnymuir they were attacked by Hussars. Another small group from Strathaven marched to meet a rumoured larger for ce, but were warned of an ambush and dispersed. Militia taking prisoners to Greenock jail were attacked by local people and the prisoners released. James Wilson of Strathaven was singled out as a leader of the march there, and at Glasgow was e xecuted by hanging, then decapitated. Of those seized by the army at Bonnymuir, John Baird and Andrew Hardie were similarly executed at Stirling after making short defiant speeches. Twenty other Radicals were sentenced to penal transportation.
Thomas McCulloch, John Barr, William Smith, Benjamin Moir, Allan Murchie, Alexander Latimer, Andrew White, David Thomson, James Wright, William Clackson , Thomas Pike, Robert Gray, John Clelland, Alexander Hart, Thomas McFarlane, John Anderson, W illiam Crawford and the 15 year old Alexander Johnstone were in due course transported to the penal colonies in New South Wales or Tasmania. Peter Mackenzie, a Glasgow journalist, campaigned unsuccessfully to have them pardoned, and publishe d a small book: The Spy System, including the exploits of Mr Alex. Richmond, the notorious Government Spy of Sidmouth and Castlereagh.
Eventually, on the 10th August 1835 an absolute pardon was granted.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_War]
4 - The nineteen Radicals whose ages ranged from the youngest, Alexander Johnston (15) to the oldest, Thomas McFarlane (45), originally sentenced to death, subsequently commuted to transportation to New South Wales were:
Name | Occupation | Location | Penalty imposed
John Anderson | Weaver | Camelon | Life
John Barr | Weaver | Condorrat | 14 years
William Clackson or Clarkson | Shoemaker | Glasgow | 14 years
James Clelland | Blacksmith | Glasgow | Life
Andrew Dawson | Nailer | Camelon | Life
Robert Gray | Weaver | Glasgow | Life
Alexander Hart | Cabinet-maker | Glasgow | 14 years
Alexander Johnston | Weaver | Glasgow | 14 years
Alexander Latimer | Weaver | Glasgow | 14 years
Thomas McCulloch | Stocking-Weaver | Glasgow | 14 years
Thomas McFarlane | Weaver | Condorrat | Life
John McMillan | Nailer | Camelon | Life
Benjamin Moir | Labourer | Glasgow | 14 years
Allan Murchie | Blacksmith | Glasgow | Life
Thomas Pike or Pink | Muslin Slinger | Glasgow | 14 years
William Smith | Weaver | Glasgow | 14 years
David Thompson | Weaver | Glasgow | 14 years
Andrew White | Bookbinder | Glasgow | 14 years
James Wright | Tailor | Glasgow | 14 Years
James Clelland was to be executed along with Baird and Hardie on Friday 8th September, but three days before he was to die, his sentence was commuted to transportation for life in New South Wales.
William Crawford, Balfron, was sentenced with the above but was 'subsequently released' according to 'The Scottish Radicals. Tried and Transported to Australia for Treason in 1820'. John Anderson Jnr., a printer in Glasgow, was 'transported' o n 4 August 1820 to a Government job in the East Indies for the price of his silence. He had prepared the final draft of the 1820 Proclamation and was probably arrested on Friday 7 April 1820 in order that he could not divulge the 'truth' to the Ra dicals.
[http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/SCT-STIRLINGSHIRE/2008-11/1226450016]
5 - The abortive general rising across the west of Scotland in April 1820 had the air of a movement of desperation rather than one of aspiration. Union Societies of 1819– 20 recruited heavily in the weaving communities of the central belt, Tays ide and Perthshire. In the historiography of the 1820 rising itself, it is those who were "martyred" in the most obvious sense, by giving up their lives, whose names are indelibly associated with events: Andrew Hardie, John Baird and James Wilson . Besides these three, however, nineteen other men were transported for their involvement. They have attracted some attention— notably from the descendants of one of the men (Macfarlane, 1981). It was only in 1993, after a prolonged restoration i n the 1980s, that the names of these transported men were added to the monument that had been raised in 1847 in Sighthill Cemetery in Glasgow (Ellis and Mac a'Ghobhainn, 2001, p. xi). This monument itself, and others, demonstrate that the memory o f 1820 played an important role in political culture and language in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Pentland, 2008). The two men who came back from Botany Bay— Thomas McFarlane and Andrew White— offer useful case studies of how their ow n exile and returns contributed to the continuing "usability" of 1820 in radical politics.
The role of McFarlane was particularly prominent. In contradisctinction to his peers, he was not a young man even in 1820. Born in Glasgow in 1775 or 1776 he had played an active role in the radical movement of the 1790s and was residing in Condor rat at the time of the abortive general rising (Macfarlane, 1981, p. 38). He had been one of the men who had gone with Baird and Hardie to Bonnymuir and had faced and engaged the troops. He also had the dubious distinction of being one of the me n seriously injured in the affray, having sustained a sabre cut across his face. He was transported to Botany Bay for his offences and, after the King granted an Absolute Pardon in 1836, he returned to Scotland in 1839 (Caledonian Mercury, 2 Dec . 1839).
What is interesting is how he was treated when he returned. On 15 January 1840 he was fêted by the Working Man's Association of Airdrie, a Chartist Society, which held its second annual soirée in his honour. The members marched out of Airdrie wit h a band and banners to meet McFarlane in Glenmavis. There were a number of speeches, which were reported in the press, and the public address from the Association amply demonstrated the purpose of the event. Political movements, of course, alway s appeal to the past as well as to the future. Parading veterans is one powerful way of achieving this appeal. The Association reminded McFarlane of his involvement in reform since the 1790s, when he had apparently swallowed a compromising piece o f paper on which was written an illegal oath. Speakers dwelt, however, on his involvement at Bonnymuir, pointing out that he still bore the scar "a convincing proof of the merciful disposition of a Tory government" (Scottish Patriot, 25 Jan. 1840) . Interestingly, all newspaper reports in which McFarlane featured mentioned his scar— both his physical presence and his damaged body served to dramatize the conflict on which radical rhetoric focused. Entertainment at the soirée was provided b y the singing of "Dark Bonnymuir", a composition by one of McFarlane's fellow transportees, Allan Barbour Murchie, which had been published in 1820. The audience was also treated to a performance by the talented Misses Fraser, the daughters of ano ther man who had been "out" in 1820, John Fraser the editor of the True Scotsman (Fraser, 1879, pp. 20– 9). All told, McFarlane's reception was a consummately "1820" event and demonstrates how the memory of the rising was being used within radica l political culture.
This was not the end of McFarlane's involvement in radical politics. 1841 saw an enormous gathering of Chartists in Glasgow to meet Fergus O'Connor, who was visiting the city. "Macfarlane of Condorrat, the aged Bonnymuir martyr" was given pride o f place at the table in the evening sitting alongside O'Connor and was presented with "a handsome ebony staff, silver-mounted, and a sovereign to pay his travel expenses" (Northern Star, 16 Oct. 1841). McFarlane's presence helped to emphasize a ce ntral theme of the rest of O'Connor's visit, during which opportunities were taken not only to mention and draw comparisons with the 1820 rising but physically to escort O'Connor to the sites and relics associated with it. In Stirling, he was take n to the Castle and shown where Baird and Hardie had been executed; he was taken to the dungeon where the prisoners had been held; and he was shown the pikes used by the Radicals, which were held in the armoury (Northern Star, 6 Nov. 1841).
In this way, the return of McFarlane allowed Chartists both to confirm the "Radical War" as a foundational moment and to draw parallels with their own conflict with the state. In newspaper reports McFarlane and earlier radicals were co-opted as th e "pre-cursors of Chartism" or even more simply as "Chartists". McFarlane contributed to the continuing memory of the events of 1820, which would see the monument raised in Sighthill in 1847. Indeed, "the venerable Macfarlane" with his "sabre woun d" was a prominent guest at the dinner commemorating the anniversary of the executions and celebrating the recent erection of the monument (Glasgow Saturday Post, 11 Sept. 1847).
The memory of the events of 1819– 20 could be used in different ways: to support physical force and insurrectionary violence or to justify resistance or as a warning against the dangers of physical force (Pentland, 2008, pp. 153– 7). For it to b e usable at all, however, required a stock of memories, images and relics on which to hang these various interpretations. A returned radical provided the perfect foil. McFarlane clearly was not much of a speaker— there are only a couple of mumble d lines of thanks recorded at dinners in his honour. He was not, however, there to speak. He was far more important as a mute physical relic of the rising, his scar and venerability making him an object to be displayed, a peg on which various inte rpretations could be hanged.
[http://etudesecossaises.revues.org/222]
6 - A group of about 25 men from Glasgow led by Andrew Hardie marched towards Condorrat to meet up with John Baird, with a design to gather a force to march on the Carron Iron Works near Falkirk, and capture the munitions there. Meanwhile Lt Elli s Hodgson of the 11th Hussars, quartered in Perth, set off for Kilsyth via Stirling in order to protect Carron where an attack was expected on the 5th April. The government spies and informers had provided good information, and by 6 o'clock on th e morning of Wednesday 5th April, Baird, Hardie and their followers had reached Castlecary Inn where they stopped briefly for for breakfast before heading on. Troops in Kilsyth got wind of their movements. Lt Hodgson left Kilsyth with 16 Hussar s and 16 Yeomanry troopers. At Bonnybridge they left the main road and made for Bonnymuir to intercept the rebels..
When the two forces met, the radicals started firing. After a few more volleys on both sides, the cavalry flanked the rebels, and the end was swift. Nineteen of them were taken prisoner and confined to Stirling Castle.. . . Lt Hodgson and a serge ant of the 10th Hussars were both wounded, the sergeant quite severely hurt, and four of the radicals were also wounded. Seven firearms and eighteen pikes were captured. Thus ended the battle of Bonnymuir.
[http://www.paperclip.org.uk/kilsythweb/history/1820_Rising/1820_rising1.htm ]
7 - THOMAS McFARLANE
The fact that no trace of Thomas McFarlane has been found in records between the census of 1828 and the time when he received his pardon document in 1839 suggests that he was a quiet, unobtrusive old man, waiting hopefully and patiently for te da ys when the efforts of those in Scotland, who he knew were actively campaigning for a pardon the banished radicals of 1820, were crowned with success.
Being a man of forty five years when transported he was the eldest of the group by five years and his height of five feet four and three quarter inches was just below the average. Although in 1839, when his pardon document was ready fr co llection, he would have attained the considerable age of sixty four, circumstantial evidence suggests that he was then alive in the Colony for on the butt of his Certificate of Freedom, dated 18 December 1827 is the annotation: 'Torn up on his r ecieving a Royal Pardon dated 21st July 1835.'
Thomas McFarlane was born in Glasgow and followed the weaving trade, but apparently he moved to Condorrat for he was residing there with his family in 1820, when he was sentenced to transportation for life because of his involvement in the uris ing. He had a sallow complexion, brown to grey hair and grey eyes.
McFarlane was one of three men too seriously wounded to be moved immediately with the other prisoners from Stirling Castle to Edinburgh Castle. He was not transferred until 28 April so it could well be that it was during the intervening three weks , whilst he was so ill, that his wife took meals to him at the Castle, and even again on his return there, which incident was told by his great grand daughter to her relatives.
In two accounts of events at Bonnymuir Andrew Hardie referred to an old man. As Hardie himself was only twenty six years of age at the time Thomas McFarlane at forty five years might have appeared to him as an old man. This supposition woud b e consistent with Hardie's declaration of 11 April that news of the Cantelon party's decision not to rise was brought by an old man, and he added 'that he does not know the name of this old man, but he afterwards saw him in Stirling Castle wounded . ' As the three men detained at Stirling Castle because of their serious wounds were McFarlane (forty use years), Hart (twenty six years) and Clarkson (twenty one years) it is very likely that the 'old man' was McFarlane.
Hardie's second reference to an old man is in his letter, previously mentioned. When describing the casualties he said, 'Another old man with a frightful-looking wound in his face, so much so that his jaw-bone was seen perfectly distinct'.'s h e had made no mention of an old man earlier in this letter his reference to 'Another old man' must have meant 'another man who was old'; and this man probably was McFarlane.
McFarlane has been traced with three employers between his arrival in the Colony and when the census was taken in 1828.
According to Thomas McCulloch in October 1821 'Thomas McFar lane and Thomas Pink are with the Barrack Master'. This gentleman was Mr. Charles McIntosh, an Ensign in the 73rd Regiment. Less than a year later, in August 1822, McFarlane was asgne d to Mr. Simeon Lord and he was still working for him in 1825, when a muster was taken which shows him as being free by servitude with a sentence of only seven years. This information is incorrect but he is positively identified by the other deta ils given.
When the census was taken in November 1828 McFarlane was employed as a labourer by Thomas Barker, miller of Sussex Street, Sydney. Mr. Barker was also prominent in civic and church affairs. Although no first name is given for McFarlane in te c ensus and his age does not tally with that in his Certificate of Freedom, details of the ship and year of arrival are correctly shown as Speke (2) 1821, and, as there was no other McFarlane in the ship, the information supplied is sufficient to i dentify the individual as Thomas McFarlane, the Scottish Radical.
There is no evidence that McFarlane's family joined him in New South Wales and descendants believe that he returned to Scotland. One grandson, William Macfarlane, who died in Ayrshire on 1 January 1912, claimed that he was taken by his fathr t o meet his grandfather, Thomas McFarlane, at the Port of Leith on his return from Australia. William MacFarlane's obituary mentions that 'Both Mr. Macfarlane's father and grandfather were hand-loom weavers of the old school, his grandfather, Thom as Mcfarlane, undergoing a period of banishment for his political opinions."
In the 1841 census of Scotland a Thomas McFarlane, a hand loom weaver, aged seventy is recorded in the household of a William McFarlane at Condorrat, Dunbartonshire. Following a very exhaust ive search of records based on this informatione autho rs have established beyond doubt that Thomas McFarlane returned to Condorrat between February 1839 when he collected his pardon document and 7 June 1841 when the census was taken, at which time he was living with his son William and family . His death may have ocurred before 1851 for his name does not appear in the census of that year. It seems highly improbable that his date of death will ever be established as unfortunately the burial records of the graveyard at Cumbern auld Church, where he would have been buried, were destroyed in a fire towards the end of the nineteenth century.
Thomas McFarlane and his wife Elizabeth Baird are known to have had at least seven children. The first three were born at Kilsyth in the County of Stirling; their next three children, all sons, were born at Glasgow. Subsequently the famiy mov ed to Condorrat where another son was born in 1809 and they were still there at the time of the uprising in 1820.
His wife Elizabeth apparently died before he returned from Australia, for her name was not in the first census taken in June 1841.
Thus Thomas McFarlane could well have been one of the r adicals of whom Peter Mackenzie wrote, 'Some of the victims joyously returned some to this their dear native land, free-pardoned men'.
Of Thomas McFarlane's descendants many are in Scotland and England, some in New Zealand and South Africa, but in Australia the authors know of no others besides members of their own family. Alastair Macfarlan, gr eat-great-grandson of Thomas the radical, was born in Inverness, Scotland. Ile had no thought of even visiting Australia until in 1936 he met his Australian wife, Margaret, in Penang where he was accountant of a merchant fir m and she was teaching at the Anglo Chinese Girls' School. He decided to settle in Sydney and some time afterwards, by a strange coincidence, he joined an organization founded by Harold Hastings Deering in 1926. I t was not until several years later after Mr. Deering's death in 1965 that he discovered that he too was descended from a Scottish radical of 1820, namely Thomas McCulloch. The authors have two sons, one daughter and s ix grandchildren.
(Alastair Macfarlane in Australia, the author of the book about the 1820 rebellion)
8 - Condorrat Tenants and Residents Association saw several years of community fundraising bear fruit when a special memorial wall was unveiled to mark the memories of its working class heroes. Divided into three sections, this lovingly crafted pi ece of stonework honours a trio of men whose sacrifices will always be remembered in this former mining village.
They are the Radical Weavers, the early trade unionists whose leader JOHN BAIRD was born in Condorrat and whose house lies a short distance away from this memorial wall. Executed in Stirling on 8th. September 1820 for his role in the uprising, h e is commemorated alongside his comrades JOHN BARR, THOMAS MACFARLANE, WILLIAM SMITH and JOHN ALLAN. The wall also honours local members of the armed forces who gave their lives for their country in conflicts throughout the world; and six Condorra t miners who perished in the Auchengeich Disaster 18th September 1959.
The unveiling of the memorial wall was carried out by PROVOST TOM CURLEY and following this, the memorial dedication was given by a local minister and blessed by a local priest then a minutes silence and the piper's lament. Flowers and wreaths wer e laid firstly by CTRA for all three sections, 1820 Society wreath laid by MARION MCMILLAN, Croy Historical Society and JAMIE HEPBURN MSP laid the Scottish National Party wreath followed by two matching bouquets of red and white roses laid by LIL Y LOVE and ANN BAIN on behalf of the 1820 Society. Also simultaneously, many others including relatives of the miners and war dead laid their own personal floral tributes. The Army Cadets and Royal British Legion Scotland also placed their tribute s. 1820 stalwart, CATHIE BROWN from Paisley laid the 1820 Society posy on the saltire draped over the newly erected 'WEAVERS REST' bench positioned immediately opposite the memorial wall and offering a fine view of the memorial to all who care t o sit awhile with their own thoughts. Speeches from PROVOST CURLEY and JOHN BURKE of CTRA prior to and after the unveiling, alongside a presentation to the Provost and also to the stonemasons, brought the ceremony's formal proceedings to a close . Many photographs were taken and a video recording too, highlighting the importance and significance of three different aspects of working life and their place in our history. A buffet and refreshments was enjoyed afterwards in the nearby CONDORR AT ARMS with many still lingering taking in the scene some hours later. An emotional day for many.
(Report by Marion McMillian)
[More photos at http://cranntara.scot/condorrat_2011.html ]
8 - most of the 19 'transportees' remained settled in Australia where, as literate men - unlike the average group of convicts, many of them made significant contributions to the development of the then British colony of New South Wales. Their indi vidual stories are told in a little book by MARGARET and ALASTAIR MACFARLANE, entitled THE SCOTTISH RADICALS - Tried and Transported for Treason in 1820, first published in Australia in 1975 and re-issued in the U.K. (by SPA Books Ltd) in 1981.
Its co-author, ALASTAIR MACFARLANE, was himself a descendant of one of the transported Radicals, namely THOMAS McFARLANE, a Glaswegian by birth - who in 1839, already an old man in his late sixties, returned home to Condorrat in Dunbartonshire. Ac cording to a report in The Stirling Observer on 30 January 1840 McFarlane was subsequently feted by the Airdie Working Men's Association on account not simply of his involvement in the 1820 affair but because of his long association with Radical p olitics which he could trace back to the days of 'MUIR, PALMER and GERALD' of the Friends of the People and the United Scotsmen in the 1790s.
The new plaque in their honour on the Sighthill Monument was the brain-child of ALASTAIR MACFARLANE, the Radical descendant arid coauthor of the only published account of their lives. A native of Inverness, Alastair had himself settled in New Sout h Wales after his marriage in the 1930s, and in his later years following the UK. publication of THE SCOTTISH RADICALS had campaigned by correspondence from his home there for the erection of the new Sighthill plaque. He died, aged 89, in April 19 93, unfortunately without learning that his efforts had finally been successful. In a sense the new plaque is his memorial too.
[https://www.electricscotland.com/history/1820/appendix8.htm ]
9 - Only one returned to Scotland - the weaver Thomas McFarlane (1775-1851) who had been wounded at Bonnymuir and given a life sentence. In 1839, he returned to Scotland staying again in Condorrat, and was buried in Cumbernauld Parish churchyar d in 1851.
[https://hotelsandshore.com/n75ns/paisley-in-a-sentence]
|
1770 - Bef 1851 (< 80 years)
[1, 2, 5]