Bantjes, Rod, “Document name.html,” in Eigg Mountain Settlement History, last modified, 29 March 2024 http://people.stfx.ca/rbantjes/gis/txt/Introduction.html.
, Archie the Widow (Eigg Mountain Settlement History)
This was an especially large well-defined basement when Lame Angus saw it as a youngster (19 teens/ 20s). The first occupant at this site was the son of Old John MacIsaac, Archie “the Widow.” The house was probably abandoned in the late 1800s.[1] Kenton later indicated that Archie the widow was a first generation settler who left early, perhaps around 1840 to settle in Fairmont.[2] This fits with the state of decay of the foundation and the difficulty in discerning fields from the aerial photographs. The land was originally granted to a Malcolm MacKinnon (from Grants Index, 1953).
We finally found the house site August 9, 2015. It was one of those cases where I walked straight to it. It is very overgrown with almost no rock showing in the cellar walls. It measures 24 X 25 feet and is oriented 41º. The cellar steps appear to be on the south side facing the stream. The extent of Archie’s fields is still unclear.
Figure 1 – Cellar Looking North. It is difficult to get the camera to show what the eyes can see when a cellar is overgrown like this. The depression becomes just a jumble of logs and foliage. So I have resorted to using stereo pairs, which if you can freeview, heighten the 3-D effect. This pair is designed for cross-viewing – that is the image for the left eye is on the right and vice versa.
[1] Kenton Teasdale, Eigg Mountain, November 4, 2005.
[2] Kenton Teasdale, 12 August 2015.