The Highland Clearances (Scottish Gaelic: Fuadach nan Gàidheal, the "expulsion of the Gael") was the forced displacement of a significant number of people in the Scottish Highlands during the 18th and 19th century, as a result of an agricultural revolution (also known as enclosure) carried out by hereditary aristocratic landowners, such as the Duke of Sutherland. The changes were seen to be supported by the government, who gave financial aid for roads and bridges to assist the new sheep-based agriculture and trade.
There was mass forced emigration to the sea coast, the Scottish Lowlands and the North American colonies. The clearances were particularly notorious as a result of the late timing, the lack of legal protection for year-by-year tenants under Scots law, the abruptness of the change from the traditional clan system, and the brutality of many evictions.
Read more about Highland Clearances: Background, "Improvements", Year of The Sheep, Landlords' Behaviour, Potato Famine, Account By Donald McLeod, Second Phase of The Clearances, Memorials To The Clearances
Other articles related to "highland clearances, clearances, clearance":
... During the Highland Clearances many Matheson families suffered great hardship in the Kildonan clearances ...
... The first clearance took place in 1801 at Clunes ... The clearances continued under the name of Donald Cameron, chief of the clan, when he took over from the Trust in 1819 ... a fair, balanced account of the Cameron clearances ...
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“If you would feel the full force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount Washington, or at the Highland Light, in Truro.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)