St. Margarets Pioneer Cemetery Restoration

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John McIntosh Memorial

Naufrage 2006

John McIntosh's great-great grandson Ronald McIntosh, delivered this address at the unveiling of the memorial to John McIntosh, M.P., in August 2006.

"Good Afternoon Everyone. It is quite an honour for me to be here this afternoon and to be able to share with you some of the qualities and experiences of my great-great-grandfather. Let me begin by letting you know who I am. My name is Ronald C McIntosh. I am the son of the late, John McIntosh and Joan Lutz. My dad was the son of Michael Francis McIntosh. He was called Frank by his friends (and they were many) and he was called Papa by his grandchildren. He was married to Christina Whitty and they had nine children. Christina had four children (Michael, Charlotte, Catherine, Mary Jane) from her first marriage to Modeste Cheverie.

John McIntosh Memorial The McIntosh children were Andrew who married Cecelia Cahill and they had nine children;

Neil who married Mattie Jennings and they had four children;
Bridgette married Bert Mullally and they had one child;
John, my father, who as I said earlier was married to Joan Lutz and they had 14 children;
Margaret Mary who was married to Douglas MacKenzie and did not have any children;
Ronald (Rudy) who married Gracie Gallant and had five children;
Theresa who married Alonzo Babineau and had four children;
Mary Ellen who married Gerry Pardis and they had four children;
Frank and Christina had another son Donald who died at the age of sixteen.

So that tells who I am and how our family has spread out.

Frank McIntosh's father was named Andrew McIntosh. Andrew married one of four Hacket sisters from Tignish. Andrew was the son of the man that we are recognizing today, John McIntosh. John was born to Roderick McIntosh and Mary McIntyre. Roderick came over from Scotland in 1772 with his father Donald McIntosh. They were among a group of Scots brought to Prince Edward Island by Capt. John MacDonald. They came from South Uist an Island in the Hebredies of Scotland aboard the ship Alexander.

Macdonald Tobacco Company

The Macdonald Tobacco Company was founded in 1858 by William Christopher Macdonald and his brother Augustine. Initially called McDonald Brothers and Co., the company procured tobacco leaf from suppliers in the southern United States that was converted to pipe and chewing tobacco at their small Montreal facility. While the use of tobacco products was growing in popularity, the American Civil War afforded the fledgling company an opportunity that brought enormous financial success leading to Macdonald Brothers becoming the preeminent company in the field in Canada. Virtually all of the tobacco growers were located in U.S. states that were part of the Confederacy and with the onset of the war, the northern states faced a huge shortage of tobacco leaf. Because Macdonald Tobacco was a Canadian company, they were able to buy the tobacco leaf from the Southern United States and have it brought by ocean cargo vessels to Montreal. There, it was processed then the finished product was shipped to the tobacco-starved market in the northern United States.

At the end of the Civil War, the company continued to prosper and by the early 1870s had more than five hundred employees. During this period, William Macdonald bought out his brother's stock position.

Deeply proud of his Scottish heritage, William C. Macdonald used the image of a Scottish Lass on the packaging of Macdonald tobacco products for nearly a century.

A lifelong bachelor who actually disliked tobacco, on his death in 1917 Macdonald bequeathed his company to Walter and Howard Stewart, the two sons of company manager David Stewart. Walter Stewart became president and under his guidance the company extended production to cut pipe tobacco and tobacco for "roll your own" cigarettes. In 1922, packaged cigarette production was added which quickly became the mainstay of the business. During the 1960s, David M. Stewart (1920-1984), expanded the business into the manufacturing of cigars.

The Macdonald Tobacco company remained in the Stewart family until 1974 when David M. Stewart sold it to the American tobacco giant R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company who, in light of the uncertainty created by the Quebec separatist movement, relocated the head office to Toronto, Ontario.

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Sir William Macdonald

Sir William Macdonald is one of the more famous descendants of ancestors located in the pioneer cemetery. His ancestors were among the Glenalandale settlers who arrived in PEI in the late 1700's. Among the best documented records of those in his family is that of Alexander and Marshally McDonald.

In 1772, with the support and leadership of Captain John MacDonald (1743-1811), and also an ancestor of Sir William (paternal grandfather), they sailed from South Uist, Scotland, on a ship called "The Alexander". This first expedition formed a settlement in what is now Tracadie, Prince Edward Island. Soon after their arrival the settler began to spread across the north east part of the island and in so doing, St. Margaret of Scotland Cemetery was established and became the consecrated burial site for those living in this area. St. Maragaret's was in use until the late 1880's when, like so many of the early cemeteries, St. Margaret's became inactive as its population center shifted. A new cemetery was established closer to the main road (in the area) and over the years that followed, the original pioneer cemetery became neglected and overgrown.

In the last few years, a group was formed to restore the cemetery, and to preserve the memory of those buried in the cemetery.