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Commemorative
Biographical Record of the County of Kent, Ontario
Dunlop, James
McDonald |
JAMES McDONALD
DUNLOP, a retired farmer and successful business man of Chatham
township now residing on his pleasant and highly cultivated farm of
100 acres in Lot 22, 6th Concession, was born in the parish of
Draghorn, Ayrshire, Scotland, August 15th, 1820. His parents, Hugh
and Jean (Dickey) Dunlop, of Ayrshire, Scotland, died there the
father in 1855, aged 90 years, and the mother in 1865, aged eighty
years. By occupation the father was a farmer, and both parents were
members of the Presbyterian Church. They had children as follows:
John, deceased of Draghorn, Scotland; Margaret, who married John
Crawford, of Salcut, Scotland; Hugh, of Draghorn, Scotland; Anna,
deceased, who married Daniel Curray, of Salcut, Scotland; Janet, of
Glasgow, Scotland, widow of Hugh Grant James McDonald; David, who
died in Scotland; Jean, who married Bowman Gibson and died in
Scotland; Tahomas, who died in Scotland; and Mary, who married James
McCommet and died in Glasgow, Scotland.
On December 16th,
1841, James M. Dunlop married Jean Brown, and children were born to
them as follows: Jane, born April 27th, 1843, of Chatham township,
was married twice, first to Amos Potroff, by whom she had six
children , and second to James Shaw, to whom she bore three
children. Hugh, born January 12th, 1845, died on the farm adjoining
his father's, December 27th, 1893; he married Elizabeth Brigham, and
had six children. Agnes, born April 4th, 1848, married Albert
Ridley, of Forest, Ontario, a farmer, and they have five children.
David, born February 15th, 1850, is a farmer of Marlette, Michigan,
and is very wealthy; he married Margaret Clarke, by whom he has
twelve children. James, born November 1st, 1852, is a wealthy
wholesale merchant of Hamilton, Ontario; he married Mary Wilson, and
has four children. Mary B., born March 9th, 1855, married David
Fox, a carpenter of Clare, Michigan, and has one son. Dr. John W.,
born April 16th, 1857, a physician of Clare Michigan, married Nettie
Bicknell, and they have four children. Matheison R. born July 1st,
1863, a farmer of Chatham township, married Louisa Turnbel, and has
two children, Jean D. and James D. Mrs. Dunlop was born in the
parish of Stuarton, Ayrshire, Scotland, Augusut 15th, 1819, and died
August 26th, 1898; she was buried in the Camden cemetery. She was a
daughter of David and Jean (Stinston) Brown, of Ayrshire, Scotland,
farming people of that locality who there lived and died.
James M. Dunlop
remained with his parents until his marriage, when he began farming
on his own account in Scotland. In 1854 he emigrated to Canada,
locating in Hamilton, and worked for the farmers for a few weeks,
and thenin the vicinity for 18 months, after which he went to
Binbrook, County of Wentworth, South. After a year he purchased a
small farm at Binbrook, and remained upon it two years, employing
his spare time working for Paul & Blaine, in the lumber regions. At
the expiration of the two years he settled in Chatham township,
County of Kent, and in 1870 bought his present farm, which was then
all a wilderness. He was obliged to make a leaning in the woods for
his little home, and out of the forest he hewed his way to a
comfortable fortune, and after an active and useful life is now
enjoying he fruits of his labours. When he landed in the Dominion
with a wife and five children, three sons and two daughters, he was
without funds, but he never lost heart or faltered in his
determination to succeed. In religious matters he is a member of
the Presbyterian Church, to which he gives liberally.
His political
sentiment makes him a Grit. In his young manhood he served as a
soldier in the British army, and as such was at the coronation of
Queen Victoria, in 1837. Mr. Dunlop enjoys in the fullest degree
the confidence and esteem of his neighbours, and is recognized as an
excellent example of the sturdy, thrifty pioneers who have developed
the County of Kent and made its present prosperity possible.
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