The History of the Highland Clearances

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In the nineteenth century many of the inhabitants of the Highland glens were cleared out, often by forcible eviction, to make way for a more profitable tenant - the Great Cheviot sheep. Families had to leave the homes where they had lived for generations. Thousands emigrated over the ocean in the hope of a better life. The tragedy of the Clearances, brought about by cynical, often absentee landowners, is a black page in Scotland's history. The effects of it are still being felt in Scotland--and in the countries where the unwilling migrants settled. Written while the effects it describes were still unfolding, Mackenzie's impassioned History brings the distress of the age unforgettably before the reader.