GEORGE AND DOLINA MACKAY

This family story starts with Annie Mackay (nee Sutherland) born 1838. She and her husband were cleared from Totaig, a settlement on the west side of the Kyle of Tongue, to Achnahuaigh along the coast of Melness. Anne and her husband Alexander Mackay had a daughter Dolina who married a local man George Mackay in 1887.George, a cabinet maker to trade, had made plans to emigrate to Canada to pursue a better way of life for his family but, on being asked by the then Duke of Sutherland to work as a boatbuilder, he agreed and moved to Heilam Ferry House by Loch Erribol to take up his new position.