Highland and Island Emigration Society

The Highland and Island Emigration Society was a charitable society formed to promote and assist emigration as a solution to the Highland Potato Famine.

Between 1852 and 1857, it assisted the passage of around 5,000 emigrants from Scotland to Australia. The Society's work was both praised for providing a solution to the famine in Scotland, and criticised for providing landlords with an easy mechanism for the Highland Clearances.

In 1846, the Highland Potato Famine caused a crisis in the Highlands and the islands of Western Scotland, an area already struggling with overpopulation and the upheavals of the Highland Clearances. The deaths from starvation were so high that, in 1848–1849, the government delivered shipments of oatmeal to locations along the western coast to give to starving families.

Relief measures were supervised by Sir John McNeill, himself a highlander. In 1846, in his role as chairman of the Board of Supervision for the New Poor Law of Scotland, he toured 27 of the most distressed parishes. As the famine continued, many, like McNeill, began to doubt that relief was a sustainable solution to the problem. His view was shared by others. For example, in Skye, one of the hardest hit areas, the local clan chief, Norman McLeod, bankrupted himself between 1846 and 1849 providing relief to his people. In 1849, he was obliged to leave Skye and move to London, working as a clerk earning three pounds a week. He became convinced that emigration was the only solution and eventually joined the London Committee of the Highland and Island Emigration Society. Similarly, Thomas Fraser, Sheriff Substitute of Skye, who had worked there since 1846 organizing relief, came to believe that emigration was the only hope.

In 1851, McNeill published a report to the Board of Supervision summarizing his views and proposing the "large-scale emigration of the 'surplus' population as the only way forward". This view was strongly shared by Sir Charles Trevelyan, Assistant Secretary to Her Majesty's Treasury in London. He saw emergency food supplies as a "useless palliative" and thought that emigration to Australia would provide the relief needed.

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