Sunday, September 22, 1901

         I finally have the answers I need.  I wrote to my cousin Heather to see if Mary and I can come and visit her over the Hogmany festival at the end of this year.   She is delighted, she says, and says I will be in time to help them celebrate the first birthday of their little Jimmy, although Mary and I will have to sleep in the kitchen box bed.  I am used to that, sure enough!

          I still have the precious money Mr. Markam used to slip me from time to time, as well as the five pound note Angus gave me when last we were together – “Just in case you need it for an emergency,” he told me, almost as if he knew I would need to be taking care of myself. 

         To make things even better Madam told me today she would be visiting her brother in Australia and leaving directly after Harvest Thanksgiving, an extended trip that will take her at least six months.  She expects me to look after the house and garden while she is away.  Well, I will, at least until my ship to Canada sails in the spring, whether she is home or not. 

         I am hoping, hoping that Heather will give my Mary a home until I can send for her, for the only alternative is my own mother, and I do not have the courage to face my parents and risk being turned away as a fallen women.  They would never believe or understand my highland marriage to a dead soldier.

Sunday, August 25, 1901

         On Friday I was able to finally able to get the news I needed to get away.  Madam wanted me to post a special delivery parcel to her brother in Australia, and sent me across town to the Post Office.  It is right next door to the steamship agent’s office.  It was a long walk, but with Mary in her pram it went smoothly enough. 

         I found they are looking for domestic servants just like me to serve in the colonies.  The poster I saw advertised “high wages, good homes, and healthy climate.”  The agent I spoke with told me the high wages would come along after I had worked off my passage and period of indentureship, which would last three years.  After that I would be on my own and free to offer my services at the going market rates.  He suggested Canada as the most likely colony.  Servants are much in demand there, and pay good wages for domestic help.  He gave me the forms I would need to fill out, and told me I would be wise to wait until spring, when the weather warmed, for the Canadian climate is much colder than ours.  

         Then he spied the baby carriage waiting outside the office, and told me the bad news.  I would not be allowed to take any dependents to Canada.  I would have to make arrangements to have someone care for Mary until my indentured period is over, and then send for her. 

         So there you have it –good news on one hand, terrible news on the other.  How can I part with my baby for three years?  Who will take care of her for me?

Sunday, July 23, 1901

         Sometimes I am very grateful for the really nice people there are in this world.  Yesterday when I was in the market Mr. Cameron the greengrocer took me aside and showed me the little pram he had tucked away behind his stall.  In it were some baby things and blankets, things Mrs. Cameron kept in the attic from her children. 

         Mrs. Adams makes me keep the pram in the little shed behind her house, but that’s all right.  It means when I go out to do my errands I can easily take the baby with me and still have room in the pram for our supplies. 

         I have been thinking of a plan.  As soon as my year is up I will apply to go to Canada as an indentured servant.  The one steamship agent has an office at the other end of the village, so I will have to be very clever.  I’ll wait for Madam to send me on an errand near there, pop in and find out what I have to do to get away from this place where everyone looks down on me as an unmarried mother.  Well, not everyone – Mr. and Mrs. Cameron were kind to me.  They have made my life easier!

Sunday, July 7, 1901

         It is harder than it was before – a half-day a month away from my duties, although there is nowhere for me to go with my wee Mary, except to walk to the nearby park and feed the pigeons.  She is getting heavier and heavier, and a load to carry, let me tell you! 

         We spend most of my free time together in our little room.  I tell her stories and sing to her, and she smiles and laughs at me.  Her little stock of nightshirts and nappies are easily washed and dried in this warm weather, but I shudder to think what I will do to keep her warm in winter.  I have no material to sew for her, nor any blankets other than the things we brought with us when we left the sisters.  I must continue to nurse her as long as I can, at least until I can feed her some of the oatmeal porridge I prepare every day. 

         When I am sent to the market in the morning for the daily provisions I carry Mary in a sort of sling, so as to free my hands for carrying the food.  Several of the merchants, especially the greengrocer, have grown fond of her, and always treat us kindly.  The baker told me yesterday I would not be able to carry her much longer.  “I have something you can use at the house,” he told me,“ Our children are grown.  I’ll see if it’s still in the attic tonight.”  

         It warmed my heart that some people are kind to us.  Most of Mrs.Adam’s friends act as if I don’t even exist, or if they do, talk about me as if I was deaf, just as Mrs. Markam did.  I will not be a skivvy again if I can help it, and my daughter never will be.

Sunday, May 12, 1901

Sunday, May 12, 1901

         It has been almost a full year since I last had my hands on my beloved diary.  I will try to keep it up from now on.  First I will try to tell the story of the last year. 

         Father Campbell was right – the nuns were very strict, but kind at the same time.  They kept us in two dormitories, all thirty of us, fifteen to a room.  I was too miserable at first to mix with the other girls.  Nobody talked much, we were all in our own sad states.  It seemed everyone was in a different stage – some girls seemed ready to give birth, the rest of us some ways off.  The nuns gave us all the material we needed to sew clothes, nappies and blankets, whether we intended to keep our babies or not.  When those were finished we were put to work sewing clothes for the children in the orphanage.

          I told the receiving sister I was engaged to my soldier, and we would marry as soon as he returned.  Most of the girls planned to give up their babies to be adopted or raised in the orphanage attached to the home.  I would never do that, even if Angus never returned. 

The sewing kept us very busy, from morning to night, except for the hour we were required to go out and walk around the grounds.

We also had to say our rosaries three times a day and go to Mass every morning.  We got very tired of hearing the priest go on about how we had sinned and had to pay, pay, pay.  If that wasn’t enough we had to listen to the screams of the girls in the infirmary who were giving birth. 

         The nuns also sent us out into service to households willing to take fallen women, who would work for room and board only.  At the end of the year we would be out on our own.  The nuns warned the few of us who were keeping our babies we would be hard to place, but there were some charitable souls who might take us.

         There was one girl, Annie, who I made friends with.  She planned to give her baby up and go to Australia as an indentured servant where no one would know about her past.   Shortly before mine was to be born the sister in charge of placement let me know a place was waiting for me right in Motherwell, a Catholic widow who needed a housekeeper/cook.  She would allow me to bring my baby with me, and we could live at her home.  She gave me a card with the name and address on it, to go to as soon as I recovered from giving birth.  That was when I had an idea.  I knew where my cousin Heather’s intended lived in Thurso, and so I wrote a letter to Heather.  I told her where I would be working, and pleaded with her to send my diary to my employer’s address.  I had no fear my new mistress would get her hands on it, for I would be answering the door.  Annie agreed to mail the letter to Heather. 

         One of my duties was to clean the office of the sister in charge of the infirmary, so I had no trouble finding paper, envelope and stamp in her desk.  As soon as the letter was written and sealed my labour pains started.  I only had time to slip it to Annie before going into deliver my baby.

         The birth was surprisingly quick, maybe because I’ve worked so hard all my life.  I named my daughter Mary, and was praised by the sisters for naming her after the Queen of Heaven.  To tell you the truth I am so tired of their pious claptrap I am ready to renounce any loyalty to the Church.  I will never be a good Catholic again.  To tell you the truth I named my daughter Mary after my mother, who will never see her grandchild, in all probability.

         Now I am settled in at Mrs. Adams, who is kind enough to me, allowing me to use her second-hand tea leaves to make my tea with, but makes no allowances for my baby.  She hates the smell of wet laundry, and so I have to dry Mary’s wet nappies on a rung in the little room we share in the attic.  Sometimes I must drape them on my back to dry them.  She is a good wee thing, seldom cries, and is easily comforted to go to sleep after feeding.

         I was so happy to get a letter from Heather, along with the diary delivered to me soon after we arrived at Mrs. Adams.  She is now married to her lad and living happily in Thurso.  She told me she would always help me whenever I had need.  With her letter Heather told me the sad news that Angus was confirmed dead in battle, shortly after I left Abbott House.  Now I am a widow, at least in the eyes of God.  My daughter will never know her father.  Will my sad state ever end?