1 Angus McGowan Belfast 's foremost local historian actually lives about 12 miles from the district, in Kilmuir , a crossroads on the way to Montague. The son of Jessie Murchison of Point Prim and Malcolm Campbell McGowan of Kilmuir , Angus is as true and ardent a Scot as can be found. Since his pilgrimage with his wife Mary Nicholson to Scotland a few years ago, he has spent much of his time researching and talking about Selkirk settlers and his own heritage. For this man, Belfast and Kilmuir on Prince Edward Island and Uigg and Kilmuir on the Isle of Skye, are treasured spots: they are the places of his ancestors. When I went back to Skye seven years ago [1978], all I knew [was] that the McGowans came from Kilmuir , Skye, and the Campbells came from Uigg , Skye ... - I'm a descendant of them - and they settled up herein the 1850s... . That's all I knew. So I went to Uigg and started inquiring, found the Campbells, and then the Campbells told me about the McGowans. They pronounce it Ma-Goo-an. And there was no McGowans left.... Then I heard a story that was told to me by two different people. There was a McGowan family -1 didn't get the date but it was from the [time of the] Highland Clearance, when the landlords was putting them off [the land]. And this McGowan man - I think his name was John - had a large family, and he had a big lot of land rented from the landlords. He complained to the landlords about not getting justice, so the landlords ordered him off. And then there was a place called Scarrabrick. It was, I think, east of Portree.... The Nicholsons was there, my wife's people, and a whole lot more. The landlord put them off in 1825: put them off, put the sheep there. Angus McGowan 13