SCOTS Heritage
Magazine
Official magazine of the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs
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Welcome
Ceud mìle fàilte G
randfather Mountain Highland Games in North Carolina is a remarkable event. It’s a stunning annual jamboree of enthusiastic Scottishness that reminds me why our heritage is such a valuable thing. While there in July along with former First Minister Henry McLeish I attended a caucus run by the US-based Council of Scottish Clans & Associations, which gave me an invaluable insight into the American-Scots. How reassuring to see how these wonderful games have actually grown in size and reputation since I was there in 1977, to the magnificent spectacle they are today. There were over 100 clan tents at Grandfather Mountain, which is one of the largest and most colourful of the 350 or so Highland Games that take place in the US each year. The three-daylong event at MacRae Meadows has grown steadily over almost sixty years since it was started up and, although modelled on the Braemar Gathering, it now dwarfs its distant Deeside forebear. What a buzz to be amongst people for whom Scotland means so much, and how reassuring to know that all over the world there are people whorevel in their links to the old country.
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The three-day gathering at Grandfather Mountain was modelled on the Braemar Games
e Yours ay
Contributors ALLAN MASSIE Our columnist examines the mysterious case of James III’s murder, which remains Scottish history’s most puzzling whodunnit.
JIM ANDERSON When an American couple bought a rundown hotel on the Black Isle, the first thing on their mind was getting their hands on whisky – and lots of it...
SUSAN McINTOSH The Council of Scottish Clans & Associations high heidyin asks what it means to be a Scot and comes up with a surprising answer.
Sir Malcolm MacGregor of MacGregor, Contributing Editor
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Culture
10 PICTURE PERFECT Images from the Scottish Traditional Boat Festival at Portsoy 56 TEN OF THE BEST Great Scottish women 76 WIZARD OF OZ How John McDouall Stuart opened up the Australian interior 88 KISS THE SKYE Scenery, history and culture combine on this truly special island
96 ARTIFACTS Mons Meg was Edinburgh Castle’s weapon of mass destruction
Clans
40 CLAN MACNAB Jamie Macnab of Macnab on bringing the Perthshire clan together
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COVER Our cover is Jamie Macnab of Macnab, the 24th Chief of Clan Macnab, taken by Angus Blackburn.
98 SPOILS OF WAR Where should the weapons and ring of James IV reside after Flodden?
48 BLUFFER’S GUIDE Ten fascinating Clan Macnab facts
100 WHISKY The tale of an American hotelier who immersed himself in the water of life
50 HEARTLANDS Ten essential Clan Macnab landmarks
114 MCLETTER FROM AMERICA Being a Scot means far more than just living in Scotland
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Contents
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Regulars 06 NEWS from Scotland and the Scots 17 LETTERS Your letters to the Editor
SUBSCRIBE To subscribe call +44 (0)1631 568000 or go online to www. scotsheritage magazine.com
Bob Dewar
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Heritage
18 THE HISTORY MAN Allan Massie on the mysterious death of James III 26 THE EVENTS THAT SHAPED SCOTLAND How the battle of Flodden led to union with England 32 PHOTO ESSAY The Forth Bridge is one of the world’s most photographed landmarks 52 CREDIT CRUNCH How an eighteenth century banking crisis ruined thousands of Scots
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64 GLAMIS CASTLE The magnificent Angus castle with impressive royal connections
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People
58 SELKIRK GRACE Robert Mailer Anderson reveals the importance of his Selkirk heritage 82 GOING FOR GOLD George Maciver on his passion for gold panning in Scotland 84 WINNING SMILES Samuel Smiles was a renowned intellectual and self-help guru
102 QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS 104 BOOKS Latest literary offerings 107 MUSIC The best in Scottish music 109 PUZZLES Pit your wits against our puzzles 110 SOCIAL SCOTS Who’s been seen out and about
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112 CLANS AND SOCIETIES
Great Scots: The swashbuckling Admiral Cochrane was a legend and a rogue
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News...
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News
The home of literature Abbotsford, the Scottish Borders home of Sir Walter Scott – the world’s first bestselling novelist, who penned works including Waverley, Ivanhoe and Rob Roy – has reopened to the public following a multi-million pound restoration. The opening is the culmination of a five-year campaign to save the historic property following the death of Dame Jean Maxwell Scott, the last of Scott’s descendants to live in the house. The Abbotsford Trust, a charitable trust, was set up in 2007 and has since raised over £12 million to pay for vital restoration and refurbishment work and to transform Abbotsford into a world-class visitor attraction. Scott’s works brought Scotland to the attention of the world for the first time and were translated into over 30 languages and avidly read from Scotland, Italy and Moscow to the American frontier. He is also credited with influencing the work of other great writers including Pushkin, Tolstoy, George Eliot and Charles Dickens. In addition to his literary works, Scott was responsible for the transformation of tartan and kilts into Scotland’s national dress through the visit of King George IV to Edinburgh in 1822 – an event he suggested and stage-managed. For more information, visit www.scottsabbotsford.co.uk
Left: Scott designed Abbotsford, now restored to its remarkable splendour. Above: The man himself.
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Mor for your money An outstandingly beautiful 800-acre island off the north-west coast of Scotland, which is on the market for £2.5m, has attracted interest from around the globe, including India, Australia, New Zealand and the Falkland Islands. Tanera Mòr is the largest and only inhabited island in the Summer Isles archipelago in Wester Ross and is managed and run as a successful tourist enterprise. Tanera Mòr was the location that provided inspiration for Frank Darling Fraser’s book Island Farm. Having gone to live on the island in the late 1930s, Darling studied the habitat of its bird colonies and reclaimed derelict land to agricultural production. His time on the island has left an important legacy through his detailed records along with his influence on the current management of the land and the magnificent Tigh an Quay stone pier, which he and his wife Bobby rebuilt by hand. For more information on the sale visit www. ckdgalbraith.co.uk www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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Left: The 800-acre Hebridean island of Tanera Mòr is for sale. Right: The fountain at Linlithgow Palace.
Right: Blairs Museum Trust
For Queen and country The column from the Linlithgow Palace fountain, dating back to around 1538 and believed to be one of the oldest surviving fountains in the UK, has been cleaned by Historic Scotland and is now installed in the exhibition Mary, Queen of Scots, which runs until 17 November at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh. Never loaned before, the fountain column was originally installed in the courtyard of Linlithgow Palace at the court of Mary’s father, James V. There is a legend that the fountain was made to flow with wine when Bonnie Prince Charlie stayed at the Palace in 1745. As well as the column, the exhibition is devoted to one of the most enigmatic figures in Scottish history and includes rare objects which were intimately connected with Mary Stewart, including jewels, textiles, furniture, documents and portraits. For further information visit www.nms.ac.uk/mary SCOTS heritage autumn 2013
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perfect Picture
the scottish traditional boat festival at portsoy provided a chance for scots heritage’s chief photographer angus blackburn to test his sea legs and take some great shots
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Picture perfect
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Portsoay is a celebration of the rich maritime and cultural heritage of the north-east
Image: David Purvis has built Coracle boats to the world’s oldest design for the past 15 years.
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Exhilarating skiff races on the open seas attract competitors from across Scotland
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Picture perfect
Left: The Moray Gig Bien Trouve. Top: Sailors of all ages enjoy Portsoy. Above: A winning crew before their skiff race.
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Above: Sea Cadets from TS Caledonia, Peterhead. Top right: Time for a shanty. Bottom right: The old Portsoy harbour.
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Sailors of all ages enjoy the beautiful boats, non-stop song and dance, plus the friendly festival atmosphere
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Picture perfect
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Alexis malcolm kilts KILT MAKER TO: U.S Naval Academy U.S Coast Guard U.S Merchant Marine Academy U.S 77th Army Band Pipe Bands from coast to coast and... Celts across the USA, Canada, Australia, new Zealand & yes, we even ship kilts to Scotland!
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www.alexismalcolmkilts.com alexismalcolmkilts@gmail.com U.S: (863) 983-8458
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Letters
Letters
Oops, wrong year.
Congratulations on your partnership with the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs. It promises a wonderfully rich synergy. Alas, though, your first issue with the new improved mission cone l t s a C tained a major oopsie. In the article In the Brodiue f ie Castle. o d about the NY Tartan Day Parade all ro B y t t u ho bo The brethae interesting articleanad met Ninian Brodieuriwng the facts were correct, except for Thanks fo naming the Grand Marshall. Brian Cox the castle as Brodie. I was to d e it d is e v I s e show simply h n d n w mid-1970 a o was our GM in 2012 and magnificent s n k n were garde hief was h private he rooms T p as Clan C ra s. he was, too. For this year, 2013, g d n to u o d gro sters to ph rooms an Dutch ma Scotland le y we were very fortunate to have the n st a a t c m a e s, d th ting elled me aroun agnificent oil pain h painters. I marv actor, musician and director Kevin tin a c m h by Fren luable p s a v rk filled wit h o it McKidd, actor (‘Grey’s Anatomy’, w w t ssionis as sold orated and Impre m which was dec e this collection w a late ‘Trainspotting’ and ‘Brave’). as Roo liev to it. It w The Blue iling. I be e d The pipe bands, dancers, clans, c e n e to p r s, p o il flo at ha affod ings from know wh Scottish societies, 400 Jarl Squad ed with d e estate, to ss a e v Dear m l lo il ld st th and wou unds were nts had lived on Vikings from Shetland, adorable d the gro Editor are rden for p a g se o le h b spring an w ta , e wee Scotties and Westies all loved n g e io v n h a it alled omp ing w but my c red the w as brimm te w following him up Sixth Avenue, and n it e e d d il w re h en as a c borde cried wh en she w the crowd was thrilled to cheer s, which h d n w a ; S rn o e in F rr by the he Culb T st it was ba s. re it u Elgin’s other best export (Macalfo fr s and ding ed into vegetable , were sadly turn tain’s largest bree lan is older but Hot Scot Kevin is stle of Bri ulls. In Brodie Ca ying one herring g cuter) as he led the parade. Our ro d l n st a y a e o d rs R , e e h of the est Servic terns, oyster-catc steward new website is www.nyctartans e a in w st r r ri e fo p , my fath were in grounds n s te d n s week.org. We hope to see lots a a S w en I Culbin indhorn In the pink 1949, wh b and the re to sail across F lu s of people join us from Scotland C d t ir h b c Ya e sea asu As a subscriber to your Findhorn pe, see th Culbin, such a ple a to celebrate their heritage in s a sc d w n It la . Lady magazine I was intrigued condition re this vast desert eads on a. New York on April 5, 2014. h re w a o e lo rr a p th x e on opening the most recent minated one-ag Bay to e o st d t h in Margaret Kennedy, former fl ic r h h fo tain, w edition to find an article and searc une in Bri SA d U , president and current d ia n n sa a st nsylv on Abraham Lincoln which the highe ville, Pen rs member of the National Tartan e ip P , ll included my grandmothDerek Fe Day New York Committee er’s cousin, Allan Pinkerton. Also there is a photograph of A thing of wonder Lincoln flanked by Pinkerton and attempted to contact a branch in Washington but was Just received the new Scots Heritage Major General McClellan that is the given the brush-off. What a pity when so much of Pinkermagazine– congratulations! The new identical one in the book The ton’s work made a huge impact on that country. By the layout, presentation and contents Pinkerton Story, which I possess. way the name is spelt with two ll’s – ie. Allan, not Alan. are wonderful. This is going to be a The book is probably out of print June Laws, Queensland, Australia. really great magazine, and I’m looking but was originally printed in 1952 forward to the next edition already. and contains some interesting history Richard Michael Scott, Ardross, Do Lowland clans exist? of Allan Pinkerton, including the fact Western Australia I would be grateful if one of your readers can specify as that his sons Robert and Allan to what makes a clan. As children of a Lowland family we guarded the king who was not were never allowed to wear tartan, a source of grievance crowned, King Edward, who SEND YOUR LETTERS TO particularly when evacuees from London arrived wearing abdicated to marry Mrs Simpson. THE EDITOR, SCOTS HERITAGE MAGAZINE, FETTES the Royal Stuart during the last war! Our father always I believe that there are now PARK, 496 FERRY ROAD, EDINBURGH EH5 2DL insisted that clans only existed beyond the Highland line. branches of the Pinkerton Detective EMAIL EDITOR@SCOTSHERITAGEMAGAZINE.COM I would love some clarification on this subject. Agency in Europe and Edinburgh WEBSITE WWW.SCOTSHERITAGEMAGAZINE.COM Margaret Lady McGrigor, Upper Sonachan, Argyll but on a trip to America in 2008 I
r e t t e l Star
SCOTS Heritage No. 61 published July 2013. © Scots Heritage Media in partnership with Scottish Field. Editor: Richard Bath Creative Editor: Heddy Forrest Deputy Editor: Tim Siddons Staff Writer: Morag Thorburn Contributing Editor: Sir Malcolm MacGregor Designer: Mark Duncan Artworker: Andrew Balahura Photographer: Angus Blackburn Advertising Sales: Emma Craig Publisher: Wyvex Media Ltd SCOTS Heritage is published four times a year in February, May, August and November. ISSN 1445-6699
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y r o t s i h e h T man
Right: Allan Massie wonders why the murder of James III excites so little controversy and so few conspiracy theories.
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The history man
James III remains The mysterious death of ottish history the great whodunnit of Sc Words Allan Massie
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he first two Stewart kings were called Robert, the next five James. The two Roberts, both elderly when they came to the throne, and the second of them lame and in poor health, were insignificant figures. The Jameses, however, were all tough and formidable men, and most of them were competent too. Yet none lived to be old, and four of them left a young child as the heir to the throne, so that Scotland suffered from a succession of minorities. James I was murdered, James II killed when a cannon exploded at the siege of Roxburgh Castle, James III was murdered, James IV killed at Flodden, and James V died mysteriously, taking to his bed depressed when his army was defeated at Solway Moss, and, as some chroniclers have it, dying of a broken heart; the cause may however have been cancer. Of these deaths the most mysterious was James III’s, one of the unsolved crimes of Scottish history. What is most remarkable is that it has received very little attention. Reams have been written about the murder of Mary Stuart’s second husband, Darnley, yet the murder of James III has excited no comparable interest. The late Gordon Donaldson, former Historiographer Royal, called James III ‘the most enigmatic of the Stewarts’. So perhaps it is appropriate that the circumstances of his death remain a puzzle. James III alienated a large part of the Scottish nobility, but there was nothing unusual in that; kings always tried to extend their power, invariably at the expense of the nobility. James I was sufficiently tyrannical to provoke the conspiracy which ended in his murder. James II had a long struggle with the powerful House of Douglas, actually murdering one Earl of Douglas with his own dagger. In 1388 James III’s policies and actions provoked a rebellion by many of the leading lords in southern Scotland. However James’s position was still strong. He retained support north of the Forth and held the great castle at Stirling, where he had left his son and heir, 16-year-old Prince James, in the care of the governor, one Shaw of Fintry, while he went north to muster an army. Things turned against him, however, when the rebels bribed Shaw to surrender the castle and the young Prince to them, and issued a proclamation in which they announced their intention of deposing this unworthy king, whom they accused of bringing Englishmen into Scotland and seeking to subvert their traditional liberties. They would place the Prince on the throne instead. Many of the most important battles in Scot-
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tish history have been fought near Stirling because the bridge over the Forth there commands the crossing from the south to the north of the country. There was no bridge further down river, and up-river you were soon in marshland and hills. So the two armies met near Stirling at Sauchieburn on 11 June. The battle seems to be been short. The king’s forces were defeated or scattered, and James himself fled from the field. The story is that he was on his own, having lost touch with his guards and household staff. This itself is mysterious. Then, as the story or legend has it, he was thrown by his horse, and sought help from a woman who was drawing water from a well. She asked him who he was, and he reputedly replied, ‘I was your king this day at morn’. I say ‘reputedly’ because the evidence for the words is poor. He was apparently taken into her cottage where, again reputedly, he asked for a priest, presumably because he feared he was dying and wished to be given the last sacraments. A man promptly appeared, saying he was a priest. He was shown into the cottage, stabbed the king to death, and disappeared. The murderer was never identified, and it seems that no great attempt was made to find him: the king’s death was too convenient to too many people for questions to be asked. When a parliament was summoned in the name of the new king, James IV, its records refer only to ‘the unhappie field’ of Sauchieburn, ‘in the quhilk the King our soverane lord happinit to be slane’. One can only guess at the real circumstances of the king’s death. It is possible that he was indeed killed in battle as the Parliament asserted, although unlikely. But did his murderer follow him from the field? Had he been assigned to the task by the rebel lords and instructed to finish the king off? It is surely unlikely that he was just there, at the old woman’s cottage, by chance, and that, on being told by her that the king was inside and asking for a priest, saw the opportunity to kill him and took it. One likes to think that the assassin wasn’t a priest, but it is conceivable that he was. And finally one comes back to the strange question: why has this murder of a king attracted so little attention, so little investigation, and so few conspiracy theories?
A man promptly appeared, saying he was a priest. He was shown into the cottage, stabbed the king to death, and disappeared
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Words Stuart Kelly
chaos The lord of
A legend and a rogue, the swashbuckling Admiral Thomas Cochrane remains arguably the most audacious and impressive of all Scottish warriors
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ost people nowadays know of Admiral Thomas Cochrane, the 10th Earl of Dundonald and 1st Marquess of Maranhão, through novels. His exploits and adventures inspired both C S Forester’s Horatio Hornblower and Patrick O’Brian’s Jack Aubrey. The naval novelist Captain Frederic Marryat, author of Mr Midshipman Easy, served under Cochrane, and he makes an appearance in Bernard Cornwell’s Sharpe’s Devil. In a way, it is wholly fitting that this larger than life character should be commemorated in fiction rather than dry history: his life is more suited to swashbuckling novels than footnoted monographs. The Cochranes rose to the peerage back in 1647 when the first Earl started a pattern of expedience trumping ideology. Made a knight by Charles I, he apparently, towards the end of his life, had a chaplain praying for the defeat of the Covenanters, while Thomas Cochrane’s father, the 9th Earl, had a strange relationship with the Navy, which goes some way towards explaining his son. Under Thomas’s father the estate became financially straitened, so, like a good Enlightenment man, Archibald Cochrane took to invention. And his invention worked: coal tar, produced on an industrial scale to his patent, could caulk boats. An experiment with a buoy, half-coated and half-uncoated was a success, but the shipyards applied enough pressure to ensure the procedure was held up long enough for the patent to expire, allowing the Navy to use the method gratis. Left: Peter Edward Unfortunately, the estates of the Cochranes had been the Straehling’s painting collateral for the experiment. Young Thomas, born in 1775, of Cochrane in 1807 grew up in Hamilton and Culross with a title, a pedigree, the captured him at the height of his powers remnants of an estate, no cash and limited prospects. In a nifbefore scandal struck ty scam – and there would be more – Thomas was enrolled as a sailor at the age of five, an illegal process called ‘false muster’, so that when he came of age he would be deemed to have served sufficient years to be promoted. His uncle enrolled him; but his father preferred that he should be in the army and pulled the same trick. When Cochrane finally went to sea, aged 17 aboard the HMS Hind and then the HMS Thetis, the Royal Navy was changing. It was the
Cochrane’s life is more suited to swashbuckling novels than footnoted monographs
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The lord of Chaos
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Sentenced to 12 months in prison, he was fined £1000, stripped of his knighthood, debarred from the Commons and expelled by the Navy
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crux between the days of Drake, when the Navy was effectively a legitimated pirate force, and the professionalisation undertaken by Admiral Jacky Fisher in the later Victorian period. By 1798, having toured Norway and North America, and having become a lieutenant, Cochrane was court-martialled for disrespect aboard the HMS Barfleur. Although he was found innocent he was reprimanded for flippancy – a pattern of anti-authoritarian behaviour had begun. In 1800, having taken command of the brig sloop HMS Speedy, we get the first inklings of Cochrane’s tactical genius. Approached by a Spanish warship disguised as a merchant vessel, Cochrane firstly flew the Danish flag and then claimed the ship was suffering from an outbreak of plague to prevent boarding. That night, he placed a lantern on a barrel and let it float away as a decoy; the Spanish vessel followed the false lights and Cochrane escaped. In this period, Cochrane – who meticulously planned all battles – captured, destroyed or ran aground 53 French ships, earning him the nickname Le Loup des Mers, The Sea Wolf. His most notable feat was to capture
the xebec frigate El Gamo, although outnumbered five to one. The capture depended on the Speedy’s better manoeuvrability; hugging close to the El Gamo to prevent them using their cannons and then moving away swiftly when they attempted to board and firing on the boarding parties. Cochrane entered parliament in 1807, although he stood on a pro-Reform agenda the year before in one of the very rotten boroughs, Honiton, he hoped to eradicate. Typically, he did not bribe the voters in 1806, but revealed in 1816 he paid voters a guinea each the next time round. Cochrane’s popularity was such that William Cobbett, the crusading anti-corruption campaigner, Left: After his considered standing in Honiton but withconviction, Cochrane drew to allow Cochrane a clear run. is lampooned: this cartoon is called In parliament, Cochrane criticised ‘Things as they have Admiral Gambier, claiming his incompebeen; things as they now tence at the Battle of the Basque Roads are’. Above: Cochrane’s prevented Cochrane’s wholesale destrucstatue in Culross. tion of the French fleet. Gambier demanded a court-martial into himself to disprove the allegation and won, after which the Admiralty viewed Cochrane even more sceptically. Certain individuals must have been delighted SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 23
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when he became implicated in the 1814 Great Stock Exchange Fraud. An essay in Dickens’ Household Words describes it succinctly. Speculating on the origin of the word ‘cock’ for ‘a tale of news having no foundation whatever in fact’, he wrote ‘[does it] spring from the famous political hoax in which Lord Cochrane was said to have been implicated... for stock-jobbing purposes [they] gave out Bonaparte to have been torn to pieces by Cossacks’. The news of Napoleon’s death caused a boom, and Cochrane immediately disposed of £139,000 worth of government Omnium shares. The source of the Napoleon rumour, a Prussian called De Berenger, was seen entering Cochrane’s Top: Cochrane at work. Above: C S Forester’s house the day the news broke. Cochrane Horatio Hornblower was tried under his political opponent is based on Cochrane. Lord Ellenborough and found guilty: he Right: Gregory Peck was sentenced to 12 months in prison, stars as Hornblower. fined £1,000, stripped of his knighthood, debarred from the Commons, expelled from the Navy and ordered to stand in the pillory (which was never enacted as the authorities
thought it would provoke a riot). Cochrane always claimed to be innocent, agruing that the accusation was politically motivated; future Lord Chancellors agreed that Ellenborough should not have found him guilty on the basis of the evidence presented. But the disgraced Cochrane was not to be beaten. At the invitation of Bernando O’Higgins he took up leadership of the Chilean navy. With only 300 men and two ships he captured seven forts and the Spanish South American flagship, Esmeralda. Moving on to Brazil in 1822, he assisted them in their war of independence from Portugal, pulling off an audacious stunt when he captured Maranhão by bluffing that a vast Brazilian fleet was just over the horizon; a tactic that owed more to Captain Kirk than Lord Nelson. Although his time in Greece was less dramatic, his attacks on the Ottomans led to the intervention of the Great Powers, a situation that would reach its climax in the Crimean War. Things were changing in Britain as well. The Whigs eventually came to power, but even the Tory Foreign Secretary, George Canning, was keen to promote British military might abroad. The Reform Bill was passed and Cochrane’s knighthood was restored by William IV. Under Victoria, he became a knight of the Order of Bath and ascended through the Admiralty until he became Admiral of the Blue (1851), the White (1853), the Red (1857) and RearAdmiral of the United Kingdom. Few politicians and military commanders nowadays could bounce back from such ignominy; and there were, no doubt, some blimpish characters who retained their reser-
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Cochrane was the best type of hero: one with a strong dash of the rogue
vations about Cochrane. During the Crimean, the government considered bringing him back into active service, but worried that he would lose the Baltic fleet in a hazardous offensive. An inveterate individualist to the end, even when he became Earl of Dundonald, he refused to sit in the House of Lords. No less a figure than Lord Byron, in conversation with Thomas Medwin, said: ‘There is no man I envy so much as Lord Cochrane. His entry into Lima, which I see announced in today’s paper, is one of the great events.’ For Byron, the existence of Cochrane was proof
that ‘patriotism and virtue are not quite extinct’. For many of his numerous foes, he was also proof that sheer gall, massive self-belief and low cunning were a surer route to popular adoration than sticking to the rules and not rocking the boat. He was the best kind of hero: one with a strong dash of the rogue. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 25
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scots heritage
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Words Stuart Kelly
That fatal encounter broke forever the pride and splendour of this country
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Battle of Flodden, 1513
point Turning
flodden was a traumatic defeat which ultimately led to union with england
W
Left – Mary Evans Picture Library/Alamy
hen Francis Jeffrey, the ‘Arch-Critick’ of the Edinburgh Review, reviewed Walter Scott’s second narrative poem, Marmion: A Tale Of Flodden Field in 1808, he was driven to paroxysms. ‘Finally,’ he wrote, ‘we must object, both on critical and on national grounds, to the discrepancy between the title and the substance of the poem, and the neglect of Scotish feelings and Scotish character that is manifested throughout... Flodden, however, is mentioned; and the preparations for Flodden, and the consequences of it, are repeatedly alluded to in the course of the composition. Yet we nowhere find any adequate expressions of those melancholy and patriotic sentiments which are still all over Scotland the accompaniment those allusions and recollections. No picture is drawn of national feelings before or after that fatal encounter; and the day that broke for ever the pride and the splendour of his country, is only commemorated by a Scotish poet as the period when an English warrior was beaten to the ground. There is scarcely one trait of true Scotish nationality or patriotism introduced into the whole poem.’ Jeffrey’s critique seems more influenced by such
Left: Flodden claimed 12,000 Scots, including its King, several abbots and countless noblemen.
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18th century songs about Flodden as ‘The Flowers o’ the Forest’ (although there was at least one English ballad recorded by Thomas Deloney in the 1623 ‘The Pleasant History of John Winchcombe, in his younger yeares called Jack of Newbery’ which laments the ‘fatherlesse childe’ and ‘widow poore’ of the Scots, although it berates ‘sillie King Jamy’, and rather oddly claims he imprisoned Above: Fighting the French, not the Scots, his wife, Margaret Tudor, was Henry VIII’s priority. because of her ‘Englisshe Right: Edinburgh feared bloode’). Jeffrey’s sentiinvasion and ruin in the mental resentment conceals weeks after Flodden. a more uncomfortable truth about Flodden, one to which Scott was attuned. Flodden was an English victory, but a sideline in English history: Henry VIII was in France at the 28
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time, at the siege of Thérouanne. There is a single English broadsheet ballad, by John Skelton, the first poet laureate, crowing over the victory. But for the Scots, the immediate reaction was incomprehension at the scale of the disaster. Numbers of casualties have a wide range, but the figure of 12,000 is mentioned most frequently. This included not just the King, James IV, but several abbots and members of nearly every noble house in Scotland. The resulting power vacuum created the conditions for the formation of modern Scotland. James V was less than two years old when he came to the throne. The resulting Regency was a fractious affair, with the competing claims and parties of Margaret Tudor (representing English influence) and John Stewart, the Duke of Albany (representing French influence) locked in a power-struggle. But the stalemate had its advantages: Scotland did not engage in any external military conflicts for a generation. Both Margaret Tudor, by dint of personal belief, and the Duke of Albany, by dint of political affiliation, were committed to the Roman Catholic Church. James V had taken control of his monarchy by the time that
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Left – 19th Era/Alamy, left - Giorgios Kollidas/Shutterstock
Battle of Flodden, 1513
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Henry embarked on the dissolution of the monasteries and the separation of the English Church from the papacy. As much as Flodden, the nailing of the 95 Theses of Martin Luther to the door of All Saints’ Church in Wittenberg would have a radical impact on Scotland. James did not share his uncle’s attitude; and actively supported anti-Lutheran writers. Protestants were persecuted under his reign, notably Patrick Hamilton. James also banished James Wedderburn, who would go on to compile Scotland’s first hymnbook, after he produced some kind of satirical play ‘conjuring a ghost’, an action supposedly done in earnest by James V’s confessor, Fr. Laing. Given than many highprofile ecclesiastics had died at Flodden, it opened the way for a new generation 30
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The memory of Flodden had an important impact
of clerics, such as David Beaton, who was 19 when the battle occurred, and who was staunchly opposed to any incursion of Protestant beliefs. Beaton would go on to be murdered in 1546. Scotland’s more ‘hard-line’ attitude meant that instead of a Reformation in the true sense of the word – the route cautioned by James V’s tutor Sir David Lyndsay – the move to Protestantism took on a revolutionary hue. The memory of Flodden had an important impact on the generation of intellectuals born just before or after the battle. George Buchanan, born in 1506, and who would go on to be the tutor of James VI, does not share much with John Knox, born the year after Flodden, but both wrote on the necessity of limiting monarchical power. John Bellenden, whose dates are uncertain but who was probably born at the end of the fifteenth
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Battle of Flodden, 1513
gold rose-noble against a bent half-penny. It has been difficult, in 2013, to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the defeat of the Scots at Flodden. Nevertheless, the catastrophe fundamentally changed Scotland. It created a new generation of aristocrats, thinkers and religious figures who were – and this is not an exaggeration – traumatised by the defeat, and Clockwise from above: intent on not allowing history to repeat itself. Flodden memorial; Although the Auld Alliance with France James IV; Mary de would remain a fact of Scottish regal life Guise fed the Auld Alliance; James V was – James V married Mary of Guise, and their two when his father daughter, Mary, would marry the Dauphin died; the Mercat Cross. – outside of court circles more and more influential individuals started to think the unthinkable, and considered whether a union with England was the only feasible means of Scottish survival. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013
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Above -Gail Johnson/Shutterstock
century, became James V’s court historian, and his free translation of Boece’s Latin history as The Croniklis of Scotland urges the king to ‘respect the common wele’, and was surprisingly praiseful of the Douglas family. Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie, born around 1532, continued the work. Although it is uncertain whether there was a genuine ‘anti-war’ faction in James IV’s court, there was certainly an anti-war faction when Lindsay was writing. It is in his history that we have such stories as the demon Plotcock appearing at the Mercat Cross in Edinburgh before the battle and reading out the names of the men who would die; likewise Pitscottie recounts the tale that Patrick Lord Lindsay advised the king against the battle, saying it was like an honest man playing dice with a trickster, and setting his own
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scots heritage
Words Morag Thorburn
Main image: The Forth Bridge connects the capital to Fife. Inset: Three men model the cantilever principle in 1887.
time Spanning
Main image: Shaiith/Shutterstock
the imposing forth bridge is one of the country’s most iconic and celebrated landmarks
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Bygone Scotland
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The iconic structure and magnificent feat of engineering that is the Forth Bridge
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SCOTS heritage
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he new Forth road crossing is due to be completed in 2016 and in a flurry of publicity the bridge has been christened the Queensferry Crossing. It will stand in line with the old Forth Road Bridge and the iconic structure and magnificent feat of engineering that is the Forth Bridge. Original plans for a suspension bridge across the Firth of Forth by Thomas Bouch were quickly stopped following the collapse of Bouch’s Tay Bridge in a storm in 1879. John Fowler and his partner Benjamin Baker were invited by the Forth Bridge Railway Company to develop their design for a cantilevered bridge, taking into account restrictions imposed by the Admiralty and the Board of Trade. The former was determined that the Firth of Forth should remain a navigable channel and the latter stipulated that the bridge must be rigid, stiff and capable of carrying heavy freight trains - a reaction to the Tay Bridge disaster. Building the foundations of the bridge began on 26 May 1884 and the bridge was completed just six years later in November 1889. Ninety-eight lives were lost in the construction of the bridge, which used 58,000 tonnes of metal, ten times as much as the Eiffel Tower. In fact, it was the first major construction in Britain to be made from steel. The bridge has three double cantilevers with two 1,700ft suspended spans between them, at the time of building the longest bridge spans in the world. As dictated by the Admiralty, the rail level is 150ft above high water. Each of the towers has four steel tubes standing 361ft above high water. Their foundations extend 89ft below into the river bed making the total height of the bridge 450ft. In 2011 a ten-year refurbishment programme was completed that saw the bridge stripped back, painted and repaired. With assurances that the bridge will now not require a full paint for another 20 years, this finally puts an end to the myth that painting the Forth Bridge is a never-ending task.
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‘‘
The bridge must be rigid, stiff and capable of carrying heavy freight trains
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Above: Rivetters at work on June 18 1888, watched by two workers balanced on a Jubilee crane. Top left: Original alternative designs for the bridge. Far right: Original engineering drawings for the bridge; for 28 years its 521-metre main span was the longest in the world. Above: The rail level is 150ft above high water.
Top right - National Records of Scotland
Bygone Scotland
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Ninety-eight lives were lost in the construction of the bridge, which used 58,000 tonnes of steel, more than ten times as much as the Eiffel Tower
Above: A nineteenth-century print made shortly after the build was complete. Far right: The granite north-east pier foundation under construction on Inchgarvie in July 1884. Right: One of the airlocks used on the caissons. These airlocks admitted or released pressure to enable workers into, and out of, the air chamber of the caisson.
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Right and left - National Records of Scotland, top - 19th era/Alamy
Bygone Scotland
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SCOTS heritage
It was the first major construction in Britain to be made from steel
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Bygone Scotland
THE FORTH BRIDGE Left: The incomplete bridge from the north-west, with Fife pier in the foreground, Inchgarvie and Queensferry beyond in 1889. Above: Four rivetters at work with a pneumatic rivetting machine in 1887. Below: The circular raft used to measure the contours of the rock at Inchgarvie. Below left: The foundations extend 89ft below into the river bed.
is being nominated for inclusion in the World Heritage List. A decision by UNESCO on whether to inscribe the bridge is expected in 2015.
Top left, top right, bottom right - National Records of Scotland
For further information on the consultation and nomination visit www.forthbridge worldheritage.com
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scots heritage
Words Tim Siddons
Clan
Macnab the famous perthshire clan’s fortunes might have fluctuated over the last few hundred years but the passion of scotland’s newest clan chief for the heritage and tradition of his family name has remained resolute
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The new Chief has swapped the castle for a flat and is far more comfortable wielding a nine-iron than a sword
Malcolm MacGregor
I
t’s been a few hundred years since the Macnabs tore up the Perthshire countryside, battling with their mortal enemies and earning a reputation as one of the ‘turbulent clans’. And whilst the new Chief, Jamie Macnab of Macnab, has swapped the castle for a flat in Edinburgh’s New Town and is far more comfortable wielding a nine iron than a sword, his passion for the heritage, tradition and future of Clan Macnab is just as strong as his predecessors’. Jamie Macnab had known for a long time that one day he would become the Chief of Clan Macnab but, as he explains, this didn’t really prepare him for the role. ‘As an heir the Chief is the embodiment of who your father, or mother, was; you can’t possibly know what it will mean to you’. However, when Jamie’s father, the 23rd Chief, James Charles Macnab of Macnab, ‘The Macnab’, died in January this year, he was in no doubt about what it meant. ‘There are some chiefs that don’t have an interest in it, and to them it means very Image: The 24th Chief little’, says Jamie, ‘but to me the kinof Clan Macnab, Jamie ship and everything else that goes with Macnab of Macnab. the clans is a fundamental part of Scottish history. So to stand up as Chief and leader of a clan is a great honour and a huge responsibility.’ This was exemplified in March this year at his father’s memorial service in Killin. ‘The service was followed by a procession to the family’s burial island, where the ashes of my mother and father were interred,’ he continues. ‘The minister then said a special prayer and handed over 40 www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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Clan Macnab
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my father’s bonnet, three-feathered badge and his official pinsel – the symbols of chieftainship. They were handed over to me at the graveside. Both the bonnet and the pinsel had been on the altar with the ashes during the service; it was a very special moment.’ Clan Macnab has traditionally been centred on the pretty Perthshire village of Killin and surrounding land, although the clan’s fortunes have constantly waxed and waned, partly through financial hardship, partly through sheer bad luck because, as Jamie’s father once joked, ‘throughout Scottish history we have a bit of a problem – usually fighting on the losing side of any battle’.
Clan Macnab has usually been on the losing side of battles. They fought against Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn, against Cromwell and for the Jacobites at Culloden
The Macnabs fought against Robert the Bruce during the Scottish Wars of Independence, and after Bannockburn in 1314 had all of their lands forfeited. During the English Civil War many Macnabs died fighting for the losing Royalist side, and in 1745 they chose to fight for the Jacobites, and suffered once again after Bonnie Prince Charlie’s defeat at Culloden. After Culloden the Macnabs managed to hold onto the family estate at Kinnell, which had been the ancestral home since 1654. However, the extravagance of ‘Big Francis’, the 17th Chief, forced his son to sell Kinnell in the early 19th-century. It was bought back by the 22nd Macnab Chief only to be resold in 1978 by Jamie’s father to meet death duties. So while there are no Macnabs currently living in Killin, the clan will forever be Above: Jamie and associated with the area. ‘I was his family with the Chieftain’s pinsel at kindly asked to be chieftain of the their father’s Memorial Killin Games this year,’ says Service in March. Right: Macnab, ‘but sadly it coincided with Plate from the famous 1847 book The Clans of our family holiday so I had to decline. the Scottish Highlands. ‘However, in 2014, a group of American Macnabs are coming to the Killin Games, so we’re going to try and attract as many people as possible from all over the world for my first gathering as Macnab Chief.’
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Top left – DC Thomson
Clan Macnab
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‘‘ SCOTS heritage
What I have learnt is that being Clan Chief is also about what others ask of you, and in that respect I’ve had a very interesting six months
Right – Ian McNab,
Far right – Picade LLC
/Alamy
Representing the clan at events and gatherings is certainly one aspect of a clan chief ’s duties. ‘But at the end of the day,’ explains Macnab, ‘there is no defined role; it is very much what the individual chief makes of it. This is one of the reasons why Malcolm Macgregor brought me onto the Executive of the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs when I was an heir, to help get things going and to help other heirs.
‘What I have learnt is that being Clan Chief is also about what others ask of you,’ he continues. ‘And in that respect I’ve had a very interesting six months. As well as having a lot of dialogue with the Clan Macnab Society in the US – often the diaspora are more passionate about their Scottish roots and ancestry than people in Scotland – I’ve met a lot of really interesting people, such as Allan and Ian McNab, who led a recent Bugatti rally into Scotland. ‘I’ve also been asked to write an address to be read at the wedding of the son of an American academic, and another Macnab got in touch to check that he had the correct crest for a tattoo he was having done. In fact, a lot of Macnabs have contacted me out of the blue, all offering support, so there is a huge amount Below: Jamie Macnab of interest out there, which is great.’ with Allan (left) and Ian McNab. Right: At For Jamie, another important role as Innis Bhuie, the Macnab clan chief is to connect with other Macnabs burial island in Killin. around the world and help them find their place within the wider clan, a project he acknowledges as ‘a lofty ambition’, but one he also
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Clan Macnab
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Right -Roy Summers
scots heritage
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Clan Macnab
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The four Macnab boys carried a boat across the mountains from Loch Tay to Loch Earn. Smooth John Macnab smashed down the castle door with his sword and decapitated the Neishes who were drunk on Macnab wine
believes is achievable in time with help from a decent website and by making good use of new social media. Jamie argues that for a Macnab to be able to locate themselves within the clan is fundamental. It also allows them to weave their own histories into that of the clan which, like most Scottish clans, is full of colourful characters, tales and legends. One of these legends is the one that explains why a head features on the Clan Crest. Traditionally the mortal enemies of the Macnabs were the Neishes, who were almost wiped out by the Macnabs after the Battle of Glen Boultachan in 1522. Just before Christmas, 1612, from their castle on an island just off St Fillans in Loch Earn, a party of Neishes raided the Macnab’s Christmas provisions as they were being taken along Lochearnside to Killin. Incensed, the Macnab chief said to his four sons: ‘If my boys were boys I’d have my Christmas dinner’. Led by the eldest son, Smooth John, so-called because he was hairy and strong, the boys carried a boat over the mountains from Loch Tay to Loch Earn – which is quite a remarkable feat. When the brothers landed on the island, Smooth John smashed in the door with one swipe of his sword and decapitated all the Neishes, who were drunk on Macnab wine. When he got back home his father asked him if he’d got his Christmas dinner Smooth John tipped out a sack containing the Neish heads and said ‘No father, but I’ve got some balls for the children to play with’. Smooth John went on to become Macnab Chief and distinguished himself fighting for the Royalists during the Civil War. He was killed during the final battle of the war at Worcester in 1651. Jamie is certainly no Smooth John, though he did do a bit of shooting, played rugby and was a regular, and sometimes successful, competitor at the Lochearnhead Games. Nowadays, he’s happiest on the golf course. ‘I’ve been a proud member of the R&A for two-and-a-half-years now’, he explains. ‘My mother’s family, the Anstruthers, were founding members. I have a real passion both
Opposite page: The Macnabs at The Gathering in 2009. Left: Jamie’s father, the 23rd Chief, ‘The Macnab’.
CLAN MACNAB JAMIE MACNAB CAN BE CONTACTED VIA HIS WORK EMAIL: JMACNAB@SAVILLS.COM
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for golf and for St Andrews; it runs through my blood’. Another colourful character was the 17th Chief, ‘Big Francis’ Macnab, who had his own illicit distillery and garnered a reputation for living wildly beyond his means. He was also a prodigious womaniser, and is said to have fathered numerous illegitimate children. Apparently, when he did find a woman he wanted to marry he proposed to her by telling her that she would be buried on the most beautiful burial island in Scotland. Needless to say, she turned him down. ‘When my wife and I got engaged in Killin the first thing we did was take a picture of us together on the burial island,’ laughs Jamie. The 24th Chief of Clan Macnab will certainly not be remembered in the same way as men such as Smooth John or ‘Big Francis’ Macnab. But, like his father before him, his passion for, and ultimate success in, re-connecting the Macnab diaspora with its heritage and tradition will surely be his lasting legacy. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 47
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SCOTS heritage
guide Bluffer’s
Right: Sir Allan Macnab, prime minister of Canada 1854-56. Bottom left: Archibald Macnab. Bottom right: Francis Macnab in the famous Raeburn portrait.
TEN IMPORTANT FACTS THAT EVERY ASPIRING MEMBER OF CLAN MACNAB SHOULD KNOW
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The crest badge of Clan Macnab is the head of a savage affrontee Proper. The clan motto is Timor Omnis Abesto, ‘let fear be far from all’. The plant badge is stone bramble b ramble or common heath. The clan tartan has an identical structure to the Black Watch tartan, though with a prevalence of crimson it is much less subdued. The current and 24th Clan Chief is James William Archibald Macnab of Macnab.
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There is a rather gruesome story behind the Macnab crest. Apparently at Christmas in 1612 the servants carrying the provisions for the Macnab Christmas feast were aattacked ttacked and robbed by a gang of Neishes. That night, the four sons of the Macnab chief crossed a 2,000ft pass in a blizzard and slaughtered the offenders. They gathered the stolen goods and the heads of the dead Neish clansmen. The head in the Macnab crest is said to commemorate this horrific event.
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The name Macnab comes from the Gaelic Mac An Aba, which means ‘child of the Abbot’. According to clan tradition, the family is derived from Abraruadh, Abbot of Glen Dochart and Strathearn, who is said to have been the younger son of Kenneth McAlpin, first King of the Scots, and a nephew of Saint Fillan, who founded the monastery at Dochart in the 7th century.
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The first written mention of Macnab is on a charter from 1124, during the reign of King David I. Another Macnab, Malcolm de Glendochart, appears on the Ragman Rolls, a subscription of allegiance to King Edward I of England from the nobility of Scotland.
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The Macnabs fought against Robert the Bruce during the Wars of Independence. Clan Chief Angus Macnab was the brotherin-law of ‘Red’ Comyn, Lord of Badenoch, murdered by Bruce in 1306, and the Macnabs fought alongside the Macdougalls against Bruce. In 1314, after Bannockburn, the Macnab lands were forfeited and all of the clan’s charters were destroyed.
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The traditional allies of Clan Macnab are the McKinnons and the MacGregors. The Macnabs had a long-running feud with Clan Neish, based mainly on a number of small grievances and quarrels, which led to regular and bloody encounters. The last large and decisive battle between the two was at Glen Boultachan in 1522, which ended in the Macnabs routing the opposition, killing almost every single Neish in the process.
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During the Civil War the Macnabs supported the Royalists. Smooth John Macnab, who became 8th Chief on the death of his father, Finlay Macnab, fought with James Graham, the 1st Marquess of Montrose, displaying great bravery both at their victory over the Covenanters at the Battle of Kilsyth in 1645 and at the siege of Kincardine Castle in 1647. In 1651 he led a 300-strong force of Macnabs as part of the Royalist army that faced Cromwell’s Parliamentarians at the Battle of Worcester. Macnab was killed during the battle.
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The Macnabs had divided loyalties during the 18th-century Jacobite uprisings. A number of Macnabs supported the Jacobites in 1715, but the 14th Chief, Robert Macnab, did not participate: he had married a sister of John Campbell, 1st Earl of Breadalbane. During the ’45 Allister Macnab of Inshewan and Archibald Macnab of Acharne fought for the Jacobites, whilst the Chief, John Macnab, held a commission in the Black Watch. He was captured and imprisoned at the Battle of Prestonpans.
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Notable Macnabs include Sir Allan Macnab, Prime Minister of Canada between 1854 and 1856 and James Macnabb, the 21st Chief, who won a gold medal in rowing in the coxless fours at the 1924 Olympics in Paris. His son, the 23rd Chief James Macnab, ‘The Macnab’ and his wife, Diana, worked tirelessly to revive the global fortunes of the Macnabs and resurrect the clan society. The Macnab was an enthusiastic supporter of Macnab heritage, and always wore the clan tartan at gatherings and ceilidhs. James died in January 2013, Diana in January 2012.
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The most colourful Macnab was undoubtedly the 16th Chief, Francis Macnab (1734-1816). Standing 6ft 3in tall and reputedly as strong as an ox, Macnab was a larger-than-life character. Known as ‘Big Francis’, he drank, gambled and womanised – it is said that he fathered at least 32 children – away the family fortune, leaving behind him a whopping £35,000 debt. He also had an illicit still from which he produced a high-quality dram. Francis Macnab is the subject in a famous 1802 painting by Sir Henry Raeburn. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 49
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SCOTS heritage
lands Heart
TEN PLACES THAT ALL MEMBERS OF CLAN MACNAB SHOULD VISIT BEFORE THEY DIE
Killin
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KINNELL HOUSE Built in 1580 on the bank of the River Dochart near Killin, Kinnell House was the seat of Clan Macnab from 1654. Remodelled in the 18th-century, it was sold to the 1st Marquis of Breadalbane by the 17th Chief, Archibald Macnab, to service the debts of the extravagant 16th Chief, Francis Macnab. It was bought back by the 22nd Macnab Chief in 1949 only to be re-sold by ‘The Macnab’ in 1978 to meet death duties.
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The Macnabs have a long association with the pretty village of Killin, which is located on the western head of Loch Tay. The village stands between two rivers, the Lochay and the Dochart – with the spectacular Falls of Dochart. Other notable sites are the ruins of Finlanrig Castle and the Moirlanich Longhouse – a rare example of a traditional Scottish longhouse, as well as a folklore centre and a number of good shops and hotels. Killin is also worth visiting for the drive along Loch Tay alone.
INNIS BHUIE The Clan Macnab burial grounds are located on an island in the middle of the River Dochart next to the Dochart Bridge. The island has a stone enclosure in which the clan chiefs are buried, and there are a couple of gravestones outside the enclosure. It was built in the 18th century and is adorned with a medieval slab bearing a kilted figure.
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WORCESTER Situated in the West Midlands in England, Worcester is the site of the final battle of the English Civil War, in which Oliver Cromwell’s army of 28,000 Parliamentarians defeated the 16,000-strong, mainly Scottish, Royalist force, which included 300 Macnabs. The battle was a rout: 3,000 Royalist troops were killed, amongst them the Macnab chief, Smooth John Macnab. Worcester itself is dominated by the 12th century cathedral and is rich in history and culture.
Doune Castle
This magnificent 14th-century courtyard castle is just outside of the village of Doune in Stirling, and is where the fifteenth Chief of Clan Macnab – who was a major in the Black Watch regiment of the Hanoverian government army – was held prisoner after being captured by the Jacobites. Amongst the highlights of the castle, which is run by Historic Scotland, are its 100-ft high gatehouse and spectacular Lord’s Hall. It was famously used in the film Monty Python and The Holy Grail.
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LOCH EARN CASTLE Located on an island in Loch Earn just off St Fillans in Perthshire, Loch Earn Castle was the stronghold of the Neishes from 1250 to the mid 15thcentury, and scene of the infamous attack by Smooth John Macnab and his brothers in 1612, leading to the demise of the Neishes.
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LOCH DOCHART CASTLE On a small, wooded island in the pretty Loch Dochart, which lies in the shadow of Ben More between Killin and Crianlarich, is the ruin of Loch Dochart Castle, built between 1583 and 1631 by the notorious Sir Duncan Campbell (1550-1631), or ‘Black Duncan of the Cowl’. The Macnabs destroyed the castle in 1646.
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The 23rd Chief, James Charles Macnab of Macnab married Diana Mary Anstruther-Gray, the daughter of Lord and Lady Kilmany in St Andrews Episcopal Church on 11 April 1959. James Macnab’s mother’s family were founding members of the St Andrews based institution The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, which is the governing body of sport and also organises The Open Championship, the sport’s oldest and most prestigious Major competition.
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Lochearnhead Highland Games
For a number of years the 23rd Chief of Clan Macnab, ‘The Macnab’, was chieftain at these Highland Games, situated in the picturesque surroundings of Loch Earn. The games run a range of traditional heavyweight events and a number of track and field events, plus Highland dancing and piping events. There are also children’s events, trade stands and food and drink stalls.
Ottawa River Valley, Canada After the 17th Chief of Macnab, Archibald Macnab (1777-1860), was forced to sell Kinnell House and Estate to pay off the debts of the notorious 16th Chief, Francis Macnab, he emigrated to Canada, taking about 500 of his clansmen with him. They settled mainly along the Ottawa River Valley in Ontario. Indeed there was a township alongside the river called McNab (recently renamed McNab/Braeside).
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Words Tim Siddons & David Torrance Illustrations Bob Dewar
Credit
Crunch NO BRITISH BANKER WAS JAILED – OR EVEN ARRESTED – FOR THE CRISIS OF 2008. YET AFTER A TWO WEEK TRIAL WHICH GRIPPED THE NATION DURING 1879, SEVEN DIRECTORS OF A SCOTTISH BANK WHICH HID ITS BAD DEBTS DIDN’T GET OFF SO LIGHTLY
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n 2008 the near-collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland and Halifax/Bank of Scotland precipitated an economic crisis, the reverberations of which are still being felt today. Thanks to a government bailout and limited liability, however, individual losses were kept to a minimum. This was not the case in 1878, when the City of Glasgow Bank closed its doors without warning, plunging thousands of ordinary Scots into financial ruin. Founded in 1839, the City of Glasgow Bank (or City Bank, as it was known) had acTop right: In 1879 cumulated deposits of more than £8 the City of Glasgow million by 1878 and had 133 branches Bank’s directors were across Scotland, catering particularly found guilty of fraud for small investors. It had 1,819 and served prison sentences. partners, whose liability for the debts of the bank was absolute and unlimited. But there was nothing to worry about: a balance sheet issued that year indicated capital, reserves and undistributed profits totalling £1,600,000; shareholders had just been rewarded with a healthy dividend of 12%. Then, on Tuesday, 1 October, the City Bank announced that it would not open for business the following day. By dawn, a massive throng of depositors had gathered outside the head office at 21 Virginia Street. The Glasgow Herald reported that ‘one could hardly walk a dozen yards in Buchanan Street without meeting a friend who found himself in some sort of tribulation’. It was a similar story in other parts of Scotland. In Paisley, ‘unlucky City notes poured in all day, and numbers, especially of the working classes, were equally chary about paper money in general, and would be content with nothing but gold’. 52 www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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As the days and weeks marched on, with no sign of the story shifting from the front pages, the sheer scale of the crisis began to unfold. The bank, it emerged, despite its healthy balance sheet, had simply run out of money. The real reason for the collapse would not be revealed until the following year at a dramatic trial of the bank’s directors, and in the meantime the papers focused on the desperate tales of ordinary savers: of the 50,000 depositors, 43,000 had had less than £100 in the bank. For most of them this was their life savings. ‘At the little fishing village of Fort Mary,’ reported one journalist, ‘great distress is anticipated. The fishermen have had a bad season, and have had to rely on those small savings for the winter’s living for themselves and families.’ Thousands of individuals went bankrupt. The effects were pronounced in the northeast, where ‘there were more sufferers by the failure in Aberdeenshire than in any other county in Scotland except Lanarkshire.’ For merchants and businesses,
The bank failed because it was in the hands of rogues and fools who embarked upon a career of reckless adventure at variance with every maxim of prudent banking
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the issue was one of cashflow. The Herald reported that ‘one merchant who dealt with the City Bank finds himself placed in such a position that he can neither get money to carry on his business nor possess himself of the guarantees which would enable him to procure money elsewhere.’ Firms were going bust every day – in the course of two or three weeks, 30 or more firms, large and small, in Glasgow, Manchester, London and elsewhere were forced to cease trading. ‘A deep gloom has been cast over Renfrew by the suspension of Messrs Simons & Co,’ wrote one newspaper. ‘The firm employed several hundred workmen.’ The collapse proved to be a double whammy for shareholders, who realised to their horror that not only had they lost their investments, but they were each liable for the City Bank’s losses in proportion to their shareholdings. The suffering was immense. ‘Consternation is the only word that can describe the feeling in Aberdeen,’ ran one editorial. ‘A number of shareholders showed unmistakable signs of emotion – some of them seeing nothing but ruin staring them in the face.’ In Airdrie, meanwhile, ‘a number of private families will, in some cases, have their little fortunes swept away.’ A quarter of the list of shareholders was made up of spinsters, married women and widows; while a third was clergymen, teachers, doctors and small capitalists. But a seventh was trustees – people holding money for other people, who were suddenly liable for huge losses. ‘In one case,’ wrote the Contemporary Review, ‘a poor seamstress having received a legacy of £100, had consulted a benevolent patron as to what she
should do with it. He volunteered to invest it in City Bank stocks in his name to save hassle and transfer the dividends to her. When the bank was wound up, this trustee found himself a ruined man. This instance is only one of hundreds.’ The crisis caused the temporary collapse of the Caledonian Banking Co Ltd, which had branches in Moray, Caithness and Wester Ross. Its customers were farmers, Highland gentry, fishermen and distillers, many of whom found themselves in severe financial straits. Celtic Magazine stated rather dramatically that ‘The fall of the Caledonian Banking Co is, not excepting the Highland clearances, the greatest calamity that ever befell the north of Scotland. Men who thought they had enough in their latter days to live comfortably are now penniless; widows and orphans are in absolute poverty and despair; trade is ruined, agriculture paralysed and enterprise crushed.’ So what on earth had gone wrong in Glasgow? An accountants’ examination made immediately after the City Bank’s closure revealed a deficit of more than £5m, and at the end of that month an order was made for the immediate arrest of the
Above left- Reproduced by kind permission of PRIVATE EYE magazine www.private-eye.co.uk”
Top left: In 1879 the City of Glasgow Bank’s directors were found guilty of fraud and served prison sentences. Centre: Famous cover of Private Eye featuring Sir Fred Goodwin. Top right: Banknotes from the City of Glasgow Bank. Below: Caricature of Robert Stronach.
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OTHER SCOTTISH BANKING CRISES
bank’s directors – John Stewart, Lewis Potter, Robert Salmond, William Taylor, Henry Inglis and John Innes Wright, and the manager, Robert Stronach. It soon became apparent that the bank had made substantial loans to investors on inadequate security, and that when these went bad it had falsified accounts to cover up the shortfall. This had gone on for many years. In 1873, for example, five years before the catastrophe hit, the directors deliberately made a false entry of £973,000 to conceal their losses. These revelations caused an outcry. The Herald called it a ‘criminal disaster’ and the Fortnightly Review commented that ‘The City of Glasgow Bank failed, first, because it was in the hands of rogues and fools who years ago embarked upon a career of reckless adventure wholly at variance with every maxim of prudent banking.’ The trial ran from 20 January to 1 February 1879, and was referred to by the Lord Justice-Clerk, Lord Moncreiff, as ‘unexampled in the annals of this Court, as the occasion of it is without precedent in the history of the country.’ A slew of character witnesses testified to the ‘scrupulous honour’ of the defendants but the tactic was derided by the Lord Advocate: ‘To press that evidence to the length to which it has been is the most preposterous thing I ever heard in a Court of Justice. If a man has a bad repute you will never find him in the position of a director of a great bank, entrusted with millions by the public, or in a position to work that wreck upon any institution which has befallen the City Bank.’ The defendants were all found guilty by a jury that included the kinds of businessmen most affected by the crisis. The manager, Robert Stronach, and one of the directors, Lewis Potter – described as a ‘resident bully’ and ‘a snarling and garrulous old man’ – were both sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment each, the others eight months’ each; the first and only sentences for fraud in Scottish clearing-bank history. As the sentences were read out, Stronach ‘was greatly affected, and his broken-hearted appearance elicited – as indeed it had done on every day throughout the long trial – the warm sympathy of the audience which filled the Court-Room. The
rest of the prisoners all protested their innocence of the charges of which they had been convicted.’ The newspapers were unsympathetic. The Times wrote: ‘It is heartbreaking that an act of weakness should lead to the imprisonment of men who should be venerable. But then we remember what evil they have wrought.’ There was also the feeling that the sentences were too light, ‘one expression being that a longer period would have been got for killing a hare.’ On 30 March 1879, calls totalling £2,579 per £100 share were made by the liquidators of the City of Glasgow Bank, and when the affairs of the bank were finally wound up, on 1 October 1882, only 254 of the 1,819 shareholders remained solvent. Nearly 2,000 families in Glasgow suffered severe loss. A public subscription was set up in over 40 places in Scotland, raising around £400,000, which was distributed in the form of donations to shareholders. The crisis precipitated the passing of the Bank and Joint Stock Companies Act of 1885, which ended unlimited liability and ensured that individual shareholders would no longer pay the price of corporate corruption. Unfortunately – as the events of 2008 attest – the Act’s provisions for external audit didn’t go far enough to prevent another banking catastrophe.
AYR BANK, 1772 The year of 1771 witnessed the climax of a long period of economic progress in Scotland through the expansion of its main industry – linen. The Ayr Bank was one of a number of private banks set up to provide finance for the grand capital investment schemes that were being embarked upon: building mills, bleachfields and canals. It issued banknotes that far exceeded its funds, and when the linen market crashed in 1772 the bank collapsed too, with liabilities exceeding £1,000,000. WESTERN BANK, 1857 Until its collapse in 1857, the Western Bank was Scotland’s second richest bank. But it had lent heavily to several Glasgow firms which suffered bad losses. When the news got out, there was a run on the bank. Shareholders lost everything, and for a while the situation was tense, with armed troops on guard because, as one newspaper put it, Glasgow was ‘in a ferment’. ROYAL BANK OF SCOTLAND, 2008 All previous crises in Scottish banks had begun in the west, where the style of banking was traditionally more risky and aggressive than in the east. That all changed in 2008, when RBS, under Fred ‘The Shred’ Goodwin and his investment bankers, embarked on a recklessly ambitious mission to become the world’s largest bank. A financial catastrophe was averted by a government rescue package worth £37 billion – about £617 for every UK citizen.
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Words Mairi MacDonald
women Great Scots
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HISTORY IS GENERALLY WRITTEN BY MEN, BUT HERE ARE TEN FORMIDABLE SCOTS WOMEN – SEVERAL OF WHOM YOU MAY NEVER HAVE HEARD OF – WHO HAVE HELPED MAKE HISTORY
4 Mary Slessor, (1848-1915)
Born in Aberdeen, she moved to Dundee at the age of 11 and worked in a jute mill. Brought up a strong Christian by her mother, at 26-yearsold Mary joined the missionary in Calabar in Nigeria, where she fought barbaric traditions such as killing twins (who were believed to be evil) and cannibalism. She won the love and respect of Nigerians, adopted abandoned children and was the first woman to appear on a Scottish bank note (Clydesdale £10).
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ANNE MACKINTOSH (1723-1787)
Known as Colonel Anne, Anne Mackintosh was a Jacobite married to Angus, chief of Clan Mackintosh. Despite her husband fighting for the king, Anne rode around the glens enlisting men to fight for Bonne Prince Charlie. When she heard of a plan to kidnap the prince from her house, she instructed staff to run around the woods shouting and firing pistols, tricking the government troops into thinking they were facing the whole of the Jacobite army. Bonnie Prince Charlie called her ‘La Belle Rebelle’ – the beautiful rebel.
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Helen Crawfurd (1877-1954)
Born in the Gorbals, in 1898 she married Reverend Crawfurd, whose parish was in a slum. Profoundly shocked by the suffering, she thought the situation would only change when women had the vote so joined the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies. Imprisoned twice, she went on hunger strike before eventually being released. In the 1930s Crawfurd’s meeting with Lenin in Moscow inspiring her to co-establish the Communist Party of Great Britain. She died in 1954.
ELSIE INGLIS (1864-1917) Born in India, Elsie Inglis studied medicine in Edinburgh. After working in London and Dublin she opened a maternity hospital – the forerunner of the Elsie Inglis Memorial Hospital – in Edinburgh. Her dissatisfaction with the medical services for women led her to become a suffragette. It was her involvement in WWI that brought her fame. She set up all women-staffed relief hospitals in France, Russia and Serbia, where in 1915 she was captured and later repatriated. In 1917 she returned from Russia only to die of cancer.
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Great Scots Women
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Mary, Queen of Scots (1542-1587)
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MARGARET MACDONALD MACKINTOSH (1864-1933)
Skilled in metalwork, textiles, embroidery and watercolour, she was one of the most talented 20th century British artists. She studied at the Glasgow School of Art and married Charles Rennie Mackintosh; with her sister and Herbert MacNair, they formed the Glasgow Four. Her husband said he believed she had genius while he had only talent.
FLORA MACDONALD (1722-1790)
In 1746 she led Bonnie Prince Charlie, disguised as her maid ‘Betty Burke’, from Benbecula to safety on Skye. When the prince escaped to France, Flora was arrested, imprisoned and then taken to London. When released, she married Alan Macdonald of Skye and had seven children. They emigrated to America in 1773, where her husband was taken prisoner for his part in the War of Independence. Flora moved to Nova JEMIMA Scotia in 1778 and two years later, on her husband’s WEDDERBURN BLACKrelease from prison, she returned to Skye where she died BURN (1823-1909) in 1790. A painter of rural life in 19th-century Scotland, Blackburn was a friend and pupil of John Ruskin and Sir Edwin Landseer, both of whom praised her work: ‘In portraying animals, I have nothing to teach her,’ said Landseer in 1843. Much of her work portrayed her Highland home, Roshven, its animals and birds. She was a keen observer of bird behaviour and her observations are referred to in Darwin’s Origin of Species.
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ST MARGARET (C. 1045-1093) Born in exile in Hungary, she moved to Scotland in 1066. She married Malcolm III, King of Scotland, and had six sons – three were Kings of Scotland – and two daughters, one of whom was a Queen consort of England. She was a pious and charitable woman known for feeding the poor daily and establishing a ferry across the Firth of Forth for pilgrims travelling to Dunfermline Abbey. She was canonised in 1250 by Pope Innocent IV and is the Patron Saint of Scotland.
In 1558 she married the Dauphin of France but was widowed in 1560. A brief marriage to Lord Darnley ended when he was strangled, apparently by her third husband, Lord Bothwell. Following an uprising against her, Mary was imprisoned in Loch Leven Castle and abdicated the throne to her one-year-old son, James VI. Mary fled to England where her cousin Queen Elizabeth I imprisoned her for 19 years before executing her for treason.
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Jenny Geddes (c.1600-1660)
In 1637 at St Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh, Jenny Geddes famously picked up her stool and threw it at the minister in objection to the first public use in Scotland of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer. The rest of the congregation joined in, throwing anything and everything at the pulpit and driving the Dean of Edinburgh from the church. This is said to have sparked the riot which led to the English Civil War and the execution of Charles I. Robert Burns later named his mare Jenny Geddes.
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Words Mark Entwistle
grace Selkirk
100 YEARS TO THE DAY AFTER HIS GREAT-GRANDFATHER LIFTED THE BANNER AT THE SELKIRK COMMON RIDING, FETED CALIFORNIAN WRITER AND SOCIALITE ROBERT MAILER ANDERSON DID THE SAME
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A
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barefoot Robert Mailer Anderson, clad in a T-shirt and the sort of dark flannels popular in the noirish American movies of the 1940s, opens the door of the large country house in the Scottish Borders which he and his 20-strong clan of family members have taken over for the week of Selkirk Common Riding. It’s a long way from Boonville, two hours’ drive north of San Francisco, whose population of 1,400 souls were the basis for Anderson’s eponymous debut novel. This was where novelist, journalist and film-maker Anderson, well known Stateside as the Fedora-wearing philanthropist involved in the new £42 million San Franciso Jazz Center, grew up. Located deep in the Anderson Valley in Mendocino County, Boonville is an area that was built on redwood logging, apple orchards and sheep, although these days it’s better known for its sparkling wine and pinot vineyards. Seventh generation Californian on his mother’s side, the 45-year-old Anderson actually spent his childhood surrounded by old photographs of his Scottish ancestors and tales of the Scottish Borders. His father even had a copy of Robert Burns’ Selkirk Grace pinned to the wall of their home Right: Anderson hosted and it was to the Bora £25,000 per person fundraiser for President ders and Selkirk early Barack Obama last year. in June that Anderson and family – his wife and children, various cousins, aunts and uncles – travelled en masse. It was where, on the second Friday of that month, that the 6ft 4ins Anderson followed in his Selkirkborn great-grandfather’s
Genealogy
His father had Robert Burns’ Selkirk Grace pinned to the wall and back in 1913 his great-grandfather ‘Honolulu Bob’ Anderson was the town’s Common Riding Colonial Society standard bearer
footsteps – exactly 100 years to the day – when he mounted a raised platform in the town’s Market Place carrying a flag in front of a crowd of thousands celebrating this year’s Common Riding. Back in 1913, Anderson’s great-grandfather and namesake, Robert Anderson – affectionately known as ‘Honolulu Bob’ after emigrating to Hawaii some years earlier - was that year’s Common Riding Colonial Society standard bearer. Anderson’s father, sister and aunt had all previously made the trip to Selkirk, and they had encouraged him to put his name forward to be Colonial Society standard bearer in his great-grandfather’s centenary year. ‘It’s all been pretty wonderful,’ Anderson says. ‘I was always aware of this anniversary because of my great-grandfather, and because every generation has carried a Robert Anderson since then. I was always told that’s who I was named after, so I was aware of the connection. And they were the only old photos around my father’s house. Ones of his grandfather – pictures of him playing cricket, fishing and the stray newspaper clippings someone keeps. But unless you know Scotland and unless you’ve experienced something like this, you just don’t appreciate just what it means.’ After his parents divorced, the young Anderson grew up alongside the juvenile delinquent residents of the care home run by his father. He spent his last high school year living with a paternal uncle, who ran a foster home as well as Boonville’s newspaper, the Anderson Valley Advertiser. After dropping out of college, Anderson moved to Mexico and then to New York where his jobs ranged from selling suits to shifting furniture. His move back to the Bay Area of San Francisco preceded the publication of Boonville. This has since been followed by a screenplay bought by Miramax, development of a TV series, producing Tom Waits’ play The Black Rider at the American Conserva-
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tory Theater and co-writing the 2008 horror film Pig Hunt. Anderson’s wife, Nicola, whom he married in 1999, is the daughter of the late Robert Miner, co-founder of the IT giant, Oracle. The couple live in Pacific Heights with their four young children, and last year they opened their home for a £25,000per-person election fundraiser for President Barack Obama. Such activities mean Anderson is well known on the San Francisco social scene, but he dislikes the term ‘socialite’ when used as if it was some kind of deliberate career choice. He is far more comfortable with being known as a hard-working journalist, writer and film-maker, but acknowledges he is well known for his love of noirish attire, even going so far as to rent and restore the apartment where Dashiell Hammett wrote The Maltese Falcon. Asked why he had felt it important to take part in an age-old ritual, in a small Scottish town thousands of miles from his home, Anderson said contributing factors were the passing of his parents: ‘Especially my father who spoke fondly of his trips to
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I’ve experienced nothing like this before. I feel huge kinship back here in Selkirk. The poetry of this land calls to the writer in me
Scotland, and the passing of my Aunt Phyllis, who was the keeper of the Scottish heritage flame.’ An integral part of Selkirk Common Riding sees homage paid to the 80 men who left the town for the bloody battlefield at Flodden in 1513. Legend has it that only one – Fletcher – returned, bearing a captured English flag and that he cast it onto the ground to indicate that all the other men of Selkirk had been cut down. It is a great honour to be chosen as a standard bearer and each year exiles from all parts of the world travel to Selkirk to reaffirm their links with the town. Carrying the flag of the Colonial Society and representing all the ancient burgh’s emigrants and exiles through a hectic week of ceremonies and social functions, the climax of the event is the famous ‘casting of the colours’ in the Market Place. Each standard bearer replicates Fletcher’s actions by whirling and dipping their respective flags carrying their ‘colours’ – the coats
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of arms and emblems of their crafts and associations – in the town’s main square in front of several thousand onlookers. ‘I’ve experienced nothing like this before.’ Says Anderson. ‘There were a lot of highlights as you might imagine. The other standard bearers were just so kind and immediately brought me into their fraternity, and the manner in which they did it was both unexpected and truly welcoming, and something I won’t forget. I feel huge kinship here in Selkirk and we’ll definitely be back. The poetry of this land calls to the writer in me.’ And he says he was excited at finally making it to Selkirk to ‘breathe the air that my ancestors took into their lungs, getting the lay of the land, and letting my own offspring know that Far left: With wife Nicola. this is partly where they sprung from.’ Left: Honolulu Bob in 1913. Above: Bob’s wife Anderson, however, readily admits he Margaret Dickson with had under-estimated what was involved in grandfather Ken (left). the role. ‘I had taken part in town ceremony Right: The next generation. and I had taken part in sport and spectacle, but nothing like this,’ he says. ‘When I was first sent the songs, I thought, “ok here are some Scottish songs to learn”. They are very beautifully written and have a poetic sense to them. Then there’s the snippets of history, but you don’t SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 61
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This page: Holding the standard at this year’s Selkirk Common Riding. Left: In action in front of the townsfolk.
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A large part of my DNA is from here. There’s an affinity for this landscape
quite know how it all comes together. Then you get here and think, “oh they know these songs, they sing these songs”. ‘These songs are an intricate part of the ceremony. This is how they carry their language and history. This is how they tell you who you are in this history. So it’s pretty powerful stuff and I didn’t know that going in. I didn’t really know what casting the colours meant. I thought I’d just be carrying a flag through the town like a parade. ‘I’ve seen a parade. I’ve been in parades. But I had no idea that that I wouldn’t just be waving the flag, that there is a very special way to do it and it’s not as easy as it looks. Then when I finally had time to watch the You Tube video I’d been sent
and when the camera panned to the audience and you could see all these people packing the streets... I just thought “wow”.’ Anderson says the visit has helped put some things in perspective. ‘A large part of my DNA is from here. It’s a huge thing. There’s my affinity for song and language and this landscape. I didn’t realise it before but this is partly why I survived in Boonville. My family knows this landscape. They thrived here for a long, long time.’ Asked how important his Scottish heritage was to him, Anderson summed it up by quoting a lyric by Tom Waits, one of his friends and musical heroes. ‘It’s a great line – “If you get far enough away, you’re on your way back home”.’ SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 63
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Words & Images Malcolm MacGregor
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Glamis Castle
castle Glamis
mysterious and magnificent, with its royal connections and haunted corridors this ancient angus castle is one of the most historic buildings in scotland
Image: The home of the Earl and Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne, Glamis has been the home of the Lyon family since the 14th century.
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Glamis Castle
G
lamis Castle provokes strong feelings. The writer Daniel Defoe was struck with ‘awe and admiration’ while another Englishman, William Shakespeare, used Glamis as the setting for the murder of King Duncan by Macbeth in his ‘Scottish Play’. Sir Walter Scott considered himself ‘too far from the living and too near the dead’ on hearing door after door closing, as he was shown to his room in some distant part of the castle. Certainly Glamis has an aura about it – turrets and mysterious towers that lead ever skywards. It is both fairytale and fearsome. It is also famous for being the childhood home of the Queen Mother, Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, who married the future George VI in 1923 Left: The Queen and gave Glamis its Mother’s sitting room. Above: A young Queen true royal connection. Mother, when she was The Thane of Glamis simply Elizabeth Angela was a title accorded to Marguerite BowesMacbeth. Somewhere out Lyon, with her younger brother David at Glamis. there, one can imagine the three witches stirring their pots of ‘hubble, bubble, toil and trouble’. Thane is an old Scottish title, roughly SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 67
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The ninth earl married Mary Eleanor Bowes, a coal heiress from County Durham who was the richest woman in England
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equivalent to that of Earl, but which has long disappeared. The present ‘Thane’, if such a term was still in use, is Michael Fergus, 18th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne, and chief of the Lyon family. His eldest son is Simon, Lord Glamis. So Shakespeare’s title lives on, but with a more modern meaning. The original fortification was built in the 10th or 11th century and was used by monarchs for hunting and lodging on journeys through eastern Scotland. Originally a simple L-shaped stronghold made from pink sandstone, the castle was added to at various times between the 16th and 19th centuries. In 1372 Sir John Lyon, known as the white Lyon for his fair complexion, was granted the Thaneage of Glamis by King Robert II. Sir John later married the King’s daughter, Princess Joanna, with the present family descending directly from this union, a connection reflected in a crest of a noble lady surrounded by bay leaves. Their grandson was created Lord Glamis in 1445 and the royal connection continued over the centuries with the close involvement of the Lyon family with the monarchs of Scotland. Lord Glamis was created Left: The magnificent 1st Earl of Kinghorne in 1606 by James mile-long drive. Above V1 for his service as a privy councillor. centre: The Queen In 1677 the 3rd Earl of Kinghorne Mother’s childhood at Glamis provides its obtained another nobility and was styled royal connection. the Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne. It Above right: Patrick, was he who enlarged the castle from its Lord Glamis. simple tower to what it is today. Succeeding Earls continued the job of improvement, though it always remained a family home. The 9th Earl, John, married Mary Eleanor Bowes, a coal heiress from County Durham who was the richest woman in England, and the family name was changed to Bowes Lyon. The 10th and 11th Earls
improved the agricultural aspects and the overall layout of the estate, with the central avenue established shortly after 1810. The 13th Earl, Claude, was responsible for building the walled garden, covering five acres to the north of the castle, but it was the Queen Mother’s parents who fashioned the fabulous Italian Garden. With its avenues of pleached beech and clipped yews and glorious borders, it is a horticultural delight. The castle is a five-storey building on the banks of the meandering Dean Water near Forfar, in the foothills of the Angus Glens. Set in open parkland, the approach from the gates is a mile long up a majestic formal avenue flanked by oaks, ash, horse chestnut and sycamore trees dating from the 18th century. Two lead statues of James VI and Charles I act as guardians before reaching the main entrance. Once inside the castle, there is a curious mix of the medieval and the Victorian. Duncan’s hall, where weapons would be removed, is the main entrance, before moving up to the crypt. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 69
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Glamis Castle
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Mystery surrounds the death of King Malcolm II, who died at Glamis in 1034, either from murder, a hunting accident or wounds sustained in a fight
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This is the oldest part of the castle and is full of arms and armour from a bygone era. It is here that the family would have received royal visitors from Mary, Left: Weapons were Queen of Scots to the stored in the crypt. Much Old Chevalier, James of the castle was built in VIII. It is here, so legend the 1600s, but the crypt may date from the 1300s. has it, that the ghost Above: The dining room. of ancient ‘Earl Beardie’ can be heard playing cards behind a bricked-up wall. It is said he was left there as a punishment for refusing to stop playing cards on the Sabbath. Above the crypt is the Great Hall, which is now the Drawing Room. This is an imposing room hung with portraits of previous earls; many are magnificent works by artists of international repute, such as Jacob de Wet. The fireplace was built shortly after 1603, is guarded by two magnificent Glamis Lions and is one of the grandest in Scotland. A homely touch are the two little chairs on the hearth where the royal princesses, Elizabeth and Margaret, used to sit. King Malcolm’s Room adjoins the Drawing Room, and is named in memory of Malcolm II who died at Glamis in 1034. Like so much here, mystery surrounds his death, which was either from murder, a hunting accident or wounds from a fight. The chapel, which leads off the Drawing Room, is said to be one of the finest in Northern SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 71
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Europe. It features more decorative paintings by Jacob de Wet, such as his depiction of the Last Supper, is well-lit and has an intimate atmosphere, though it is said to be haunted by the Grey Lady of Glamis. Every castle in Scotland must have its resident ghost but this one appears to have more than most. The Dining Room was built in the 1850s by craftsmen from the English borderlands. The history of the family is told in the stained glass windows and the wood panelling, using heraldic shields of the arms of the Bowes family from County Durham, and the Lyons from Angus. The walls are adorned with fine portraits, including a full-length painting of Patrick, Lord Glamis, as an officer in the Scots Guards. These great state rooms contrast with the informal and relaxed atmosphere of the billiard room, with tapestries by Thomas Poyntz dating from the 1680s. Then there Top left: Timothy, 16th Earl of Strathmore. are the private apartAbove: Ornate wooden ments of King George panelling. Right: Current VI and Queen Elizabeth. Lord Strathmore and The sitting room has his son. Far right: The chapel has paintings by a cosy feel with silver Jacob de Wet. framed photographs of the Royal Family. Portraits of the Queen Mother by Philip de Laszlo
The chapel, one of the finest in Northern Europe, is said to be haunted by the Grey Lady of Glamis
and Michael Noakes adorn her bedroom. Offset is the King’s study and dressing room with desk tucked away in the corner. In addition to running Glamis Castle the current Earl has another string to his bow. Lord Strathmore is more likely to be found behind the counter of his traditional hardware shop, David Irons & Sons, in nearby Forfar – a modern occupation for a man with such an ancient and regal lineage.
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Glamis Castle
IF WALLS COULD TALK Glamis Castle
MONEY Since 1987 an illustration of the castle has featured on the reverse side of £10 notes issued by the Royal Bank of Scotland. ROYALTY Princess Margaret, the Queen’s sister, was born at Glamis. ARCHITECTS Opinion is split on whether Glamis was redesigned by England’s Inigo Jones or the king’s master mason William Schaw. WITCHCRAFT John Lyon, 6th Lord Glamis, married Janet Douglas at a time when King James V was feuding with the Douglases. In 1528 Janet was accused of treason for bringing Douglas supporters to Edinburgh, then charged with poisoning her husband, who had died three months earlier. Accused of witchcraft she burned at the stake in 1537. James V subsequently lived in Glamis. MONSTERS Legend says that the Monster of Glamis, a hideously deformed child born to the family, was kept in the castle all his life and his suite of rooms bricked up after his death. An alternative version is that to every generation of Lyons a vampire child is born and is walled up in that room. The legend was inspired by the true story of the Ogilvies. Somewhere in the 16-foot-thick walls is the famous room of skulls, where the Ogilvie family, who sought protection from their enemies the Lindsays, were walled up to die of starvation.
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Now the official magazine of the Standing Council of Scottish Chiefs, the new-look Scots Heritage magazine is an unbeatable read. With features on clans, genealogy, great Scots, the events which forged a nation, and a wealth of articles on Scottish history and culture, no other magazine is as successful at keeping Scots at home and abroad in touch with their heritage. To subscribe to Scots Heritage call the subscriptions number, fill out the form opposite and post to the relevant address or visit the website and click on subscribe. It couldn’t be easier.
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scots heritage
Words Alex Freeborn
Oz
Wizard of
virtually unheard of in scotland, John mcdouall stuart is regarded as australia’s greatest inland explorer
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The wizard of Oz
Stuart’s achievement took six unimaginably brutal expeditions that ultimately destroyed his health and broke his spirit
Above – courtesy of Adelaide Masonic Musuem
O
n 5 June 1866 seven people turned up to Kensal Green cemetery in London for the funeral of a small man who had finally succumbed to the ill-health that had plagued him for years. It is hard to believe that only three years earlier the wee Fifer was proclaimed a hero, had walked head-held-high down streets thronged with excited crowds cheering his name. He had been honoured with plaques and statues, and roads and societies had been named after him; not in Scotland but Australia. Scottish history often overlooks those heroic Scots who have helped to shape the cultures of nations across the world. This is certainly true of John McDouall Stuart, who is recognised and celebrated Down Under as one of its greatest explorers. He and his team were the first Europeans to successfully traverse the harsh and uncompromising Main image: Stuart 3,500km from Adelaide in south Australia forged a path through to Van Diemen Gulf in the north, in the the unrelenting Australian bush. Above: process opening up the continent to vital trade and communication networks. HowJohn McDouall Stuart. ever, it was also an achievement that took six unimaginably brutal expeditions that ultimately destroyed his health and broke his spirit. The youngest of nine children, Stuart was born on 7 September 1815 in Dysart, Fife. His father, SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 77
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William, a customs officer, and mother Mary both died when Stuart was a teenager and he was brought up by relatives. He graduated from the Scottish Naval and Military Academy as a civil engineer and secured a job as a clerk in a shipping firm. However, due to a combination of a thirst for adventure and a broken heart – he witnessed his fiancé kissing another man – in 1838 Stuart boarded the 422-ton barque Indus which departed from Dundee on its maiden voyage to Australia. Tragically, he never spoke to his fiancé again; if he had, he would have discovered that the kiss was the innocent departure of two cousins. Standing 5ft 6in tall and weighing nine stone, even then 23-year-old Stuart was described by his fellow passengers as ‘delicate’. However, he did have a stubborn streak that would become Left: Portrait of John integral to the scrawny Scotsman’s sucMcDouall Stuart. Above: cess. His birthplace, Dysart The Indus arrived in South Australia in Fife. Top right: South shore of Lake Eyre. – then only three years old and a crowded, dusty outpost of tents and dry-floored huts – on 21 January 1839, and found work as a public surveyor and then as draughtsman for the famous Surveyor-General Charles Sturt. During this time he also befriended William Finke and
Left – courtesy of Adelaide Masonic Musuem, top – Kilnburn
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James Chambers, who both would later finance Stuart’s expeditions. Land surveyed by Stuart was bought by Chambers, who then ran thousands of cattle across them. In 1854, Stuart discovered copper at Oratunga and Chambers and Finke started a mine. By this time finding virgin country had become a livelihood and an obsession for Stuart. In 1844 Stuart set off on an expedition with Charles Sturt to discover a great inland sea that was thought to sit at the unknown centre of the Australian continent. However, the expedition was a failure, with both Sturt and Stuart almost dying of scurvy. The first of the expeditions to explore central Australia led by Stuart was in 1858. Sponsored by William Finke, Stuart took a small team of men, six horses and supplies for six weeks. After four months in the bush they returned home starving, but having successfully discovered 40,000 square miles of sheep country, with permanent water in what Stuart named Chambers Creek. More importantly for Stuart, he had discovered a series of water sources that would allow him to continue his forays deeper to the centre of Australia. Stuart’s second and third expeditions were to properly survey the land around Chambers Creek but the fourth, sponsored by Chambers in 1859, had a much loftier goal: to cross the continent
They pushed into the drought-ridden interior, suffering horribly from scurvy, bleeding gums and sand blight
from south to north. At the time there was intense rivalry between the governments of New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia to be the first hub for an extension of the telegraph line from India. The government of South Australia had offered a reward of £2,000 for the first person to find an overland route for the telegraph, a task Chambers believed Stuart could achieve. That summer Stuart and his men surveyed 8,000 square miles, going without water for days at a time. Stuart suffered terrible eye problems caused by glare and flies but he never displayed weakness, and after days on half rations many of his men gave up apart from William Kekwick, who Stuart described as ‘everything I could wish a man to be’. Returning to Chambers Creek, Kekwick found thirteen new horses, another volunteer and a further three months of rations and they set off again in March 1860. Despite rain destroying their food supplies and the need to halve rations once again, they pushed into the drought-ridden interior. The men soon began suffering from scurvy, bleeding gums and sand blight, with Stuart losing the use of his right eye. Undettered, he pushed forward on his faithful horse Polly deeper into uncharted territory. On the way he discovered beautiful creeks, which he named the Finke River, remarkable geological formations and mountain ranges he named the MacDonnell Ranges. Continuing north, Stuart discovered a permanent rock-hole he named Anna’s Reservoir after Chambers’ youngest daughter. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013 79
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On 22 April 1860 they reached the centre of Australia, where Stuart ‘marked a tree and planted the British flag in the centre’. This was later named Mount Stuart. He was now further north from Adelaide than any European had ever been but was determined to push further north. However, after a torrid few weeks battling through impenetrable scrub, desperately low on water, they were forced to turn back. Ravaged by hunger, sick with scurvy and mostly blind, Stuart and his team stumbled back to Chambers Creek. The Royal Geographic Society rewarded Stuart with the Patron’s Medal. Determined to complete his mission, in 1861 Stuart assembled eleven men, forty-six horses and rations for thirty weeks for his fifth expedition. At one point the central plain was so arid the men had to dig for water. A week later Stuart found a treacherous route through the MacDonnell Ranges to a plain he named after Charles Sturt and, after another desperate two weeks, he discov-
ered a further expanse of water. However, after a further five weeks on the Sturt Plains, Stuart conceded that they could neither be crossed or skirted and in July 1861 they headed home. Undeterred, and with last minute government support, Stuart left Adelaide in October 1861 on his sixth and final expedition. Unfortunately, during the drunken send-off, an inebriated Stuart had his hand crushed by a horse and lost the use of it completely. Nonetheless, the party, consisting of Thring, Keckwick, Auld, King, Frew, Nash, Billiatt, Jeffries, the saddler, and McGorrerey, the farrier, set off with seventy-one horses. Six months later, when they reached the hostile Sturt Plain, Stuart used all of his experience and skill to take a more deliberate approach, eventually navigating a route into the Northern Territories in July 1862, nine months after setting off. They followed the Chambers River for 150 miles, which brought with it the additional problem of mosquito-ridden swampland with rank grass that made the horses ill. However, on 24 July 1862 their efforts were finally rewarded with the sight of the north coast of Australia. Thring, hardly containing his excitement, shouted to the others ‘The sea! The sea!’ Stuart wrote that the rest of the men, ‘at length understanding what was meant commenced cheering at a terrible rate which lasted some time.’ Stuart was the first onto the beach, weakly crossing the sand to splash the waters of the Indian Ocean onto his exhausted face. The following day they cleared a space
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The wizard of Oz
around a tree and nailed a Union Jack to its highest branch. Across the centre of the flag was Stuart’s name, embroidered months earlier by Chambers’s wife, Elizabeth. A paper bearing the party’s names and signatures was buried in an air-tight tin case at the foot of the tree. Ravaged with hunger the party was eager to get back to Adelaide. However, with the horses weak and the men exhausted it was only Stuart’s stubbornness and determination that got them home alive. By now Stuart was almost blind and could barely stay on his horse, appointing Kekwick leader and Thring as chief guide to lead them back to Adelaide. With his condition deteriorating, on 18 October 1862 Stuart wrote in his journal: ‘While taking a drink of water, I was seized with a violent fit of vomiting blood and mucus, which lasted about five minutes and has nearly killed me. I have kept King and Nash with me in case of my dying during the night, as it would be lonely for one young man to be there by himself ’. Against all odds, Stuart survived and on 27 November 1862 the ragged, dishevelled group of starving men and emaciated horses stumbled into
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Stuart had successfully taken the centre line through the vast Australian continent, south to north and back again
Mount Margaret in South Australia, with Stuart being carried on a litter. Miraculously, after a short rest and food, Stuart was back in the Saddle and they soon reached Chamber Creek. A station owner’s son wrote of Stuart’s return, ‘Oh, he is such a funny little man, he is always drunk. Do you know, once, when he got to one of Papa’s stations, on coming off one of his long journeys, he shut himself up in a room, and was drunk for three days’. On 21 January 1863 the party was welcomed into Adelaide as heroes. The government proclaimed a holiday, crowds lined the streets and banners and flags were hung from buildings. The dishevelled party made its way through the streets to be honoured at a public banquet for achieving what many had thought impossible: Stuart and his companions had taken the centre line through the vast Australian continent, south to north and back again. The expedition party and its patrons were all handsomely rewarded for their achievements. And whilst Stuart received the £2,000 reward, he was lonely and restless. Unable to read, ride or Clockwise from top sleep, his hand crippled and virtually blind, left: The McDonnell he left Austrialia in April 1864 to recover in Range; the unveiling of London, where he stayed with his sister and a statue of Stuart; an excerpt from his diary; her husband. And although the Australexpedition members; ian Government gave Stuart an additional planting the Union Jack £1,000 in recognition of his services to on Mount Stuart, 1860. Australia, he never properly recovered from the deprivation and torture that the bush inflicted on him, a rather sad end to the life of a truly remarkable Scot. In 2014 an expedition by Allied veterans will retrace Stuart’s steps for charity. www.backoutthere.org or www.thestuartexpedition.org
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Words Tim Siddons Images Angus Blackburn
gold Going for
For gEORGE MACIVER gold PANning IN SCOTLAND’S RIVERS is a labour of love
T
he equipment used to pan for gold hasn’t changed much since the time of the first gold rush over 200 years ago. ‘All you need is a shovel, a gold pan, a garden riddle and waterproofs’ explains George Maciver, who became hooked after being invited to a gold panning weekend at Kildonan Burn – scene of a famous ‘gold rush’ in 1868/9 – near his home village of Brora in Sutherland. ‘It’s a really social activity and it also keeps me fit’. That was six years ago, and since then the writer and photographer has built up quite a large, and valuable, collection of gold flakes and nuggets from a number of Scottish rivers. ‘My biggest single find was a two-gram gold nugget. But there’s nothing very big in Scotland’. Maciver is also quick to point out that there’s no money to be made in gold panning. ‘I have spent more in petrol and travelling to build up the collection; if I sold it I wouldn’t recoup my costs’, he laughs. There is a specific technique to gold panning that’s pretty simple to learn, ‘but what most people probably don’t realise is that it is also physically demanding’, says Maciver. ‘You literally have to shift a few tons of rock and gravel just to find a few flakes of gold’. As well as Kildonan Burn, other well known gold panning areas include Tyndrum and the Buccleuch estate at Leadhills and Wanlockhead, for which you will need a licence. ‘Each river has its own type of gold’, explains Maciver. ‘The gold at Tyndrum is about 15 carats, whilst it’s much purer – around 22 carats – at Kildonan, and I believe the gold that comes out of Borland Glen, near Dollar, is purer still’. ‘There are other, more secret places’, says Maciver, ‘but a lot of landowners don’t allow gold panners on their estates because of the economic and environmental impact on estate activities and salmon spawning sites, amongst other things’. For that reason, Maciver has a special way of thanking the landowners and gamekeepers who have been generous enough to let him pan in their rivers. ‘I give those people a ring made from some of the gold I have taken from the river. You should see their faces when I do. It’s pure gold’.
‘‘ My biggest single find was a two-gram gold nugget
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Traditional artisans
Image: George Maciver.
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scots heritage
Words Ian Samson
Image: Portrait of Samuel Smiles by Sir George Reid.
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Winning Smiles
Smiles Winning
An inspiration to many successful and talented souls, samuel smiles was the godfather of the self-help book
I
t’s difficult to know where to start with a life as extraordinary as that of Samuel Smiles, the Victorian intellectual colossus whose doctrine of self-help continues to echo down through the ages. The Scot was a radical newspaper editor who led the charge for universal suffrage for all men over 21, who campaigned against ‘rotten boroughs’ and for the secret ballot, who championed pay for Members of Parliament, women’s suffrage and free trade, but who was implacably opposed to the prevailing laissez faire ideology. He also campaigned on issues as diverse as the need for nationalised railways and on his opposition to Home Rule for Ireland, while also writing 26 major books, of which 21 were hugely successful biographies of the age’s great thinkers and industrialists. In short, he became one of the most feted figures of the Victorian age, yet this was not because he pushed for Parliamentary reform, but because Smiles was the founder of an astonishingly successful self-help movement which stressed the citizen’s responsibility to improve his or her own lot through their own efforts. Not only did his writ-
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ings fire the imagination and industry of countless Scots, but his genius ignited a galaxy of international entrepreneurs and even sparked the birth of the success movement across the USA. ‘Heaven helps those who help themselves,’ rang in the ears of Victorian Britain. It was just one of the well-tried and trusted maxims trumpeted by Smiles to power up the population. And they loved him for it. Smiles’ beliefs were forged by his own upbringing as the eldest of eleven children born in 1812 in Haddington, East Lothian, the birthplace of Alexander II of Scotland and the fiery reformer John Knox. Leaving school at 14, he was apprenticed to a doctor and later studied medicine at Edinburgh University while his mother worked tirelessly at the family shop after his father was claimed by the cholera outbreak of 1832. Her thrift and belief that ‘The Lord will provide’ were to drive her son’s political philosophy from then on. His enthusiasm for parliamentary reform led him to abandon a career working as a GP, disregarding medicine to pursue his passion for politics. Scarcely out of his twenties, he was well on the way to
For Smiles the spirit of self-help he had encountered in young workers lay at the heart of personal development
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turning his back on any notion that political change alone was the answer to society’s ills and he urged people to search for solutions within themselves. Smiles saw progress in the shape of personal change, becoming an eager advocate of self-help. He set out to steep himself in the attitudes and values of individuals who had been rewarded with remarkable results solely by their own efforts. It struck him that such people were sparkling role models for the rest of us - surely crystal-clear examples of success in life must be the royal route to understanding industrial and business advancement. He noted that the great chemist, John Dalton, had precious little time for the title, ‘genius,’ preferring to see his outstanding achievements as merely the rightful reward for hard work and application. Even Sir Isaac Newton’s understanding of the notion of genius had been modest. ‘Constant thought about the solution of the problem’ had been his simple advice. And the no-nonsense formula for success according to the renowned painter, Sir Joshua Reynolds, had been merely, ‘Work! Work! Work!’ Smiles built up biographies of his favourite role models. When at length he published his first account of the inventor of the locomotive and modern railways, George Stephenson, it flew off the presses in tens of thousands and was seized on by an avid public. Yet, thrilled as he was by the enterprise and industry of the great and famous, Smiles was deeply moved by the self-helping spirit of many young working class folk. He felt impassioned to offer them support and encouragement. So he delivered a series of empowering talks to young artisans who had formed an evening school for mutual improvement. For Smiles, the spirit of self-help he had encountered in young workers lay at the heart of personal development. Success in life was surely born more out of hard work and perseverance than absurd accidents of birth and special talents. Sound advice and inspiring stories of achieveTop left: ‘Self-Help’ by Samuel Smiles. ment must hold the key to revolutionisLeft: Orison Swett Marden. Top: Lord Leverhulme. Middle: Enamelware by ing lives. Bernard Palissy. Above: Telescope by Those evening class lectures formed Sir William Herschel. the basis of his iconic work, Self-Help. 86 www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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Winning Smiles
Left: Smiles was the greatgreat-grandfather of Bear Grylls. Bottom right: Samuel Smiles.
Published in 1857, the book became a classic of its time and catapulted him into household name status. An endless succession of fascinating and inspiring anecdotes, jotted down over the years, was paraded before the reader. All preached industry, thrift and self-improvement and made heroes of anyone who embraced such sterling qualities. Self-Help fairly rippled with the spirit of the age and transformed Samuel Smiles into a publishing sensation. It certainly fired up the imaginations of go-ahead Victorians and before long ranked alongside the Bible as the second most prized book in British homes. Nor was its popularity confined to these shores. The vitality of its examples of the lives and characters of successful people appealed to hopeful readers around the world. The voice of inspiration and encouragement had struck a universal chord. Smiles published the book at his own expense and risk, and saw it sell a remarkable 20,000 copies in its first year, and more than quarter of a million by the time of his death in 1904. The supreme feature of Self-Help lay in the sheer variety of role models it offered as examples. Suddenly, the population had its eyes opened to the myriad ways individuals in all walks of life and social classes had carved out their own unique paths to success. Bernard Palissy had been little more than a poor potter when he threw his own furniture into a furnace to create his celebrated enamel ware and became master potter to the
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French royal family. Even the great Sir William Herschel, astronomer to the King of England, had begun life as a musician in a travelling orchestra. Perhaps the sky really was the limit. If others could achieve so much through resolve and perseverance, what could stop the working person? Here then was the key to fulfilling yearned-for dreams. Across the Atlantic, a young man from a poor family, Orison Swett Marden, devoured the message and set out to prove its point on a dramatic scale. ‘The little book was the friction which awakened the spark sleeping in the flint,’ Marden explained. He vowed to turn himself into the Samuel Smiles of America. True to his word, he founded Success Magazine and transformed himself into the architect of the modern success movement in the United States. But he was only one of a legion of world-wide successes who attributed their achievements to the empowering Scotsman. In Britain, the millionaire industrialist, Lord Leverhulme, and Frank Hornby, creator of the boys’ construction outfit Meccano, were prime examples. Self-Help was translated into a multitude of foreign languages, including Turkish, Arabic, Japanese and those of native India. In English-speaking countries, it profited from the same astonishing sales it enjoyed at home. The Japanese edition followed in British footsteps, becoming no less than the bible of western-inspired businessmen. In time, the work ethic that dominated the industrial revolution gave way to management science. But today the values of effective organisation are returning to an emphasis on self-awareness – time again for Samuel Smiles’ voice of inspiration, the proven powerhouse of outstanding enterprise.
Self-Help fairly rippled with the spirit of the age
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scots heritage
Words Charlie Thomson
Skye Kiss the
Spectacular scenery, a fascinating history and a diverse mix of traditional and contemporary culture makes Skye a truly special place
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Skye was recently voted the world’s fourth best island by National Geographic magazine
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Kiss the Skye
U
S news channel CNN has named Scotland as the number one tourist destination for 2013. And since Skye was recently voted the ‘world’s fourth best island’ by National Geographic magazine, no trip to Scotland would be complete without visiting the Isle of Skye. Skye is the largest island in the Inner Hebrides and the second largest in Scotland. With a population of around 2,500, Portree is the main settlement, Broadford is the main village in the south of the island and Kyleakin, on the east coast, is where the Skye Bridge links the island to the mainland. There are also a number of small, pretty villages, as well as crofting townships, such as Achnacloich, which has a sandy beach and lovely views.
Left: The climber’s mecca of the Old Man of Storr on the Trotternish peninsula.
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Below: Patrick Wang/Shutterstock, far left: David Hughes/Shutterstock
Kiss the Skye
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Skye is bursting with spectacular landscape and scenery, making it extremely popular with walkers. There is a range of walks across the island to suit all ages, experience and ability, although there are a number of challenging walks for which the fit and adventurous will be richly rewarded. The island is dominated by the Cuillins, a range of mountains right in the centre from which the island’s peninsulas radiate. The Black Cuillin includes no less than twelve Munros and extremely challenging terrain – the ascent of Sgurr a Ghreadaich, for example, is one of the longest rock climbs in Britain and has the only pinnacle in Britain that requires technical mountain climbing apparatus. Other parts of Skye also offer some wonderful sights. In the north-west there’s Glen Brittle, the mesmerising Fairy Pools and the stunning Lealt Gorge and
Skye is dominated by the Cuillins mountain range
Falls; in the north-east try the incredible rock pinnacles of the Quiraing, the Old Man of Storr – a spectacular 165-ft pinnacle – and the Rha Waterfall at Uig, a real hidden gem; in central Skye visit the lovely coastal scenery of the An Aird peninsula; and in the south there’s the pretty woodland walk to Armadale Hill. Skye also has some lovely beaches, including Staffin in the north and Camas Daraich in the south. Skye is also well known for its wildlife. The best spot for birdwatching is probably Broadford Bay, where you’ll see a variety of wildfowl, waders and other seabirds, as well as otters if you’re really lucky. Loch Dunvegan is also a great place to see common seals, and Left: Former MacDonald further inland a walk bastion Duntulm Castle. up Beinn Aslak could be Below: Sligachan bridge. rewarded with a sighting of ptarmigan or snow bunting. Skye is also home to sea eagles and a variety of marine
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mammals, including bottlenose dolphins and orcas. In the north-east you’ll also discover evidence of the first creatures to roam the island around 165 million years ago. Bearraig Bay is an excellent fossil-hunting spot, and look out for the dinosaur footprints at Staffin, which are apparently best seen after a winter storm. The Staffin Museum at Ellishadder has a large collection of dinosaur material. Whilst Skye’s landscape and wildlife is spectacular, it is equally rich in history, with hundreds of sites of archaeological and historic interest dotted throughout the island. There is evidence of the first human settlers at An Corran, a Mesolithic shell midden dated at around 6,500 BC. Above: Dunvegan At Annait in the north-west of Castle, the seat of the island there are the remains of Clan MacLeod for 800 years. Far right: Celtic an Iron Age promontory fort and cross. Right: The ruins at the mouth of the River Snizort of Cill Chriosd. is an island on which are the remains of what is believed to be the mother church of Skye founded by St Columba, and the site of Skye’s first Christian burial. The two most powerful clans on Skye were the MacLeods, based in the north, and the MacDonalds, based in the south. Dunvegan Castle has been the 92 www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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‘‘ Clockwise from top left: David Hughes/Shutterstock, Jan Holm/Shutterstock, Tomas Rebro/Shutterstock.
Look for dinosaur footprints at Staffin, which are best seen after a storm
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Above: Lighthouse at Neist Point. Left: The ruined Armadale Castle, home to the MacDonald Centre.
ancestral home of Clan MacLeod for 800 years, and is the oldest continually inhabited castle in Scotland. The Clan Donald Skye Visitor Centre at Armadale Castle takes you through 1,500 years of the history and culture of the area once known as the Kingdom of the Isles. Skye also has an important association with Bonnie Prince Charlie. After his defeat at Culloden in 1746 he fled to Skye dressed as an Irish serving
maid ‘Betty Burke’ with Flora Macdonald – an event that inspired the famous Skye Boat Song. Johnson and Boswell spent a month on the island during their famous tour, staying with Flora Macdonald – whose grave at Kilmuir cemetery is worth a visit – and with the chiefs of both the Macdonalds and the MacLeods at Armadale and Dunvegan Castle respectively. Skye’s more recent history is celebrated at the Skye Museum of Island Life in Kilmuir, a preserved township of thatched cottages typical of Skye in the 19th-century. South of Portree you’ll find the monument to the Battle of the Braes, fought between croft-
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Kiss the Skye
ISLAND TALES
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BATTLE OF THE BRAES When Skye’s landlords seized crofters’ grazing lands during the 1865 clearances, leaving only narrow strips of land, trouble was inevitable. In November 1881 the crofters demanded the return of the land to them, but instead received eviction notices. When angry crofters burned the eviction notices, 60 Glasgow policemen arrived and used physical force to arrest crofters in April 1882, sparking a full riot that needed 200 marines to quell. With unrest spreading throughout Scotland, the government was forced to act and created the Crofters Act of 1866. Songs are still sung about the victorious outcome of the Battle of the Braes.
women, including jewellers, potters and candlemakers. For such a small and remote part of the world, Skye has an embarrassment of riches when it comes to accommodation. The island has a wealth of hotels, B&Bs and self-catering properties to suit a range of budgets. Notable hotels include Duisdale House Hotel, Toravaig House, Kinloch Lodge Hotel and Cuillin Hills Hotel, all of which also offer an excellent dining experience. The famous Three Chimneys is also a must for any food lovers. So if you’re looking for breathtaking scenery, a rich and extraordinary history and authentic Scottish culture, Skye really is the place to be. The only problem you’ll have is that you just won’t want to leave.
BONNIE PRINCE CHARLIE’S ESCAPE After his Jacobite army was routed at Culloden in April 1746, Jacobite leader Charles Edward Stuart (or Bonnie Prince Charlie) fled the scene of the slaughter on Drumossie Moor. Along with two loyal men, Irish officers Felix O’Neil and John O’Sullivan, he was then smuggled across Scotland by Highland sympathisers. At one stage he masqueraded as Betty Burke, the maid of Flora MacDonald, in order to escape to Skye on a rowing boat. He then hid in cottages and caves until a French Frigate took him back to the safety of France. THE MACDONALD MASSACRE During the 1500s Skye was a vicious battlefield between the MacDonalds and the MacLeods. The violent skirmishes and raids came to a climax in 1578 when Trumpan Church was set on fire with an entire village’s congregation inside by a band of MacDonald clansmen. However, a single young girl managed to escape to sound an alarm by running ten miles to the next village, before dying of burns and injuries. Repercussions were swift as a MacLeod force hunted down the MacDonalds and proceeded to slaughter them all at ‘The Battle of the Spoiling of the Dyke’.
Top left:Luboslav Tiles/Shutterstock, Bottom left: Jaime Pharr/Shutterstock.
ers and around 60 policemen in 1882 after a dispute over high rents and grazing rights. Skye has an extremely vibrant cultural scene and has been at the forefront of the Scottish Gaelic revival. Students from all over the world attend Sabhal Mor Ostaig, the Gaelic college in Sleat, to study Gaelic language, arts and heritage. The island also attracts a range of artists and musicians. Bands such as Runrig and the Peatbog Faeries have managed to combine both traditional and modern music and the island’s landscape and wildlife has inspired writers including Sorley MacLean and John Buchan, and artists such as sculptor Laurence Broderick and painter Diana Mackie. The island also boasts a number of artisan craftsmen and
Three events on Skye that shaped Scottish history
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SCOTS heritage
Words Kirsten Waller
Meg
Right: Mons Meg could reduce any castle wall to rubble within a day of bombardment but was only used in five battles.
Mons
SCOTLAND’S MOST FAMOUS GUN IS EDINBURGH CASTLE’S MEDIEVAL WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION
M
ons Meg was a gift to James II by the Duke of Burgundy, a relative of his wife. Started in 1449, Meg was sent to James eight years later. Weighing six tons, over 15ft long, and able to fire canonballs of 400lbs, her size and strength gave Meg a ferocious reputation. However, she was only ever used in five battles and retired from active service in the 1540s. Such was her power that when a celebratory shot was fired to mark the wedding of Mary, Queen of Scots to the French Dauphin in 1558, pieces of cannon ball were found over two miles away in Wardie Mure, in the modern day district of Trinity. Cannon enthusiast James II imported several Flanders cannon for his siege of Roxburgh Castle in 1460. Unhappily, his favourite, nicknamed the ‘Lion’, exploded as he watched it fire. Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie recorded that ‘his thigh bone was dug in two with a piece of misframed gun that brake in shooting’ adding that the King ‘died hastily’. Despite its famous name, no reference was made to the cannon as ‘Mons Meg’ until 1678. Previous names include ‘Monss’, ‘Mounce in the castell’ and ‘Muckle Meg’. Meg is thought to be an allusion to Margaret of Denmark, who married James III, James II’s heir. Mons Meg was effectively neutered when she was removed from Edinburgh Castle in 1754, as a result of the panic created by the Jacobite rebellion. After nearly 80 years in England, she was sent back in 1829 after extensive campaigning by Walter Scott persuaded George IV to return her to her rightful setting. She sits there still, just next to St Mary’s Chapel, gazing across the city. 96 www.scotsheritagemagazine.com
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Artifacts
Weighing six tons, Mons Meg is over 15 feet long and is capable of firing cannonballs of 400lb
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s l i o p S of war
T
here is no getting away from it: the Battle of Flodden was probably the biggest and most comprehensive disaster in Scottish military history. Not only was a large Scottish army routed by the English exactly 500 years ago this year but the Scottish King, James IV, was killed with his body taken to England where further humiliations were heaped upon it. It might seem sensible, then, for Scots to wipe Flodden from their memories but something different has happened. A group of historical campaigners has launched a crusade which highlights Flodden by calling for the return of James IV’s weapons and jewellery - items which were ripped from his body by the victorious English Above: A contemporary commander at the end of the battle. image of King James IV before his defeat at What is most intriguing about this Flodden 500 years ago. campaign to reclaim the heritage of one Right: The disputed sword. of Scotland’s most unfortunate Stuart kings is the anger and bitterness it has aroused on both sides of the border. The seeds of the current dispute were sown on 9 September 1513 as King James IV lay dead on the
Flodden battlefield, just inside the English border, surrounded by the bodies of 10,000 of his men. James had been killed in a doomed attempt to reach the standard of the English commander, the Earl of Surrey, who then took his due reward in the form of James’ sword, dagger and a jewelled ring. The ring was particularly important because it had been given to James IV by the French Queen to help seal a pact between Scotland and France. It was that pact – part of the Auld Alliance between the two countries - which pushed James to invade England in an attempt to draw some of Henry VII’s troops away from their battles with France and which ultimately led to his death. After the battle, the weapons and ring became, under the rules of engagement at that time, war booty and the rightful possessions of the victorious commander, the Earl of Surrey, who then became the Duke of Norfolk in recognition of his success on the battlefield. So celebrated was his victory over the Scots that the Coat of Arms of the Duke of Norfolk was drawn up to reflect his success, showing the Lion of Scotland with an arrow through its mouth.
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Talking point
weapons and ring is ’s IV s me Ja ng Ki of te fa The th sides of the border bo on es ur at er mp te g in rais
Top left - Alamy, top right - The Royal College of Arms
Words Lachlan Macdonald Words Hamish Macdonell Image Paul Reid
James’ weapons and ring stayed with the Duke of Norfolk’s family for just one generation before they were gifted to the College of Arms in London, where they have stayed ever since. They have hardly ever been photographed or displayed and very few people even knew they were there – until the Scottish campaigners decided the 500th anniversary of Flodden was a good time to get them back to Scotland, at least on loan. And this is where the trouble started. First, a request was put in to the College of Arms for the return of the artefacts to Scotland, then a motion was tabled in the Scottish Parliament to
reinforce the request. But the College of Arms was unrepentant. Their experts had it on good authority, they insisted, that the weapons were not authentic, that they were crafted in the late 1500s so couldn’t possibly have belonged to James IV. The College also bridled at suggestions that the artefacts should be returned to Scotland permanently. Clive Cheesman, the Richmond Herald at the College of Arms and the resident expert on the artefacts, said: ‘Flodden is an important battle for the English as well as the Scots and these items – if they were real, which we dispute - were not stolen from Scotland. They became the rightful property of the Earl of Surrey at the end of the battle. That’s what happened in those days. Had the weapons been taken from Scotland in the 1920s, centuries after the battle, I could see the validity in a request for their return, but they became the rightful property of the victor 500 years ago.’ To reinforce its position (and hopefully put the matter to bed), the College of Arms commissioned a forensic examination of the weapons by Scottish historian and weapons expert Dr Ralph Moffat. The verdict suggested the weapons may not have belonged to James, as the campaigners believe, but it was ultimately inconclusive. Moffat concluded that the hilt of the sword was almost certainly from the late 1500s, as was the dagger, but he conceded that the blade of the sword may have come from the time of James IV. ‘The sword blade, however, may well be an older example that has been reused and refitted to the hilt,’ he stated. Far from deterring the Scottish campaigners, Moffat’s report emboldened them. Gary Stewart, vice-convener of the Society of William Wallace and a prime mover behind the repatriation project, said: ‘The hilt is not the most important part. They have admitted the blade might be from earlier. All they are doing with the hilt is perpetuating the negatives: saying it is not from the right era, rather than concentrating on the blade. It is a smokescreen, we’ve been down this road before.’ Stewart says the ring may be the key to the whole collection. ‘We are trying to get a French jeweller to look at it,’ he said. ‘If the Queen of France gave it to King James she would have used somebody she had used before. It will be like a painting, it will have distinctive marks of the person who designed it. I genuinely believe these are the real thing.’ The College of Arms has offered to loan the artefacts to a Scottish museum, if a formal request is lodged, but officials have also made it clear that this would be only for a temporary, agreed period before the items are returned to their vaults in London. Stewart wants the artefacts back in Scotland permanently ‘because they belonged to our king. They may have been the spoils of war but, in the current political climate, surely it would be a good gesture to return them to us. After all, the Stone of Destiny and the Wallace Letter were both taken as spoils of war but were returned,’ he said, suggesting that, even 500 years after the battle, there are some cross-border arguments over Flodden that are a long way from being resolved.
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These items were not stolen from Scotland. They became property of the Earl of Surrey at the end of the battle
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scots heritage
Words Jim Anderson Images John Paul
whisky In search of
when an American bought a crumbling highland hotel, his first task was to immerse himself in the water of life
I
t was a short phrase, but one that sent chills down my spine. The phrase was ‘about 200’, and was my wife, Anne’s, response to a question that would change our lives forever. We had just sold everything we owned and bought the family – pets and all – one-way tickets to Scotland. Our tie to the Old Country was not a strong one (my father’s mother moved to America from Fife when she was a young girl), but something was drawing us away from a safe, salaried existence
in Philadelphia to this strange and mystical land. The move was a healthy combination of careful execution and poor planning that placed us at the helm of a crumbling, nineteenth-century coaching inn in a storybook seaside village in the Highlands. On our first morning here – jet-lagged and coffeeless – we were like a pair of well-groomed deer staring motionless into the oncoming headlights. Anne’s cathartic phrase was part of an impromptu business plan that we decided to forge
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Whisky
Left: The Anderson’s whisky specials board. Below: Jim Anderson, font of whisky knowledge.
while loosening our aprons in the brief respite between breakfast and lunch. Our remote Black Isle location demanded that we attract customers, and what better way to do so than to have a good selection of whisky? When we arrived, there were fifteen singlemalt Scotches already on the shelves (I learned quickly to call them ‘malts’), but there wasn’t enough variety or rarity to interest anyone. ‘How many do you think we should have?’ I asked, innocently, wishing there was a Starbucks nearby. That’s when she said it: ‘about 200’. I remembered a thing or two about whisky from my bartending days, but that was about it. I knew, for example, that in Scotland, the drink is spelled without an ‘e’. And that it’s alright to drink it with water. But adding 185 malts to our shelves on a shoestring budget in the ancestral home of uisge beatha was going to create a learning curve of intimidating steepness. So, we set about doing what any newcomer does: we began looking around. Using whisky as an itinerary, we zeroed in on one distillery after another, winding our way down secret, verdant driveways, knocking on solid, ancient back doors and asking if there were any bottles lying about with an inch of dust on them. Each distillery presented another face of Scotland: the stately homes surrounding Strathisla in Keith; Pulteney perched proudly in the midst of Wick’s tidy working-class townhouses; queues of cars with ignitions off while they waited for disorganised flocks of woolly-white sheep to cross stony single-track roads on the way to Talisker. As we criss-crossed this new home of ours we were struck by Scotland’s Tardis-like vastness. Within the space of only a few miles lush, wooded glens turned into eerie, treeless plains of rock
and heather before suddenly ending in sheer, craggy cliffs buffeted by the surging tides far below. This vastness is echoed in the wide range of flavours of Scotland’s malts. Our learning curve began to relax in a glow of warm happiness as each new glass was put in front of us, as we received the same unfailing, hospitable welcome at every distillery we visited. Although it is possible to explain differences between Scotland’s malts through geology and physics, we prefer the pastoral romance that overcomes us still whenever we travel through whisky country. It’s as if the whisky speaks in an intoxicating tongue of each region’s terrain and people: the austere saltiness of the northern Highlands, the uncompromising ruggedness of the West Coast & Hebrides, the staunch earthiness of Islay, the lyrical balance of the Lowlands and rolling, grassy sweetness of Speyside. And, to our delight, nearly every distillery had secreted away some wonderful, rare bottles, each with its own story. Naturally, these canny Scots were saving the best stuff for themselves. As we approached the magic number of malts, the choice became strangely more difficult. I truly agonised over the final five bottles. But I needn’t have done so. True to that typically Scottish blend of loyalty and steel-trap memory, I began to get phone calls that eventually nudged our whisky collection well over the 250-bottle mark. These calls were from whisky fanatics (now good friends) whom I’d long-ago asked to keep an eye open for a particular malt, and who inevitably would have another unusual bottle on hand that I might be interested in. Suddenly, 200 malts – like life in the Highlands itself – didn’t seem so intimidating any more. Jim and Anne Anderson own The Anderson restaurant with rooms in Fortrose. www.theanderson.co.uk
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Q What is a kelpie? A Kelpies were said to be mythical shape-shifters who haunt the lakes and lochs of the Scottish countryside. They most often take the appearance of magnificent horses, in black or grey with seal-like skin, and lure children onto their backs in order to drown and then eat them. However, the kelpie can also appear as an attractive woman to lure men to the same fate. They are known as ‘nuggles’ on Orkney and ‘shoopiltees’, ‘njogels’ or ‘the tangi’ on Shetland.
Q Who invented bagpipes? A Though famous as a Scottish institution, bag-
Q What is the Scottish Independence Referendum? A This is a question which will be put to the people of Scotland in September 2014, asking them ‘should Scotland be an independent country?’ The verdict of the majority of Scottish residents will determine whether Scotland remains in the Union with England, established in 1707, or begins negotiations to cut ties and become a wholly separate country.
pipes are thought to have originated in the Middle East, in modern day Turkey. The earliest depiction of bagpipes has been found on a Hittite sculpture dating from 1000 BC. They are also believed to have been present in the Roman Empire at the time of Nero before beginning to spread through the rest of Europe in the second millennium. There is no written record of bagpipes being used in Scotland until 1547, when a French source mentions their use at the battle of Pinkie Cleugh.
Q What is the Order of the Thistle? A A chivalric order, which was first founded in 1687 by James VII of Scotland, though he claimed at the time to be reviving an older order. The Order has sixteen members as well as the current monarch, and membership is granted by the King or Queen alone – there is no involvement from other government departments. 102
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Questions & Answers
Q What
are the lyrics of Flower of Scotland about?
A
Although written in 1967, Flower of Scotland harks back to a time long past. The song tells of the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, when a much smaller Scottish force, famously led by Robert the Bruce, successfully routed the army of Edward II. Bannockburn saw the end of the English Plantagenet king’s attempts to wholly conquer Scotland – at least for a time. Below is the text for both the first and last verses:
O Flower of Scotland, When will we see Your like again That fought and died for Your wee bit hill and glen. And stood against him, Proud Edward’s army, And sent him homeward To think again.
Q What happened at Kirk O’Fields? A Kirk O’Fields was the sight of a church and several clerical houses, located just inside the Edinburgh city walls. It was here in 1567 that Lord Darnley, the second husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, was brutally murdered. The house at the site suffered a violent explosion on the morning of February 10 and the top floor was almost completely destroyed. However, the bodies of Darnley and his servant were found in the garden, with no sign of being damaged by the blast; smothering being the most likely cause of death. Mary married Darnley in 1565 after something of a whirlwind romance but both she and the Scottish nobles began to tire of his arrogance. Rumours at the time had it that Mary had helped murder her husband, though this has never been conclusively proven. There is some debate as to where the site is located in modern day Edinburgh. Historians have long believed it to be underneath Edinburgh University’s Old College, but an excavation in 2002 suggested that the Kirk was closer to the Cowgate.
Q What
is the history of the cross of St Andrews?
A
On a headland to the north of St Andrews stand the ruins of St Andrews Castle which was the official residence of Scotland’s leading bishop (and later archbishop) throughout the Middle Ages – it has quite a bloody history! Cardinal Beaton is the castle’s most infamous resident. In 1546 he imprisoned preacher George Wishart then burnt him at the stake in front of the castle walls (his initials still mark the spot). Wishart’s allies gained entry to the castle disguised as stone masons, murdered the Cardinal and suspended his body from the castle walls by one arm and one leg to form the St Andrews Cross.
Q Who
was the last person to be executed in Scotland?
A Henry John Burnett was hung in Aberdeen in 1963 for the murder of Thomas Guyan. Guyan’s wife had left him for Burnett, but later returned to her husband due to Burnett’s increasingly controlling behaviour. Driven by jealousy, Burnett went over to Guyan’s flat with a shotgun and shot his love rival in the face at point blank range, killing him instantly. The jury took just 25 minutes to deliver their verdict and both the victim and the accuser’s families campaigned for the death penalty not to be implemented, to no effect. SCOTS heritage autumn 2013
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In print A selection of literature to ensure that your reading has a truly Scottish perspective Scottish Fossils By Nigel Trewin An intriguing book suited to both those with a knowledge of fossils or those with just a passing interest. A virtual museum consisting of over 100 of Scotland’s finest specimens from public museums to private collections. Within these pages one can expect to see rare and mysterious fossils that are seldom seen by the public and more commonly found examples.
Dunedin Academic Press £30.00
Found At Sea By Andrew Greig This unusual but enjoyable short story, originally adapted from a sequence of poems, tells in a poetic sequence the tale of a Scottish man and his voyage from Stromness in Scapa Flow to Cava, a mysterious island whose previous residents were two equally mysterious women. The tale expands on the protagonist’s personal journey of discovery in the increasingly dangerous conditions and how it affects his outlook on life.
Arran: A History By Thorbjørn Campbell This well-written book follows the history of the island of Arran which has seen some dramatic moments in history, such as the Viking invasions and was a key location for Robert the Bruce’s triumphant vengeance. As well as these turbulent times, the book tells the tale of how the island has played a part in the revolution in farming from the ancient ‘runrig’ style. A must read for anyone with a connection to, or interest in Arran.
Birlinn £10.99
Polygon £8.99
Simply Scottish Cakes & Bakes By Karon Grieve This cookbook, written by an experienced chef who regularly features on the BBC, gives a second-to-none set of tutorials on how to cook some delicious Scottish cakes and bakes in the comfort of your own home. The pages are filled with professional directions and mouth-watering photographs as well as suggestions on the optimum presentation of these tasty treats.
Forth Books £9.99
AJ Cronin – The man who created Dr Finlay By Alan Davies This is the first authoritative biography of Cronin, the creator of some of the best-loved novels of the mid-twentieth century, and on the whole Davies has done a good job teasing out the inner man and separating fact from fiction. Much of the latter surrounds Cronin, a doctor who endured a difficult childhood in Scotland and a tempestuous relationship with his publishers.
Alma Books £20 104
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The Battle of Flodden 1513 By John Sadler & Rosie Serdiville A journey back in time to the great battle that took place 500 years ago. This book is a well informed account of the battle which saw the Scottish King James IV head south into England with a force of 30,000 men in order to split the English forces between Scotland and their old ally - the French. The book covers the entire campaign including deployment and tactics.
The History Press £16.99
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Books
A Season in Strathglass By John Fowler The descriptive prose takes the reader straight into the Highland glens of Strathglass. Effectively describing the true beauty of the area as well as giving a glimpse into the lives of the Highlanders who live there. The author shows a deep love for the Scottish countryside.
Birlinn £8.99
The Caledonian: Scotland’s Imperial Railway By David Ross Columba’s Iona By Rosalind K Marshall This book charts the fascinating history of Iona, the isolated Island off the west coast of Scotland that was the gateway for Christianity to enter the county. The author tells the story of what has befallen the community there in a well-researched book that contains information catering to anyone interested in Scottish spirituality. It also holds the results of some of the recent interesting archaeological research carried out on the island.
Sandstone Press £17.99
Ross has made use of a variety of sources such as journals and newspapers from the time to create this collection of information on the development of the great Caledonian railway. This guide contains well expressed information and illustrations and is a great read for anyone with a desire to know more about the original railways of Scotland.
Stenlake Publishing Limited £30.00
Applauding Thunder By Simon Berry Alexander Smith was a poet from the impoverished Calton district of Glasgow. A pattern-cutter in a muslin factory, Smith led the so-called Spasmodic School. Attacked for his unconventional style and lack of scholarship, his 1853 opus, A Life in Drama was nevertheless compared to Keats and Byron. His career was finished by orchestrated accusations of plagarism, with Berry’s thought-provoking biography revealing much about attitudes towards class in Victorian Scotland.
For the Right Reasons Press £12.99
Tom Weir: An Anthology Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Hamish Brown ByByxxxxxxxx
An engaging collection of Coles’ essays and articles to from of the most Edinburgh-based William follow-up Theone Well-Tempered famous Scottish TV figures. The author takes extracts from Weir’s Clavier is an entertaining romp about a journalist who falls for an publishedbeautiful writings and presents themthe to provide of the life intelligent, woman despite fact thata time she’sline happily of this greatwith man.another The book covers manyfast-paced hikes as well as his embroiled man. This Weir’s is a witty, romance television career and also the impact the war had on his aspirations. which neatly teases out some eternal truths about the nature of A great insight into the life of an extremely interesting man. love.
Sandstone Press xxxxxxxxxxx £14.99 £8.99 Winchman By Chris Murray This entertaining and well-written autobiography recounts the intriguing and exciting life story of an ex-navy diver who becomes a winchman on a search and rescue helicopter in the Western Isles and north of Scotland. The book explains the incredible story of the hardships of Murray’s career, and reveals how he won the Queen’s Gallantry Medal.
Fledgling Press £11.99
A Reed Shaken by the Wind By Gavin Maxwell This beautifully written book marks the beginning of Maxwell’s love affair with otters, but also provides an invaluable record of the lives of the Marsh Arabs of Iraq. Travelling with the legendary explorer Wilfred Thesiger, Maxwell successfully managed to capture the essence of this mysterious society, with the end result proving to be as enjoyable as it is important and enduring.
Eland Publishing Limited £12.99 SCOTS heritage autumn 2013
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The History of St Kilda By Kenneth Macaulay This historic travelogue is a fascinating snapshot into the lives of the 88 islanders – and the wildlife that they existed alongside and depended upon – on St Kilda in 1763 at the time of Macaulay’s visit. Its praise for the strength of the people is as vivid as when the book was first published 150 years ago.
Polygon £7.99
Diaries of an Adventure Queen: An American in Scotland By Robin Smith This diary-style book tells the tale of an American woman travelling to Scotland with her best friend to visit a family castle. The book tells of their journey and what they get up to in Scotland including meeting a mysterious handsome stranger along the way. This would make a nice light-hearted holiday read for anyone planning to tour Scotland.
Self-published £5.29
Charlie Meg and Me By Gregor Ewing An excellent account of the author and his dog’s expedition following the path taken by Bonnie Prince Charlie’s as he fled the English after the battle of Culloden. Ewing manages to successfully mix historic facts with his own experiences on the 530-mile trail, making for an entertaining and informative read. The book should hold the interest of any history lover as well as reflecting the first-hand experiences of a hiker.
An American Caddie in St Andrews By Oliver Horovitz If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to spend a gap year as a caddie in St. Andrews, worry no longer! This book is the hilarious memoir of the author’s time working on the most famous golf course in the world. The book goes on to mention his studies at Harvard and how he’s always hankered to be back in St Andrews every year. A great read for a golfer.
Gotham £18.99
Luath Press £9.99
Scotland’s Choices By Iain McLean, Jim Gallagher & Guy Lodge Scotland’s Choices is a handbook about the coming referendum that details the possibilities and the known facts about what will happen to Scotland if its people choose independence. It’s an extremely in-depth guide to making an informed choice when it comes to voting in the referendum, which will prove useful to anyone who is as yet undecided about the right way forward for Scotland.
Edinburgh University Press £12.99
Scotland: History of a Nation By David Ross This book provides a potted history of Scotland. Illustrations are mixed with the facts and sources to create an easy to follow and understand book that successfully conveys the history of Scotland, including many events that are not normally covered in textbooks. The guide is succinct and approachable while remaining detailed enough to ensure that there are no gaping holes in the story of a nation.
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The Ancient Pinewoods of Scotland By Clifton Bain Scotland was once covered by ancient Caledonian pinewoods, and conservationist Bain sets out to visit the remaining vestiges of what was a vibrant ecosystem. He traces an emotional connection to that past through those who work in the woods, and finds trees up to 350 years old. Beautifully illustrated, accessible and well-written, this ia a gem for nature lovers.
Sandstone Press £24.99
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Music
In tune A round-up of the latest Scottish and Celtic music releases. All available from www.musicscotland.com To Each And Everyone – The Songs of Gerry Rafferty (CD) Barbara Dickson A tribute to Gerry Rafferty’s music by top recording artist Dickson, delivered in her unique style with the help of the producer and multi-instrumentalist Troy Donockley. Dickson was a friend of the late Gerry Rafferty and this album is her personal tribute to the Scot’s music and skill as a singer/ songwriter after Rafferty passed away in 2011.
Elements (CD) The Paul McKenna Band A third album on the Greentrax label with fresh, innovative arrangements. Staying true to their traditional roots the contemporary approach to songs results in an exciting, dynamic sound.
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
Mysterious Boundaries (CD) Tony McManus Top guitar master Tony McManus explores classical music in this album and demonstrates the diversity of his repertoire. A collection of classical pieces from a variety of composers including Bach, Monteverdi, Satie, Couperin and Granados. McManus turned professional just over ten years ago and since then he has toured the world and already has a massive following.
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
The Flooers O’ The Forest – Songs And Music Of Flodden (2CD)
To mark the 500th Anniversary of the Battle of Flodden, this album is dedicated to the memory of all those who fell in battle, September 1513. This album features the Songs and Music of Flodden, and includes a ‘FREE’ CD of Poetry and Prose of Flodden. The poems and prose are read by BBC Radio Scotland presenter Iain Anderson, the actor John Shedden, and Alastair McDonald.
500 Sessions (CD) Fullsceilidh Spelemannslag The long awaited second album from this talented folk band from Shetland. This energetic, fiddle-led group unleashes a maelstrom of melodies backed up by an impressive rhythm section.
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
Hebrides – Islands on the Edge (CD) Donald Shaw
This CD is the official soundtrack as featured on the hit BBC TV series ‘Hebrides – Islands On The Edge’ composed by Donald Shaw. Shaw is one of Scotland’s top musicians, composers and producers. The album features orchestral arrangements composed by Shaw, along with first-class musicians from the traditional music scene resulting in beautifully atmospheric celtic music.
£11.69 UK & EU or £9.74 USA & ROW
Silver Darlings (CD) Da Shanty Yellmen Songs fresh from the sea sung by the most northerly shanty group in the UK. The Shanty Yellmen reside on the islands of Yell and Unst in Shetland.
£12.48 UK & EU or £10.40 USA & ROW SCOTS heritage autumn 2013
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Our hand crafted Scottish clan crest badges are made of solid sterling silver and painstakingly finished to a high lustre, fine jewelry quality.
www.crestbadges.com
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Puzzles
Puzzles pit your wits against our scottish quiz
Where are we?
Guess the year 1. Sir Alexander Fleming dies at the age of 73.
2. Cumbernauld is designated a New town.
A burgh in the Scottish Borders, it lies on the north bank of the River Tweed. It was the location where Edward I invaded Scotland in 1296. They have an impressive bridge that crosses the Tweed. It was a popular place during the 18th and 19th centuries for runaway marriages, much like Gretna Green. They have a football team, formed in 1895, and the home matches are played at Home Park. It is also home to the oldest regiment in the regular army, originating in 1650.
3. The Scottish Cup is won by Clyde, who defeat Celtic in a replayed final.
Who said? ‘Iona of my heart, Iona of my love, instead of monks’ voices shall be lowing of cattle, but ere the world comes to an end, Iona shall be as it was.’
4. Television presenter Kirsty Wark is born
Word search
Sprauchle
5. Jimmy Shand has a Top 20 hit with his traditional country dance classic ‘Blue Bell Polka.’
How many English words can you make from the word above? We can find 376. Try to find as many as possible. Words must be at least three letters. 100 words: good, 200 words: excellent, 300 words or more: you are a genius
Answers: Where are we? – Coldstream. Who said? – Saint Columba. Guess the year – 1955. Advertising Terms and Conditions: Your attention is drawn to the following terms and conditions which relate to the placing of advertisements in all publications owned by Wyvex Media Ltd. Parties to this agreement are the Publisher, Wyvex Media Ltd. on the one part and the Advertiser on the other part. The Publisher publishes newspapers, magazines, books and provides advertising space therein or provides for the delivery of advertising materials to the public within these publications. 01 Advertising copy shall be legal, decent, honest and truthful and comply with the British Code of Advertising Practice and all other codes. 02 The Publisher does not guarantee the insertion of any particular advertisement. 03 The Publisher reserves the right to cancel or alter the advertisement by giving reasonable notice. 04 An order for an advertisement shall be deemed to be made on acceptance of the advertisers’ order by the Publisher whether placed by telephone, mail, fax, email or in person. 05 Cancellations or postponements of orders must be notified in writing and cannot be accepted later than 30 days prior to the scheduled publication date. Cancellations not in accordance with these terms will be subject to payment of the full cost of the advert. Advertisments that are part of an agreed discounted campaign or series and have appeared prior to cancellation will be re-charged at full rate. 06 The parties submit to the jurisdiction of the Scottish Courts and Scots Law. In the event of any dispute or action by the Publisher to recover payment from an advertiser, it is agreed that matters will be settled in the Oban, Argyll Sheriff Court or such other Court as the Publisher may choose. 07 The Publisher shall not be liable for any loss or damage occasioned by any total or partial failure (however caused) of publication or distribution of any newspaper or edition in which any advertisement is scheduled to appear. In the event of any error, misprint or omission in the printing of an advertisement or part of an advertisement, the Publisher will either re-insert the advertisement or relevant part of the advertisement, as the case may be, or make rea-
sonable refund or adjustment to the cost. No re-insertion, refund or adjustment will be made where the error, misprint or omission does not materially detract from the advertisement. 08 Errors must be notified to the Publisher in writing within fourteen days of publication. In no circumstances shall the total liability of the Publisher for any error, misprint or omission exceed the amount of a full refund of any price paid to the Publisher for the particular advertisement in connection with which liability arose or the cost of a further or corrective advertisement of a type and standard reasonably comparable to that in connection with which liability arose. 09 The Advertiser/Advertising Agency agrees to indemnify the Publisher in respect of all costs, damages or other charges falling upon the publication as the result of legal actions or threatened legal actions arising from the publication of the advertisement in any one or more of a series of advertisements published in accordance with copy instructions supplied to the publication in pursuance of the Advertiser/ Advertising Agency order. 10 Adverts under the value of £75 must be paid on acceptance of order by the Publisher. All advertising on a credit basis must be agreed with the Publisher in advance. 11 Payment of any invoice raised by the Publisher will be due 15 days from the date of invoice or as otherwise directed on the invoice. In the event of non-payment the Publisher may charge late payment interest at a rate of 2% and this is chargeable on a daily basis from the due date until the bill is paid. In addition the Publisher may charge a late payment levy of £10 as an administration fee. In the event of late payment the Publisher reserves the right to disallow any discounts given and to raise an additional invoice for the discount which will be treated as though it has been raised with the original invoice. 12 A request to insert an advertisement assumes acceptance of our conditions. Photographs etc. must be accompanied by a SAE. Although every care will be taken, Scots Heritage is not responsible for loss, damage or any other injury as to material provided.
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scots heritage
SocialSCOTS Grandfather Mountain Scottish Clan Caucus
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1 Judy Lloyd, Dr Phil Smith, Jim L Monroe, Jo Ann M Tuskin 2 Alan Bain 3 Ralph Wallace 4 Russell Harper 5 David Pickens 6 Clark Scott, Candace Scott 7 Peter Wilson, Robert Campbell St John
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Social Scots
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8 The Lord Sempill, Sir Malcolm MacGregor of MacGregor 9 Rt Hon Henry McLeish 10 The Lord Montgomery, Ken Scott, Susan L Macintosh 11 Michael T McAlpine, Dale McAlpine 12 Ralph Wallace, Al Ankram 13 Mark Stephenson, Carol Stephenson, Gillian Swan
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SCOTS heritage
Clans &societies
Clan Crest emblems © Gaelic Themes Limited, Glasgow, Scotland.
CLAN ELLIOT USA
We are part of a worldwide organization, with active branches in Australia Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States. In 1977 the ECS was formed by the Clan’s late hereditary Chief, Sir Arthur Eliott, 11th Baronet of Stobs and Laird of Redheugh the ancient seat of the Clan Chiefs. Our present Chief is Sir Arthur’s daughter, Margaret Eliott of Redheugh. Judy Elliot : US Branch president elljudscot@aol.com www.elliotclanusa.com
AUSTRALIAN SCOTTISH HERITAGE
Clan group society contacts, information, events and worldly news. Scottish history, heritage and culture. Interested in family stories of Scots that settled in Australia? We are the perfect organisation for you. We sell a variety of Scottish items, also interesting items on our ebay page, many recycled or antique.’www. australianscottishheritage.com
CLAN MACNAB
Clan MacNab Society of North America is the only active clan MacNab society in existence, we are very active, setting up clan tents at about 20 Highland games in the US, publish a 40-page quarterly newsletter, have a clan library for members as well as a genealogy program to help members find more ancestors in their family trees and sell over a dozen clan items thru the society at a discount for members. We also organize a clan trip to Scotland every 5 years (the next one being 2014), and have an excellent web site: www.clanmacnab.org. society contact: mcnabbprescott@ aol.com and (928) 771-1218.
CLAN LAMONT SOCIETY
The Clan Lamont Society was formed in 1895 its purpose is to keep alive the traditions and values of the Lamont Clan and its members. The headquarters are situated within the Old Manse Inverchaolain Dunoon which has a small museum containing historical artefacts. Email: clanlamontsociety@gmail.com www.clanlamontsociety.org
CLAN DONALD
ASSOCIATED CLAN DONALD SOCIETIES OF NEW ZEALAND High Commissioner Harold McIsaac harold@financialaccounts.co.nz South Island Commissioner Elwyn Martin – elmart@ihug.co.nz Federal President Grant MacDonald macsol@paradise.net.nz Auckland Secretary Tom McDonald tom.mcdonald@xtra.co.nz Canterbury Secretary Margaret Donald margaretdonald@xtra.co.nz Hawkes Bay Secretary Jill Macdonald houseofmacdonald@xtra.co.nz Otago Secretary Bill McDonald invergarry@xtra.co.nz Southland Secretary Elma McDonald 700 Tweed Street, Newfield, Invercargill 9812, NZ Wellington Secretary Kathryn MacDonald macsol@paradise.net.nz Dedicated to the preservation of Scotland’s customs and culture. Visitors welcome. Functions can be checked at www.clandonald.org.nz
CLAN MACLAREN
The Clan MacLaren Society of Australia welcomes enquiries from descendants of MacLarens/McLarens (and other variations), and their derivations Lawrence, Laurence, Law, Low, Lawson, Lowson, Lawrie and Laurie. The main sept is Pat(t)erson. A popular newsletter is published twice a year. Contact the Secretary, Bruce D McLaren, 152 Ramsgate Rd, Ramsgate Beach, NSW 2217. Tel: 02 9529 7784. E: bruce_d_mclaren@hotmail.com
CLAN KEITH
Austen, Dick, Dickison, Dickson, Dixon, Dixson, Falconer, Hack, Hastron, Hake, Harvey, Haxton Henry, Hervey, Hurrie, Keith, Lum, Lumm, Lumgair, Mackeith, Marshall, Urie or Ury, are names associated with the ancient Clan Keith. Enquiries welcome. Australian convenor - Brenton Dick dickscot@bigpond.com New Zealand convenor Ian Dickson convenor@ceitteach.org.uk www.clankeith.org/australia
CLAN CURRIE SOCIETY
The Clan Currie Society is one of the preeminent cultural societies preserving and promoting Scottish culture. In addition to offering scholarships, the Society’s signature events include The Pipes of Christmas and Tartan Day on Ellis Island. The Society sponsors the National Scottish Harp Championship of America. The Society was formed in 1959 to further the knowledge and appreciation of the MacMhuirich Bardic dynasty. The Clan Currie Society P.O. Box 541 Summit, NJ USA 07902-0541 Tel: + (908) 273-3509 Email: clancurrie@mail.com www.clancurriegathering.com www.pipesofchristmas.com www.tartandayonellisisland.com
CLAN GUNN
The Clan Gunn is one of the oldest Scottish Clans and descends from the Norse Jarls of Orkney and the Pictish Mormaers of Caithness. From the fifteenth century, the senior line was based in the Strath of Kildonan in Sutherland while the junior lines established seats in Braemore, Cattaig and Dalemore in Caithness. The clan is led by Commander Iain Gunn of Banniskirk and further information about the clan can be found at www.clangunnsociety.org.
CLAN MACPHERSON
Clan Macpherson welcomes enquiries from Macphersons and members of our Associated families. For information contact your local representative, our website www. clanmacpherson.org/branches or the ‘Official Clan Macpherson Association’ Facebook page. Australia - John L Macpherson Email: greymac@acenet.com.au Tel: +61248711123. Canada - John C Gillies Email: jcgillies@rogers.com Tel: +17054460280. New Zealand - Tim McPherson Email: dalmore@xtra.co.nz Tel: +642345098. Scotland - Norman McPherson Email: Scottish.Chairman@clan-macpherson.org Tel: +44 (0) 1224 594 635. England and WalesAngus Macpherson Email: angusmacpherson@1templega rdens.co.uk. USA - Jack Raines UnitedStates.Chairman@clanmacpherson.org Tel: +1 817 233 1018.
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Clans & societies CLAN LOGAN SOCIETY
Membership is open to all persons descended from or connected by marriage or adoption to the Logan’s of the UK and Ireland, and their friends. Our purpose is to foster Clan sentiment and spirit, collect and preserve our Clan history, encourage our children to be proud of their heritage, and participate in cultural events by wearing Clan Logan attire. Associated names include: Lagan, Laggan, Leonerd, Loban, Lobban, Loben, Logane, Logan, Logen, Loggan, Loggane, Loggans, Loghane, Loghyn, Login, Logyn, Lopan, Lowgan, Lyndon.
THE NORTH COAST SCOTTISH SOCIETY
We have been part of Humboldt County for over thirty years and enjoy the history, tradition and culture of Scotland. We hold many different events throughout the year Laurene Thorpe - Vice-Chieftain Tel: (707) 839-4153 E: Info@northcoastscots.org North Coast Scottish Society 77 Sole St. Eureka, Ca. 95503 www.northcoastscots.org
Vernon E. Logan (President) 6255 Towncenter Dr., Suite 636, Clemmons, NC 27012. E: clanlogan_president@yahoo.com James C. Logan (Vice President) 6255 Towncenter Dr., Suite 636, Clemmons, NC 27012. E: clanlogan_chairman@yahoo.com Peter Logan (UK Commissioner) 2 Grenville Close, Haslington, Crewe CW1 5TU. E-Mail: rury@uwclub.net Membership Information: 6255 Towncenter Dr., Suite 636, Clemmons, NC 27012. E: clanlogan_membership@yahoo.com www.clanlogansociety.com
THE SCOTTISH TARTANS AUTHORITY
CLAN DONNACHAIDH
CLAN MACLENNAN
Why Belong to the Clan Society in Scotland? In essence, the job of the Society in Scotland is to be the trunk of the tree from which the branches spring. Its health depends on support from clansfolk who wish to preserve and enhance their heritage. Branches: Arizona - Carolinas - Florida - London & Southern Counties - Mid-Atlantic - Midwest -New Zealand - Northeast - Northern California - Ontario - Pacific Northwest - Queensland - Rannoch & Highland (Scotland) - Rocky Mountain Donnachaidh of the South - Southern California New South Wales, Western Australia - Texas - Upper Midwest Branch Clan Secretary: secretaryclandonna@btconnect.com Membership Secretary / Catherine McCartney managerclandonna@btconnect.com Clan Donnachaidh Centre, Perthshire PH18 5TW, Scotland www.donnachaidh.com
Join the Donnachaidh DNA Surname Project Family History Research and DNA testing; www.clandonnachaidhdna.org Contact: Tim Duncan HC-1 Box-86, Kelso, CA 92309 Phone: (760) 733-4002 Email: tim@clandonnachaidhdna.org
We’re a charity and are independent so we have no hidden agendas. We maintain the world’s largest and most comprehensive tartan database, the most extensive woven tartan archives and an unsurpassed archive of books and documents on tartan and its many strands. Brian Wilton Tel: +44 (0)1764 655 444 E: admin@tartansauthority.com Fraser House, Muthill Road, Crieff, Perthshire, PH7 3AY Scotland www.tartansauthority.com
Chief Ruairidh (Scotland) and Chieftain Greg (NSW) are the worldwide leaders of the proud MacLennan Clan. If you have any connection with the names MacLennan, Lobban, Logan or similar names there are two active branches of the Clan in Australia which would love to hear from you. Please contact: Max McLennan (Chief’s Representative) Unit 1, 6 Fisken Street, Ballan, Victoria 3342, A. Tel: 0431 231 933 e: max_mary_mclennan@msn.com.au Graeme MacLennan (President, Melbourne Association) ‘Seaforth’, 722 Balloong Road, Woodside, Victoria 3874. Tel: 03 5187 1291 e: seaforth@wideband.net.au Malcolm McLennan (President, Grafton Association) PO Box 247 South Grafton, NSW 2460. Tel: 02 6642 4290 e: kaemac1@bigpond.com.au Graeme McLennan (Sydney, NSW representative) 82 North Road, Denistone East, NSW 2112. Tel: 02 9809 5152 e:maclennan.kintail@bigpond.com www.clanmaclennan-worldwide.com
To feature your Clan or society here, contact Emma Craig:
ecraig@scotsheritagemagazine.com or call
+44 (0) 131 551 7919 CLAN MACKENZIE SOCIETY OF SCOTLAND THE UK The Clan Mackenzie Society in the UK is for the benefit of members of the Clan who are interested in finding their roots and exploring their genealogy. We have an Annual Magazine, a 5 yearly Gathering in Strathpeffer, an Annual AGM weekend this year in Burnham and Dunkelt on 18th, 19th, 20th October and other special events during the year. To join our Society you may contact the Secretary. E: sweinmann@btinternet.com www.clan-mackenzie.co.uk
CLAN CRAIG ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA
The CCAA is a voluntary, nonsectarian, non stock, and non profit organization. The purposes for which this corporation is formed are to: Honor, preserve, promote and perpetuate the traditions and heritage of the Scottish-American people, with particular emphasis on descendents of and family of the descendents of the Scottish Clan Craig; Preserve and perpetuate for the present and future, the history of the ancient Clan Craig of Scotland; Foster and promote education by providing assistance to deserving students and supporting educational institutions in programs of Scottish literature, history, dance, music and similar activities; Preserve and promote Scottish and Celtic culture including art, music, dance, athletics through the establishment of competitions, awards, and scholarships for deserving students, artists and athletes; Preserve, foster and promote Scottish-American heritage and to facilitate communication between members and promote a fraternal atmosphere through periodic newsletters and other publications, and through meetings, and gatherings of the membership of the Association and their families and guests. Michael A. Craig - Association President E: president@clancraig.org E. Jeffrey Craig - Vice-President E: vicepres@clancraig.org www.clancraig.org
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Final fling
SCOTS heritage
m o r f r e McLett America
been about far Being Scottish has always Scotland more than simply living in Words Susan L McIntosh Illustration Bob Dewar
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any people believe that Scotland is a small but awesome piece of earth found just north of England. These folks are, geographically at least, correct. Yet the deeper one digs, the more one understands that Scotland has never been limited by a landform. She is a wanderer and is not so tame as to be content to remain in one wee spot of earth, no matter how awesome. While there is still plenty of Scotland in Scotland, the ancient essence has been hauled to the far corners of this globe by Scots who have carried it away in their hearts, their DNA and in trunks and satchels, only to unpack it and start anew. I recently travelled to North Carolina to attend one of the greatest and most colourful of all of the Scottish-American spectacles, the Grandfather Mountain Scottish Clan Caucus. It is an annual summer ritual that even non-Scots make room for on their July calendars. While the non-Scots are energised by the colourful tartan and the caber toss, it is ‘Clan Row’ that holds the focus of the ancestral Scot. Grandfather Mountain’s Clan Row impressively encircles the entire games field with the tents of roughly 100 Scottish clans. What one finds within Clan Row is a buzzing culture of Scottishness manifested in far too many ways to count. It is a subspecies of Scotland that has taken shape in America over the centuries and it is a twist away from what developed back in the homeland. As the years passed the variations grew, but it is still undeniably Scottish. Each Scottish-American family’s distinctive expression of Scotland depends very much upon that family’s particular point of divergence from the home country. My American family is grown from an 18th century Caledonian root, which shapes my perception of what Scotland is. A new friend of mine, the American granddaughter of a 20th century Aberdonian immigrant, conjures a very different Scotland. But while
our roots differ, we are both, at our core, Scottish. Of course, Scots still living in the modern nation of Scotland see things differently and are often disturbed by our extravagant performance of Scottish heritage. But what else could be expected? Our Scottish experience is quite different from theirs. Scotland did not appear suddenly in history as a homogeneous thunderbolt. Kenneth MacAlpin became the first King of Scots in the 9th century, but it was not until well into the 13th century that the term ‘Scotland’ became synonymous with the modern nation state. Until then, Scotland ‘proper’ was a much smaller place within a larger idea of Scotland. ‘As late as the early thirteenth century, there were two senses of Scotland - Scotland “proper”, between the Forth, Moray and the Grampians; and an imprecise “greater Scotland”,’ says Professor Dauvit Broun of Glasgow University. ‘Eyebrows would have been raised at the suggestion that Edinburgh or Glasgow were in Scotland - even though the former had been in Scottish hands almost continuously since c. 960.’ It is fascinating that the Gaelic term for ‘King of Scots’, Ri Alban, was first used around c.900. It was much later that the term evolved into ‘King of Scotland’. Early on, Scotland existed wherever Scots were operating, regardless of their geographic location. Once technology and access to the seas freed Scots from north Britain, Scotland become the world as Scots ventured everywhere and influenced everything. Yet they were still just as Scottish. Scotland is much greater and more complex than the 30,500 square mile tip of a north Atlantic island. A core part of Scotland is the 40-60 million members of its global diaspora. Compared to a global population of 7.3 billion people, we are small. Yet it only takes one Scot to change the world. We have always been bigger than we appear. Susan McIntosh is the President of the Council of Scottish Clans & Associations, www.COSCA.net
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