The History of the Highland Clearances 5

The History of the Highland Clearances 5

When the herring fishery succeeds, they generally satisfy the landlords, whatever privations they may suffer;

but when the fishing fails, they fall in arrears and are sequestrated

and their stocks sold to pay the rents, their lots given to others, and

they and their families turned adrift on the world; but in these trying

circumstances, he concludes, “we cannot sufficiently admire their meek

and patient spirit, supported by the powerful influence of moral and religious principle.”

 

The beautiful Strathnaver, containing a population equal to Kildonan,

had been cleared in the same heartless manner.

 

In 1828, Donald Macleod, after a considerable absence, returned to his

native Kildonan, where he attended divine service in the parish church,

which he found attended by a congregation consisting of eight shepherds

and their dogs--numbering between twenty and thirty--the minister, and

three members of his family. Macleod came in too late for the first

psalm, but at the conclusion of the service the fine old tune Bangor

was given out, “when the four-footed hearers became excited, got up on

the seats, and raised a most infernal chorus of howling. Their masters

attacked them with their crooks, which only made matters worse; the

yelping and howling continued to the end of the service.” And Donald

Macleod retired to contemplate the painful and shameful scene, and

contrast it with what he had previously experienced as a member, for

many years, of the large and devout congregation that worshipped

formerly in the parish church of his native valley.

 

The Parish Church of Farr was no longer in existence; the fine

population of Strathnaver was rooted and burnt out during the general

conflagration, and presented a similar aspect to his own native parish.

The church, no longer found necessary, was razed to the ground, and its

timbers conveyed to construct one of the Sutherland “improvements”--the

Inn at Altnaharra, while the minister’s house was converted into

a dwelling for a fox-hunter. A woman, well-known in the parish,

travelling through the desolated Strath next year after the evictions,

was asked on her return home for her news, when she replied--“O, chan

eil ach sgiala bronach! sgiala bronach!” “Oh, only sad news, sad news!

I have seen the timber of our well attended kirk covering the inn at

Altnaharra; I have seen the kirk-yard where our friends are mouldering

filled with tarry sheep, and Mr. Sage’s study turned into a kennel for

Robert Gunn’s dogs, and I have seen a crow’s nest in James Gordon’s

chimney head;” after which she fell into a paroxysm of grief.

 

 

THE REV. DONALD SAGE ON THE SUTHERLAND CLEARANCES.

 

I remained for about a year in the capacity of tutor in the family

of Mr. Robert MacKid, Sheriff-Substitute of Sutherland, who lived

at Kirkton, in the parish of Golspie. I shall briefly sum up what I

remember of this period.

 

It was a very short time previous to my residence in Mr. MacKid’s

family that the first “Sutherland Clearance” took place. This consisted

in the ejection from their minutely-divided farms of several hundreds

of the Sutherlandshire aborigines, who had from time immemorial been

in possession of their mountain tenements. This sweeping desolation

extended over many parishes, but it fell most heavily on the parish

of Kildonan. It was the device of one William Young, a successful

corn-dealer and land-improver. He rose from indigence, but was

naturally a man of taste, of an ingenious turn of mind, and a shrewd

calculator. After realising some hundreds of pounds by corn-dealing,

he purchased from Sir Archibald Dunbar of Thundertown a small and

valueless property in Morayshire called Inverugie. It lay upon the

sea-shore, and, like many properties of more ancient date, it had been

completely covered with sea-sand which had drifted upon its surface.

For this small and worthless spot he paid a correspondingly small

price--about £700--but, tasking his native and vigorous genius for

improvement, he set himself at once to better his bargain. Making use

of a plough of peculiar construction, he turned the sand down and

the rich old soil up, and thus made it one of the most productive

properties in the county. This, with other necessary improvements,

however, involved him in debt; but, just as it became a question with

him how to pay it, his praise in the north as a scientific improver

of land reached the ears of the Stafford family, who, in connection

with their immense wealth, were racked with the anxiety to improve

their Highland estate. As William Young had been so successful on the

estate of Inverugie they thought he could not but be equally so on

the Sutherland estate. Young introduced the depopulating system into

Sutherland.[3] This system, during his tenure of office as commissioner

on the Sutherland property, was just at its commencement. It was

first brought to bear on the parish of Kildonan. The whole north and

south sides of the Strath, from Kildonan to Caen on the left bank of

the river, and from Dalcharn to Marrel on the right bank, were, at

one fell sweep, cleared of their inhabitants. The measures for their

ejectment had been taken with such promptness, and were so suddenly and

brutally carried out, as to excite a tumult among the people. Young

had as his associate in the factorship a man of the name of Sellar,

who acted in the subordinate capacity of legal agent and accountant on

the estate, and who, by his unprincipled recklessness in conducting

the process of ejectment, added fuel to the flame. It was said that

the people rose almost _en masse_, that the constables and officials

were resisted and their lives threatened, and the combination among

the peasantry was represented as assuming at last so alarming an

aspect that the Sheriff-Depute of the county was under the necessity

of calling in the military to quell the riot. A detachment of soldiers

was accordingly sent from Fort-George, a powder magazine was erected

at Dornoch, and every preparation made as for the commencement of a

civil war. But the chief magistrate of the county, shrewdly suspecting

the origin of these reports, ordered back the military, came himself

alone among the people, and instituted a cool and impartial enquiry

into their proceedings. The result was that the formidable riot, which

was reported to have for its objects the murder of Young and Sellar,

the expulsion of the store-farmers, and the burning of Dunrobin

Castle, amounted after all only to this, that a certain number of the

people had congregated in different places and had given vent to their

outraged feelings and sense of oppression in rash and unguarded terms.

It could not be proved that a single act of violence was committed.

Sellar laboured hard to involve my father and mother in the criminality

of these proceedings, but he utterly failed. The peasantry, as fine

as any in the world, were treated by the owners of the soil as “good

for nothing but to be cast out and trodden under feet of men,” while

the tract of country thus depopulated was divided into two large sheep

farms, one of which was given in lease to William Cluness of Cracaig,

and the other to a Mr. Reid from Northumberland.

 

[3] “Clearances” had, however, been effected in some parts of

Sutherland previous to this period, although to a smaller extent. From

along the banks of the river Oykell, for instance, many families were

evicted, in the year 1780. (Statement by the Rev. Dr. Aird, of Creich).

 

The reckless lordly proprietors had resolved upon the expulsion

of their long-standing and much-attached tenantry from their

widely-extended estates, and the Sutherland Clearance of 1819 was

not only the climax of their system of oppression for many years

before, but the extinction of the last remnant of the ancient Highland

peasantry in the north. As violent tempests send out before them many

a deep and sullen roar, so did the advancing storm give notice of

its approach by various single acts of oppression. I can yet recall

to memory the deep and thrilling sensation which I experienced, as

I sat at the fireside in my rude, little parlour at Achness, when

the tidings of the meditated removal of my poor flock first reached

me from headquarters. It might be about the beginning of October,

1818. A tenant from the middle of the Strath had been to Rhives, the

residence of Mr. Young, the commissioner, paying his rent. He was

informed, and authorised to tell his neighbours, that the rent for

the half-year, ending in May, 1819, would not be demanded, as it was

determined to lay the districts of Strathnaver and Upper Kildonan

under sheep. This intelligence when first announced was indignantly

discredited by the people. Notwithstanding their knowledge of former

clearances they clung to the hope that the “Ban-mhorair Chataibh” (the

Duchess of Sutherland) would not give her consent to the warning as

issued by her subordinates, and thus deprive herself of her people,

as truly a part of her noble inheritance as were her broad acres. But

the course of a few weeks soon undeceived them. Summonses of ejectment

were issued and despatched all over the district. These must have

amounted to upwards of a thousand, as the population of the Mission

alone was 1600 souls, and many more than those of the Mission were

ejected. The summonses were distributed with the utmost preciseness.

They were handed in at every house and hovel alike, be the occupiers

of them who or what they might--minister, catechist, or elder, tenant,

or sub-tenant, out-servant, or cottar--all were made to feel the

irresponsible power of the proprietor. The enormous amount of citations

might also be accounted for by the fact that Mr. Peter Sellar had a

threefold personal interest in the whole matter. He was, in the first

place, factor on the Sutherland estate at the time; then, he was law

agent for the proprietors; and, lastly, the lessee or tacksman of more

than a third of the county to be cleared of its inhabitants. It may

easily be conceived how such a three-plied cord of worldly interest

would bind him over to greater rigour, and even atrocity, in executing

the orders of his superiors on the wretched people among whom he was

thus let loose like a beast of prey. But the effects produced by these

decided measures I now distinctly remember. Having myself, in common

with the rest of my people, received one of these notices, I resolved

that, at the ensuing term of Martinmas, I would remove from Achness,

and go once more permanently to reside under my father’s roof, although

I would at the same time continue the punctual discharge of my pastoral

duties among the people till they also should be removed. I could not

but regard the summoning of the minister as tantamount to the putting

down of the ministration of the Word and ordinances of religion in that

part of the country. And, indeed, it is a fact, that, although this

desolate district is still occupied by shepherds, no provision has,

since that time, been made for their spiritual wants. I left Achness,

therefore, about the middle of November, 1818, sold my cow at the

Ardgay market, and got my furniture conveyed to Kildonan by my father’s

horses and my own. The people received the legal warning to leave for

ever the homes of their fathers with a sort of stupor--that apparent

indifference which is often the external aspect of intense feeling.

As they began, however, to awaken from the stunning effects of this

first intimation, their feelings found vent, and I was much struck

with the different ways in which they expressed their sentiments.

The truly pious acknowledged the mighty hand of God in the matter.

In their prayers and religious conferences not a solitary __EXPRESSION__

could be heard indicative of anger or vindictiveness, but in the sight

of God the