Author: Max Fletcher

In his book The Little General and the Rousay Crofters, William P L Thomson tells of estate  regulations  in  general  making  no  mention  of  mining  or  quarrying. In 1881, the laird, Frederick William Traill Burroughs, was optimistic about the mineral potential of his Rousay estate, so a clause was added to the regulations reserving the right of the landlord to open a mine or quarry on a tenant’s land. Later a second clause was added prohibiting mining or quarrying by tenants.

The Crofters Act with its explicit reserving of mineral rights to the landlord coincided with Burroughs’ interest in mining ventures and it was perhaps not surprising that he saw his rights under the Act as a weapon he could use against his enemies. There was a further reason for his action. Estate regulations had previously required crofters to obtain the proprietor’s permission for any new building they intended to erect but, under the Act, this was no longer required. Burroughs was incensed that crofters who had recently been pleading poverty should now be busily engaged in putting up new buildings over which he had no control. On an estate liable to rack-renting, it was never wise that a croft should appear more conspicuously prosperous than its neighbours, and tenants-at-will had hitherto been unwilling to invest in a doubtful future. The new security, however, had unleashed a flurry of building activity.

The matter came to a head over the re-roofing of a house occupied by Robert Inkster, a seventy-six-year old crofter living at Swartifield in Sourin. Both house and barn had stood unaltered for forty years and both were in a very poor state. In the summer of 1890 Inkster and his sixty-four-year old wife Mary Leonard of Digro, took up residence in the barn, With the help of a relative, he stripped the old flagstone roof from the house and set about the work of repair. He had not consulted Burroughs about his intentions and indeed had no legal obligation to do so. The laird first heard about the repairs in a report of what he described as ‘a triumphal procession of some ten carts’ taking stone from a quarry to the house site. Although estate regulations had for some years forbidden quarrying, this clause, like a number of others, had not been enforced and tenants had always been in the habit of opening small quarries whenever they required stone. In Rousay good building stone was plentiful and seldom far below the surface. Burroughs, however, angrily resenting this display of independence, sent his ground officer to warn Inkster and, in a heated exchange, Inkster declared he would continue to take as much stone as he needed.

The laird’s next move was to have a lawyer’s letter sent to Inkster warning him that, unless he gave an undertaking that he would remove no more building stone, Burroughs would obtain a legal interdict against the ‘theft’ of his property. A similar letter was sent to Peter Yorston who was also improving the house and steading on his croft of Oldman in Sourin, where he lived with his wife Mary Kirkness and children Eliza, James, and John. The crofters immediately contacted Kirkwall lawyer Andrew Thomson who was again called on to defend Rousay crofters from their laird. He, however, realising that, no matter how unreasonable the laird’s action might appear, he was acting within his legal rights, informed Burroughs that the veto would be strictly adhered to, but at the same time asked if there was any quarry where Inkster would be permitted to take stone. Would he be permitted to buy building stone or could he open a quarry on his own land? Burroughs was quite open about his intention. The Crofters Act, he replied, obliged the crofters to keep up their houses but the proprietor was within his rights to prevent quarrying and that was exactly what he intended to do.

Andrew Thomson thereupon published the whole correspondence in the press and both local papers were forthright in their condemnation of Burroughs. No legal action was taken against Peter Yorston of Oldman who reluctantly accepted the veto, although protesting vigorously in a letter to The Orcadian. But because Inkster had told the grounds officer that he intended to continue to take stone and was reported to have claimed a right to quarry on his own croft, an action for interdict was brought against him and was granted by the Sheriff. At the same time a further interdict was sought against Betsy Craigie of Fa’doon. In September her son-in-law, William Grieve, was quarrying building material when he heard that other crofters were in trouble. He immediately abandoned the stones he had already cut but, two months later, thinking the fuss was over, he brought them home. In this case the Sheriff dismissed Burroughs’ application for an interdict on the grounds that, although quarrying was contrary to estate regulations, Betsy Craigie, like other former tenants-at-will, had never been given a copy of the regulations nor had she been warned that the traditional freedom to quarry was being withdrawn. Burroughs, in seeking these interdicts, had won the first case and lost the second, yet it would be wrong to think of the honours as having been equally divided. As Sheriff Armour said in granting the interdict against Inkster:-

It may be that a landlord who so chooses to act inflicts great hardship on his tenants, and, perhaps in certain cases, he may defeat the Crofters Act and get rid of a crofter by this indirect means. It appears to me, however, that as the law at present stands, he is within his rights.

The second case had merely established that, before a landlord could obtain an interdict, he had to make sure that the tenant knew the estate regulations or had received a proper warning. The Sheriff’s decision was confirmed by the Lord Advocate when Burroughs’ affairs were once again raised in Parliament by the member for Orkney and Shetland. The Lord Advocate considered that there was no need for fresh legislation since the abuse was not widespread and the landlord was not breaking the law.

With the onset of winter, the plight of seventy-six-year old Inkster was becoming increasingly desperate. He had moved out of his house in the summer thinking that repairs would soon be completed but he now had ten cartloads of stone at his door which he was interdicted from using. In November, while carrying a caizie of peats into his makeshift quarters in the barn, he accidentally stumbled against the doorway of the ancient building, causing the collapse of the whole precarious structure and damaging his household effects. He is reputed eventually to have repaired both buildings using a cargo of building stone purchased in Westray.

The dispute dragged on for years, with Burroughs remaining adamant in his refusal to allow crofting tenants access to quarries. The law having been unable to protect them and Parliament having refused to consider a change in the law, the crofters’ only redress now lay with the Commission. But even the Commission was precluded from immediate action since the fair rents already determined had by law to run for seven years before they could be reviewed. In 1897, when this period had elapsed, seven crofters applied for a reduction in rent on the grounds that the action of the proprietor put them to additional expense in building and repairing houses, steadings, dykes and drains.

The Sheffield Independent newspaper of October 16th 1890 reported on the proceedings within its columns:

LANDLORD TYRANNY IN ORKNEY.
THE ACTION OF THE CROFTERS’ COMMISSION.

General Burroughs, the holder of some crofting property, is creating some excitement in the Orkney Islands by the bad grace with which he receives the decisions of the Crofters’ Commission, which is concerned in adjusting for the Crofters the legal rights which Parliament has given them. According to some recent issues of The Orcadian, copies of which have been sent to us, the General seems to hold himself entitled to thwart the purposes of the Act, even to the exposure of his own foolishness. It appears that the dwelling house on the croft of Swartafiold having become unfit for habitation, the crofter, Mr. John Inkster, took it down and proceeded to erect, at his own charges, a new house with stones from “an old use-and-wont quarry on the commons.” This course was dictated by considerations that might be called personal, but also by regard for the law which imposes on crofters the duty of keeping their holdings in good condition. However, the eye of General Burroughs was upon him, and Mr. Inkster, along with another crofter, was treated to a solicitor’s letter, intimating that if the quarrying was not instantly stopped an action of interdict would be raised, and, over and above, the offenders would be reported to the Procurator-Fiscal for theft. An instructive correspondence followed. General Burroughs was informed of the circumstances under which the quarrying was being done; that the dwelling house had been taken down; that the crofter was house-less; and he was asked – (1) whether there was any quarry on the estate from which the crofter could obtain stones; (2) or, alternatively, whether he might open a quarry on his own croft; (3) whether he might be permitted to use the stones he had already quarried on payment of surface damage or a small lordship. To this the general replied that he could not prevent a crofter erecting any building on his holding, but he could prevent him quarrying stones; and that he was determined to do. This was absolute enough, but the crofter ventured one more appeal, “Was he at liberty to quarry stones from waste or other suitable ground on his own croft?” to which General Burroughs answered “neither on his own croft nor elsewhere.” So, if it be at all within the compass of General Burroughs’s power, the crofter is to remain houseless; he is to contravene the Act by allowing his holding to become dilapidated, or he is to take his fate in his hands and his stones from the quarry and hazard a sentence for theft. The Scottish Leader, under these circumstances, advises the crofter to build his house with the best stones he can get from his croft, and to let General Burroughs do his worst, adding, he could not go to gaol in a better cause. But the gaol is not so easily made ready. General Burroughs, in spite of his tasteless threat, will find it rather hard to prove that a crofter who takes stones from his own croft to build a respectable house on General Burroughs’ property is committing a felony. Whatever be the true motive, General Burroughs is lending a service to land law reform; and if he will only have the crofter clapped in gaol, Radicals will have the more to thank him for.

Writing in his own defence, General Burroughs says: – “My case is this. Some 1900 acres of my land in Rousay have been forcibly taken from me without compensation, and have been handed over to a class of persons who have no more right to it than has any reader of this newspaper. These people are called crofters, and my land has been handed over to them and to their heirs and successors for ever, so long as they choose to continue to pay for it a rent below its market value, and fixed by the Crofter Commission – a Commission consisting of three men, who, contrary to all law until recently in force in Britain, have been invested with the despotic power of a Czar of Russia, and the infallibility of the Pope of Rome, and against whose unjust decrees there is no appeal! And at the mercy of these three men have been placed the reputation and the estates of landowners in the so-called “Crofting counties” of Scotland. He complains that John Inkster and Peter Yorston, who, before the Commission, made out that they were too poor to pay their rent, as soon as they had succeeded in getting it reduced and obtaining fixity of tenure, their poverty was soon forgotten, and they set about pulling down the existing buildings and erecting new ones on his land without consulting him, and without his permission they took stone from his quarries to do this.

The following is extracted from an edition of the Shetland Times dated October 18th 1890:

AN ORKNEY LANDLORD AND HIS CROFTERS.
REMARKABLE CORRESPONDENCE.

The following correspondence has passed between Messrs Macrae & Robertson, solicitors, Kirkwall, and Mr John Inkster, Swartafiold, Sourin, Rousay, and Mr Andrew Thomson solicitor, Kirkwall. Messrs Macrae and Robertson, agents for the General, wrote as follows to John Inkster: – “We are informed that you are quarrying stones upon General Burroughs’ property without his permission. If we do not hear from you within five days from this date that you have ceased quarry, we shall raise an action of interdict against you in the Sheriff Court and report you to the Procurator-Fiscal for theft.” To this Mr Thomson replied: – “Your letter of 16th instant to Mr John Inkster, Swartafiold, Sourin, Rousay, has been handed me. The veto put by you upon his quarrying stones in the old use-and-wont quarry on the commons will be strictly observed. I understand you are aware that the former dwelling-house on the croft, having become ruinous, and threatening to fall, has been taken down and that Mr Inkster was in course of erecting, at his own expanse, a new dwelling-house upon the croft in substitution for the old one. In this way he went to the quarry, which he understood had all along been freely open to the whole tenantry. As he is at present houseless, I shall esteem it favour to be informed at your early convenience whether Mr Inkster can quarry stone in any quarry upon the estate, to enable him to re-erect his dwelling-house, and, if so, from what quarry, or alternatively whether he can open a quarry on his own croft. Mr Inkster has about as many stones quarried in the quarry referred to as will enable him to erect his house. Cannot he have these on paying surface damage, or on payment of a small lordship?” Messrs Macrae & Robertson, in answer to this, wrote: – “As we are aware, under the Crofters Holdings Act, General Burroughs is powerless to prevent a crofter erecting any building upon his holding. He can, however, prevent their quarrying stones on his property, and we are now instructed to inform you that if either the tenant of Oldman, or Inkster, the tenant of Swartafiold, quarries or removes or makes use of any stone from General Burroughs’ property, they will be at once interdicted.” Mr Thomson then asked: – “ Would you kindly inform me whether General Burroughs will allow the crofters to quarry stones from waste or other suitable ground on their own crofts?” and, in reply, received the following: – “General Burroughs will not allow quarrying on any part of his lands, either on their own crofts or elsewhere.” The last letter is from Mr Thomson, who says: – “I need not recapitulate the circumstances. These crofters are bound not to dilapidate their holdings. Their houses having become ruinous and dangerous had been taken down, and were in course of being rebuilt in terms of the Act. General Burroughs steps in with threats of both civil and criminal prosecution, both of which are unwise, the letter reprehensible. The result is that these crofters are meantime prevented absolutely not only from rebuilding their houses, but they and others are prevented from draining and improving their land.”

The People’s Journal commenting on the above, says: – People who take an interest in the affairs of the crofters are not unacquainted with General Burroughs. The General is one of the landlords whose high and mighty notions of his rights on the face the earth have greatly helped advance the cause of the Land Law Reform in the North. Of course he hates the Crofters’ Act and everything connected with it, and his latest performance among his tenants is evidently designed to show his contempt for the Act and his desire to get some of his tenants back into the grips from which it has rescued them. Under the statute, crofters are required to keep their houses in good repair. It they fail to observe this condition they may be removed. Now, some of General Burroughs’ tenants are the occupants of tumble-down houses. These they resolved to rebuild at their own expense and for this purpose they took stones from a quarry on the estate which has hitherto been open to the tenantry. The General by all sorts of threats stopped them from taking stones from this quarry, he refused to let them have the stones for payment, he forbade them to open a quarry on their own crofts, and, lastly, he has refused to let stones be taken from any part his lands. What is to be thought of a landlord who thus shows his childish impotence against an Act of Parliament, which the more he kicks against its provisions will be the more strengthened to restrain him from mischief?

Reference was made to
The Little General and the Rousay Crofters
by
William P. L. Thomson:
(John Donald Publishers Ltd. Edinburgh)
and the
British Newspaper Archive

Digro was a small croft on the east slope of Kierfea Hill, Rousay. Peter Leonard, a 40-year-old wool weaver, lived there in 1841. He was the son of Thomas Leonard and Isabella Inkster and was born in 1798. He married Isabella McKinlay, daughter of William McKinlay and Isabella Lero of Essaquoy, Sourin, and between 1820 and 1837 they had ten children, seven girls and three boys :-

They were; Ann, born on December 3rd 1820, Peter, on August 4th 1822, Cicilia on September 7th 1824, Mary, on October 7th 1826, Isabel, on August 3rd 1828, Margaret Smeaton, on November 9th 1830, Ann, on September 23rd 1833, James, on July 6th 1835, William Smeaton, on August 23rd 1837, and Helen, in March 1841. Cicilia died in January 1825 aged 3  months. Ann died in 1832 at the age of twelve, Margaret Smeaton died in 1845 at the age of fifteen, and William Smeaton died in 1847, when he was ten years of age.

Their mother Isabella died on January 3rd 1873 aged 77 years and father Peter died on December 18th 1882 at the age of 83. They were buried in the same grave as their four young children in Scockness kirkyard.

By now son James was head of the household at Digro. He was a stone-mason and was married to Hannah Reid, youngest daughter of George Reid and Janet Harcus, who was born on December 2nd 1840 at Pow, Westside. They had a family of fourteen children, nine sons and five daughters:

George Reid, born June 7th 1860, died August 11 1879;
John Reid, May 18th 1862, died April 4th 1906;
Hannah Catherine, born March 24th 1864, died February 28th 1936;
James, born November 16th 1866, died March 20th 1962;
Frederick Cunningham, born June 12th 1869, died October 25th 1939;
Isabella McKinlay, born August 4th 1871, died January 29th 1940;
Annie Gibson, born, born September 23rd 1872, died October 20th 1956;
Arthur William, born January 18th 1875, died August 22nd 1879;
William Irvine, born April 11th 1877, died August 23rd 1879;
Alfred, born May 2nd 1879, died August 4th 1933;
George Arthur William, born July 7th 1881, died January 9th 1954;
Edith Harriet Helen Stevenson, born October 7th 1883, died 1960;
Archibald McCallum, born February 17th 1886, died May 28th 1972;
Lydia Reid, born December 18th 1889, died December 31st 1972.

Three of the boys, Arthur, William, and the first George, died within a fortnight at Digro during a diphtheria epidemic in 1879.

As an accomplished singer James was in demand at concerts and soirees and served as precentor at the Free Kirk in Sourin. After the deaths of his children he ceased to take any pleasure in secular music and he became increasingly serious, even melancholy.

Digro lay on the very margin of cultivation, high up on Kierfea Hill, commanding a view over the whole wide sweep of Sourin. Four hundred feet above sea level in Orkney’s cool and windy climate is a considerable altitude. The land was poor and the soil shallow and stony, but the buildings at Digro were good and still stand to this day. The well-built walls and neat flagstone roofs are a testimony to James Leonard’s skills as a mason, as is a miniature water-mill standing behind the original house and supplied from a small dam farther up the hillside.

In 1883 a Royal Commission, with Lord Napier as chairman, was set up to look at the condition of crofting in the Highlands and Islands. When the commission sat at Kirkwall, James Leonard led the Rousay crofters in their evidence regarding the harsh regime imposed on them by their laird, General Burroughs. Napier sought an assurance from Burroughs that he would not take retaliatory action against those who had spoken out against him. Burroughs refused to give such an undertaking, being the only one of the Orkney lairds to act in that way. Shortly afterwards, James Leonard and his large family were evicted from Digro. Unable to find other accommodation in Rousay they left the island and eventually settled in Oban. There James set up business as a coal merchant, a trade in which he seemed to have prospered to the extent of being the owner of the first motor car in the town.

Tommy Gibson of Brinola is in possession of a letter written by James Leonard in September 1912, which he sent to his sister Isabella who was married to Robert Grieve of Outerdykes. James was 77 years of age when he posted the letter and his sister was in her 84th year when she received it. It shows that he had fond memories of his earlier life in Rousay. He died at Oban in 1913.

My Dear Sister,

It is a long time since I wrote you now but today it just came in my mind to write you a few lines by way of remembrance of long ago. Well, Bello, I have not been well this long time I am bad with Rheumatism in my legs and feet I am lame in one foot but still able to move about. I have had a lot of worry this year between one thing and another. You would have seen in the papers that our motor had an accident whereby a young man was killed. George was driving it but I am glad to say no blame was found against George. Again Alf was driving another day and he stupidly ran the motor in a ditch with three people. He broke my car but wonderful none of the people got hurt. So you see what risks I have had. Mother is like myself bad with Rheumatism but still able to move about. She would venture to Rousay yet if she was well but business is bad with us at present and she cannot go. We are both thinking of seeing you once more but who knows whither that will be so or not. There is One who knows and in His hands we leave the matter.

I sometimes wonder that you are keeping so well considering your age. I should like very much to have a cup of tea with you now and some chickens as I used to get. I may get that at least I am hoping so. George Reid is still with us. He went to Orkney on Saturday. Hannah does nearly all the housework now, but Ma is always about. She (Hannah) gets letters from James regularly. He was saying that he might come and see us this winter if all went well. Now Bello write me and tell me exactly how you are keeping. Can you go to Digro or Faldown yet? Is Willie still Precenting? Do you go to church and can you sing as well as ever? I can sing still if I was in Rousay I would step into my old place and lead you all as I used to do is not that wonderful. Give our love to all our friends Digro Faldown Broland and any one you meet with who still remembers us. Ma and all the boys bids me to send their love to Bello o’ Whitehall. Boys and girls and all like you. God bless us all. That is my prayer Bello and He will bless us. Goodnight just now.

Your loving brother

James Leonard

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After James and his family’s eviction, Digro was occupied by his sister Helen Leonard and her husband William Louttit. He was the son of William Louttit and Christina Cormack, Faraclett, and he was born on April 1st 1842. Helen was the daughter of Peter Leonard and Isabella McKinlay, and she was 18 years of age when she and William were married on January 6th 1859. They lived at Faraclett and raised a family of six children: Peter was born on April 3rd 1859; Mary, on November 10th 1860; Margaret, on April 27th 1863; Matilda Leask, on August 7th 1865; Helen, on July 1st 1870; and William, who was born on September 4th 1873. Peter was just seven years of age when he died on the evening of February 20th 1867, having suffered from croup for four days.

At the time of the 1891 census William and Helen were both 50 years of age. Living with them were their unmarried daughters Helen and Margaret. Margaret had a son by joiner’s apprentice Hugh Craigie, Turbitail, later Deithe. Christened Robert William Reid Craigie, he was born on the afternoon of February 8th 1886 at Grain, Wasbister. On May 17th 1892, Margaret married William Learmonth, son of William Learmonth, Westness farm, and Mary Sarle Gibson, Bucket, Wasbister, who was born on August 13th 1865. They had six children: George was born in 1893; William, in 1894; Mary Helen (Cissie), in1898; Robert Alexander (Bertie), in 1902; James Louttit, in 1905; and Leonard, who was born in 1908.

Later occupants of Digro were stonemason William Grieve and his family. Willie was the son of William Leonard Grieve, Whiteha’, and Christina Craigie, Fa’doon, and he was born in 1887. In 1914 he married Ann Leonard Corsie, daughter of John Corsie, Brendale, and Margaret Jane Skethaway, Knarston, and she was born in 1893. Willie and Ann raised a family of five children: Ann Elizabeth was born in 1914; William, in 1915; John David, in 1923; Thomas Archibald, in 1927; and Margaret Christine, who was born in 1929.

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Prompted by an idea of Robert Craigie Marwick an inscribed stone was erected on the roadside at Digro in memory of the ‘champion of the Rousay crofters’. On August 18th 2001 the stone was unveiled by two of James Leonard’s great-grand-daughters; Christine and Rosemary. Also in the picture below are the then Councillor Robert Cormack, Parish Minister the Rev Graham Brown, the late Jim Marwick, chairman of the community council, and Robert Craigie Marwick.

The inscription reads as follows:

Erected
by the people of Rousay
in memory of
James Leonard
of Digro
1835-1913
who was evicted because
of the evidence he gave
to the Royal Commission
which led to the 1886 Crofters Act.
“I will not be cowed down by landlordism…
We are telling only the truth.”

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[All black and white photos are courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection]

Knapper, Grindlay’s Breck, Feeliha’, & Cruannie

KNAPPER

Knapknowes is the name of a vanished house close to the Westness dyke, just below the Quandale school building. It was also the name of an old Sourin croft, as recorded in a Rousay Birth Register of 1825. That house is now called Knapper, and is situated east of Brendale. Hugh Marwick tells us the Old Norse word knappar, plur. of knappr, meaning a knob, or protuberance, is common in Norse place-names. Knapknowes is a semi-translation of Knappar, and it is interesting to note that the original name has existed side by side with its half-translation, and ultimately outlived it.

The census of 1841 has it spelled Knapnows, and occupied by 45-year-old shoemaker Hugh Craigie, his 50-year-old wife Mary Yorston, and three of their children, twins Hugh and Mary, and younger son Robert. Hugh was the son of Hugh Craigie and Barbara Marwick, and was born c.1793. Married on December 6th 1816 he and Mary had five children: Hugh and Mary were born on April 26th 1819; Peter, in June 1821; Robert, in August 1823; and John, who was born in July 1825.

Hugh’s wife Mary had passed away before the census of 1851 was carried out, he being described as a widowed cobbler/farmer. Sons Hugh, and agricultural labourer, and Robert, a fisherman, were with him though. Ten years on, and the house was called Knapper in the census, the annual rent for which Hugh paid £2 10s.

Hugh’s son Robert was 38 years of age when he married 26-year-old Mary Marwick on May 9th 1861. She was the daughter of Robert Marwick, Essaquoy, and Bell Mainland, Cotafea. They had no children of their own, but adopted Mary’s niece, Lizzie Robertson, after the death of her parents. Hugh Craigie died in 1872, and when son Robert took over the tenancy he was paying an annual rent of £3, rising to £4 10s. by 1879 for Knapper and its 7 acres of surrounding land – though that was reduced by £1 thanks to the Crofters Commission findings.

Lizzie Robertson, mentioned above, was the daughter of John Robertson and Elizabeth Marwick. John, born in 1840, was the son of John Robertson and Ann Hutcheson, St. Andrews, and Elizabeth, or Betsy as she was known, was the daughter of Robert Marwick, Essaquoy, and Bell Mainland, Cotafea. Betsy died at Mesquoy, Netherbrough, Harray, on November 25th 1869, and her husband John passed away soon afterwards, which led to Lizzie’s adoption. Lizzie was 28 years old when she married James Eunson Laird on December 27th 1894. He was the son of John Laird and Margaret Marwick, Brakedale, St Andrews, Orkney, and was born on July 12th 1864.

Robert Craigie died in October 1908 and his wife Mary passed away seven months later. The new tenants of Knapper were retired farmer Hugh Inkster and his wife Georgina. Originally from Gorn and Hammer in Wasbister, then Geo, Westside and now Knapper, Hugh and Georgina had a hard time of it. Robert C. Marwick writes:- ‘The 15 acres of land at Hammer (15 acres) was removed from the Inksters in 1881 and incorporated into Innister to justify the large new steading the Laird had built there. The Inksters, who had been in Hammer for only 3 years, were forced to sell their stock which had been provided by Hugh Inkster’s mother, Margaret, when she gave up Gorn. They lived on the proceeds for a year or two, but they were then impoverished because, Hugh, being in poor health, was unable to work to provide for his large family.  By 1891 they had moved to Geo at Westness and later they moved to Knapper.’ Hugh and Georgina later moved to Myres, where he died in 1933 at the age of 88, as did Georgina within a year when in her 86th year.

Angus and Jeannie Harcus were later occupants of Knapper. Jeannie, or Mary Jane as she was christened, was the daughter of John Inkster and Jane Irvine and born when they were living at Essaquoy, in 1897. On December 28th 1917 she married farm servant Angus Harcus who, at that time, was a member of the Royal Garrison Artillery Territorial Force. He was the son of agricultural labourer Angus Harcus and Jessie Harcus, New Glen, Westray, and was born in 1892. The officiating minister at the marriage ceremony at Essaquoy was the Reverend John Deas Logie, and the witnesses were John Inkster, jnr, and Helen Craigie. Angus and Jeannie had two children: John Angus, born on New Year’s Day 1918, and Clara Margaret, who was born in 1919. She married James Alexander Seator in 1943.

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GRINDLAY’S BRECK

Grindlay’s Breck was a small crofter’s house of one storey and thatched beside the road, halfway up the Sourin Brae on the left. Hugh Marwick, in his Place-Names of Rousay, mentions the Old Norse grind-hliðs-brekka, meaning ‘gate-slope.’ Grind is a common term in Orkney dialect for a gate, and was so used in Old Norse – grind-hlið – a gateway or passageway that was fitted with a gate to close it. This compound, or its variant grindar-hlið, appears frequently in Orkney place-names, usually as a house or farm-name, i.e. Grindally, a vanished house just north of Knarston, and in each case must have been given by reason of proximity to one of the ‘slaps’ or gateways through the old hill-dykes, through which animals passed to and from the ‘hill’ or common grazing grounds. Grindlay’s Breck stands on a steep slope just below the line of one of those hill dikes.

The first recorded occupant of Grindlay’s Breck was John Mowat in 1653, followed by Christie Mainland, who lived at Upper Grindly as it was called then, living on independant means. Come the census of 1851 it was spelt Grindles Brake, and 28-year-old farmer and fisherman Robert Mowat lived there with his wife Mary Yorston. Robert was the son of Thomas Mowat and Margaret Marwick of Scowan, near Knarston, and he was born on April 25th 1822. Mary was the daughter of Peter Yorston, Oldman, and Rebecca Craigie, Hullion, and she was born on July 23rd 1816.

Robert was paying £4 2s 0d rent in 1887 but the following year after a reduction by the Crofter’s Commission, he paid £3 10s 0d. He died in 1892 and his widow Mary took over the tenancy until she passed away early in the morning of January 25th 1900 – cause of death being ‘old age’. Later that year John Logie became the tenant and he paid £5 5s 0d for the 5 acres arable and 2 acres of pastureland. He was a cattle dealer, and he and his wife Mary had moved from Quoygrinnie on the Westside. Their time at Grindlesbreck was short-lived though, for John passed away in February 1906, and Mary died in February 1909.

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FEELIE-HA’

Feelie-ha’ was the name of a cottage far up on the hillside above the farm of Brendale and croft Grindlays Breck in Sourin and was occupied by Andrew Moss in 1737 and John Craigie in 1798.

In the census of 1841 it was spelt Philihaw, and occupied by 50-year-old widow Mary Craigie, who was living there, by independent means, with her son William, a 25-year-old fisherman. The annual rent at this time was 12s.

Mary was the daughter of William McKinlay and Isabel Lero and she was born in 1788. She married William Craigie of Tou, and they had four children; James, born in 1811, William, who was born about 1814; and Hugh and Isabel, who were born in 1815 and 1817 at Mid Quandale.

In the census of 1871 the cottage was spelt Fillyhall, and occupied by Robert Marwick, a small farmer and fisherman. ‘Robbie o’ Scockness’, as he was later known, was the son of Robert Marwick and Bell Mainland of Essaquoy, born on September 4th 1845. He married 22-year-old Ann Ballick Hourston, daughter of carpenter William Hourston and Mary Ann Rendall, Scapa, St Ola, on October 25th 1866 and they eventually had seven children: Isabella was born in June 1867; Mary Ann, in July 1869; Jemima Baikie, in December 1871; Robert William, in April 1874; Margaret Johan, in 1876; Elizabeth, in July 1879; and Jessie, who was born in November 1882.

The Marwicks moved to Woo, but sadly not long after they did so wife and mother Ann died of peritonitis during the evening of February1st 1892, and was later interred in the Scockness kirkyard.

In 1885 Miss Ann Gibson was the tenant of Feeliha’, paying £2.0.0. for the 3 acres arable and 3 acres pasture, but in 1891, when in her 75th year, she rented the house for just 6d., the land being rented annually by James Leonard, Cruannie, at the cost of £1. Ann was the daughter of James Gibson and Christian Harcus, Brendale, and she was born there on October 29th 1816. She never married, but at the time of the 1891 census she had a lodger to keep her company at Feeliha’, 14-year-old Mary Ann Harrold. She was the daughter of William Harrold, Hammermugly, and Elizabeth Marwick, Hanover, and was born on June 2nd 1876. She later married James William Grieve, Whiteha’, on February 12th 1897. Ann Gibson passed away in 1905 and Feeliha’ remained unoccupied after that. Nothing remains of it today.

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CRUANNIE

In an old rental dated 1653, James Leonard is on record as being the first inhabitant of the small croft of Cruannie, high up on the south-eastern slope of Kierfea Hill, between Digro and Feelyha’.

It is not until the census of 1841 another tenant is mentioned – named Robert Harrold. He was the son of William Harrold and Mary Ann Mainland, and he was born in 1798. He married 34-year-old Ann Banks on January 31st 1822, and they lived at Cruannie where Robert worked as a handloom weaver and mason. They had five children: Mary, who was born in August 1822; John, in December 1824; Elizabeth, in March 1827; Helen (Nelly), born in July 1829, but died in infancy; and another Helen, who was born in December 1831.

Ann Banks died in 1859. She was buried in Scockness Kirkyard and the inscription on her gravestone reads as follows:-

In memory of Ann Banks
who was espoused to Robert Harrold
who died trusting in Jesus
March 31st 1859 aged 73 years

On May 22nd 1860 Robert married Ann Grieve, the daughter of Robert Grieve and Ann Work of Outerdykes, but she was to die eight years later at the age of 47. She gave birth to a daughter Ann in March 1863, but she died herself at the age of 18. They were also buried in Scockness Kirkyard, the headstone reading thus:-

Sacred to the memory of Ann Grieve
wife of Robert Harrold who died
25th June 1868 aged 47 years
also their daughter Ann
who died 9th January 1882 aged 18 years.
“They are preserved forever.”

Five months after his wife Ann died Robert married a third time, on November 25th 1868, which was also prior to their daughter Ann passing away. He was 70 years of age when he married Cecilia Craigie, the daughter of William Craigie and Barbara Craigie, who was born in an unrecorded house in Wasbister in January 1817. Cecilia died in 1880, and as mentioned above, Robert’s daughter Ann died in 1882. Robert himself passed away in 1888 at the age of 90.

Later occupants of Cruannie were the Grieve family. Blacksmith Robert Grieve was the son of William Leonard Grieve, Whiteha’, and Christina Craigie, Fa’doon, and he was born in November 1891. On February 12th 1920 he married 22-year-old Catherine Lyon, daughter of Robert Watson Lyon and Catherine Lyon, Ervadale, the ceremony being performed there by the Rev. John Deas Logie, and witnessed by Mary Ann Grieve and James Robert Lyon. Robert and Catherine had six children: Kathleen Christine, who was born in 1921; Mabel Leonard, in 1922; Robert William, in 1924; James Arnold, in 1926; George Lyon, in 1928; and John Denis, who was born in 1941.

[All pictures courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection – unless otherwise stated]

ERVADALE

In the 1503 land rental of Rousay, Ervadale was taxed as a 3-penny land farm in Sourin on the southern breast of Kierfea Hill between Wasdale and Brendale. Called Ovirdaill in 1563, and Overdale in another Rental of 1595, Hugh Leonard and James Craigie were joint tenants in 1653, and in 1740 John Craigie was the sole tenant. The land was valued in terms of early Norse money as ouncelands and pennylands. The old Norse silver mark was sub-divided into 8 ounces and in Orkney the ounce was divided again into 18 pennies – the land being valued as urislands (ouncelands) and pennylands – 1 urisland consisting of 18 pennylands.

The property was called Irvadale in the 1841 census. It was then occupied by 46-year-old farmer William Inkster and his family. He was the son of William Inkster and Robina Rendall and was born in 1795. He married Margaret Gibson, the daughter of William Inkster and Margaret Marwick, who was also born in 1795. Between 1823 and 1839 they had seven children; Bethynia, who was born in April 1823; Christian, in August 1825; Ann, in August 1827; William, in October 1829; Margaret, in July 1832 [she married John Craigie, son of John Craigie and Marion Louttit, Hurtiso, later Myres, raising a family of seven – all but the first two being born in Unst, Shetland]; James, in March 1836; and Hugh, who was born in February 1839. Hugh had a particularly interesting life, ranging from Ervadale, Rousay, to Greenfield, Shetland, and back to Westness Farm, Rousay. Click > here < to read more about him.

By 1845 the Inksters had moved to Finyo, a house on the farm of Banks in Sourin, and later to nearby Quoys. Arvodale, as it was then spelled in the census, was occupied by 48-year-old farmer John Marwick who had moved there from Banks, and he paid an annual rent of £15.8.0. John was the son of Hugh Marwick and Betsy Sinclair, another of her ‘ten devils,’ born on January 31st 1803. On February 2nd 1829, he married Betsy Mainland, daughter of James Mainland and Christian Louttit of Cotafea, who was born there on June 25th 1806. They had no children of their own, but adopted their nephew James Marwick, who was born in September 1831, the son of John’s brother Robert, whose wife Bell was Betsy’s sister.

When James Marwick was 25 years old he married Mary Baikie on March 4th 1856, daughter of Peter Baikie and Helen Moar of Evie, and between 1857 and 1865 they had five children: James was born in January 1857 [married Jane Drummond Harcus, North Pharay, and went to Hamilton, Ontario]; John, in April 1858 [married Mary Mitchell, Shapinsay, and went to South Ronaldsay]; George Ritchie [christened after the Rev. George Ritchie, at whose manse Mary had worked prior to her marriage] born in February 1860 [married Betsy Gibson, Knarston]; Robert [married Janet Bertram Johnston, Musselburgh, and went to Victoria, British Columbia], in October 1862; and David Baikie, who was born in November 1865 [he married Elizabeth Norquay, and they went to South Chicago, USA]. At this time James earned a living as a ploughman, and eventually in 1871 he was a farmer in his own right, and head of the household of the 63-acre farm at Ervadale. They lived in Hurtiso for a while, before moving to Bankburn, South Ronaldsay.

In 1881, the land at Ervadale was farmed by John Mainland, who paid £40.0.0. rent for the 43 acres arable and 32 acres of pasture land. John was the son of Alexander Mainland and Janet Kirkness, Cruseday, and he was one of triplets born on February 23rd 1839. His first wife was Margaret Craigie, daughter of Magnus Craigie and Christian Craigie, House-finzie, or Finyo, Sourin, though she died in April 1880. Later that same year, on November 4th, John married Mary Craigie Gibson, daughter of Hugh Gibson [who was a twin], and his third wife Margaret Harcus, Burness, Wasbister, who was born in December 1835 when they were living at Geo, Westside. John and Mary later lived at No. 3 Frotoft, or Brough, and moved from there to Ervadale. They had no children, but lived on the farm with Mary and John Corsie Mainland, the children of John’s first marriage to Margaret Craigie. Mary was born on June 8th 1866, and John on July 28th 1869.

After John and Mary moved to Stronsay, the Moodie family, from Saltess, Lady, Sanday, occupied Ervadale. The 1901 census records Benjamin Moodie being 48 years of age and living in one part of the house at Ervadale with his children, and his mother Janet being kept company by her daughter Janet in another. Benjamin was the son of Benjamin Moodie and Jannet Drever, and he was born on May 4th 1852 at Saltess, in Lady parish, Sanday. In 1882 he married Mary Sinclair, daughter of David Sinclair and Margaret Muir, Tangbrae, Cross parish, Sanday, who was born in June 1853.  She and Benjamin had five children: Maggie Ann, who was born in 1885; twins Benjamin Drever and David Sinclair in 1887; and another set of twins, Mary and James Skethaway, who were born in January 1889. Their mother Mary passed away just before the 1901 census was carried out.

Beryl Simpson writes: Robert Watson Lyon was my great-grandad through Catherine and Bertie Gillespie’s great-grandad through Agnes. They lived on Graemsay, then moved to Stromness, but moved to Rousay when their peedie lass died and great granny blamed the drinking water for her death. The lived at Ervadale and our great grand parents died the same day [16 May 1943] never knowing the other was dead. Granny said it was hard on them but the best way for them to go. They are buried in the Brinian kirkyard.

BRENDALE

Brendale, an old farm in Sourin to the east of Ervadale, was occupied by George Sinclair in 1653, John Moss in 1737, John Craigie in 1739 and Thomas Mowat in 1740.

Hugh Marwick, in his Place-names of Rousay, has a suggestion as to the origin of the name Brendale. Many years ago Rousay land was taxed in such a way that original farmland was split into ‘units’ or subdivisions of some larger original settlement. The very names of two of these – Ervadale and Brendale – tend to confirm such a conclusion. Though the earliest extant spelling of each name would imply that the termination is simply our -dale (or valley : Old Norse dalr), the present-day pronunciation still proclaims otherwise. These names are pronounced locally Brendeal (-dil) and Ervadeal (-dil), whereas real -dale names in Rousay are pronounced -dəl, e.g. Swandale (Swan-dəl), Quendale (Kwan-dəl). But still more convincing is the fact that neither lies in a dale at all; both are situated on the south shoulder of Kierfea! The termination in each case is, then, he suggests, Old Norse deild, a share, portion, divisional part.

In 1845 James Gibson was the tenant of Brendale and he was paying an annual rent of £13.17.0. James, the son of John Gibson and Christy Mainland Marwick, was born c.1781 at Bigland, and he married 24-year-old Christian Harcus on January 9th 1807. This was a common name for girls in Rousay families until the early 1800s when the form ‘Christina’ became more common. They lived at Brendale and had ten children: John was born in December 1808; William, in April 1811; Jean, in May 1813; Ann, in October 1815; Margaret, in April 1818; Christian, in June 1820; Isabella, in June 1822; James, in May 1825; another James, in March 1828; and another James, who was born in July 1829. Sadly all three James’ died in infancy.

James died in 1866 at the age of 85; his wife Christie having herself died in 1861 aged 78. Their 59-year-old son William, a bachelor, took over the running of the 69-acre farm at Brendale, the rent for which, by this time, was £21.0.0. per annum. Living with him was his unmarried 55-year-old sister Ann, 31-year-old niece Margaret Gibson, who was an agricultural labourer, and two cousins, 15-year-old James, who was a farm servant, and Jessie, who was then a scholar nine years of age and also employed as a herd. William gave up working the land at Brendale due to bad health, and ended his days living at nearby Filliehall where he passed away on December 10th 1884.

When William Corsie moved into Brendale in the early 1880s, from Geramount in Frotoft, he had to pay £42.0.0. rent for the farm’s 36 acres arable and 35 acres pastureland. William and his wife Ann Smeaton Leonard were in their latter years by then, eventually retiring from farming in 1889. They then lived in Albert Street, Kirkwall, and were featured on the front page of The Orcadian when they celebrated their diamond wedding anniversary in 1913. [Click > here < to read the newspaper report.] The eldest of their thirteen offspring was christened Margaret Mainland Corsie, having been born in March 1854. In 1873 she married Hugh Smith Robertson, son of David Robertson and Barbara Craigie, South Tofts, Egilsay, who was born in September 1847. They had six children: Hugh Corsie, who was born in 1874; Margaret, in 1875; William, in 1876; Elizabeth Jane, in 1878; David, in 1883; and Annie, who was born in 1885.

Brendale had a new tenant – farmer John Russell from Evie. He was the son of Magnus Russell and Jane Wood, Craya, Evie, and he was born there on September 13th 1838. On May 8th 1873 he married Margaret Ann Moar Harper, daughter of blacksmith Peter Harper and Isabella Folsetter, Lylie, Birsay, and she was born in 1849. They had ten children: Williamina Wood, who was born in 1874; Lydia Wood, in 1875; Jane, in 1877; Margaret, in 1879; Mary Jane, in 1880; John, in 1881; Ann Seatter, in 1882; William, in 1885; James, in 1888; and Catherine, who was born in 1890.

Above left: John Russell, born 1881. Centre: his brother James on the left, with Willie
Corsie, Knarston, son of John Corsie, Brendale, and Margaret Skethaway, Knarston.
He married Lydia Baikie, Sourin school teacher. Above right: James’ wife
Agnes Munro, mentioned below.

John Russell was 88 years of age when he passed away at Brendale on October 21st 1926. Head of the household then was his son James Roy Sinclair Russell, born at noon on July 27th 1888. On September 4th 1914 he married 34-year-old Agnes Macdonald Munro, the daughter of Alexander Munro and Christina Stephen. The ceremony was held at Old School, Sourin, where Agnes was the postmistress. The officiating minister was the Rev Alexander Irvine Pirie, and the witnesses were Hugh Munro and Mary Gillespie. James and Agnes had four children: Roy Sinclair, who was born in 1918; Hugh Alexander, in 1919; Chrissie Davina, in 1921; and Nessie Alberta (Netta), who was born in 1925.

[All photographs courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection]

Conflict between the laird and the Rousay crofters came to a head with the visit of the Royal Commission to Orkney, and their findings were to lead to the Crofters Act. Burroughs evicted those tenants who gave evidence to the Commission. There was a storm of protest, not just in Orkney, but nationally and even overseas. This was the first case of crofters being evicted as a direct result of giving evidence to the Commission and their removal caused a sensation.

The local newspapers condemned the evictions, as did Scottish and English newspapers. An outspoken attack even appeared in The Boston Daily Evening Traveller, apparently written by one of the crofters who had emigrated after being evicted from Quandale in 1846. Both James Leonard and James Grieve argued the justice of their case in the local papers, the nationals copied their stories and Burroughs, supported by the `Respectables’, kept the controversy alive with a stream of letters and articles.

With support for the crofters gathering, Rousay itself was brought to the very brink of violence. Even before the Royal Commission there had been some unrest, but during the winter of 1883-4 there were frequent cases of damage to crops and agricultural implements. One of the `Respectables’, writing to The Scotsman, described how some of the Sourin crofters who had refused to attend the original meetings had damage done to their boats, and the writer warned the culprit that he ‘would not, if detected, guarantee him against a thorough lynching’.

The main trouble, however, centred on John Moyes, the Sourin schoolmaster, who was widely criticised for the part he had played in the investigation of the anonymous threatening letter sent to the laird. It was felt that he had been too co-operative with the authorities and had cast suspicion on boys who had recently been his pupils. Moyes’ duties included the unenviable task of collecting school fees from impoverished parents and compelling the attendance of children deliberately kept from school to assist on the croft. To this end he sent out Burroughs’ gamekeeper, George Murrison, who acted as Attendance Officer, to round up recalcitrants. Many were ready to believe the worst of the schoolmaster, and the Sourin crofters did not let matters rest until they secured his dismissal. Life for Moyes became increasingly difficult. Shortly after the Fiscal’s visit he went south to get married and arrived back in Rousay with a new wife and a boatload of furniture. He was met by a crowd of ‘roughs’ who jeered and hooted at him and he could find no one willing to transport his belongings to the schoolhouse. The farmer who eventually came to his assistance was threatened with vengeance and at night youthful vandals, now unrestrained by their parents, prowled round the school creating a disturbance and doing a certain amount of damage.

George McCrie of Curquoy, Inspector of Poor, was another target and, under cover of darkness, a section of his dyke was pulled down. He was disliked for his office and the niggardly amount of poor relief commonly given. He was also a leading ‘Respectable’ and a frequent writer of letters to the newspapers attacking the ‘Crofters’, sometimes under his own name but more often using various noms-de-plume. He encouraged Burroughs in the belief that unrest on the estate was the work of agitators. When Burroughs was in London for his customary winter visit, McCrie wrote:—

I trust that, by the date of your return, at all events, the present ‘wave’ of carefully fostered discontent will have passed away from the island. Nothing will give me greater pleasure than to see it subside – I am certain it will – for artificial sentiment never lasts long.

However, when Burroughs returned in April 1884, the disorder still continued. He did his best to restore peace, personally visiting the homes of some of the more unruly youngsters and telling their parents that he would hold them personally responsible for the actions of their children. He also wrote warning letters to some of the older people whom he suspected might be involved.

It was always Burroughs’ contention that it was the Napier Commission which had created the trouble in Rousay and set neighbour against neighbour. It was a rather superficial view since it glossed over the tensions which had been building up on the estate ever since 1840. Nevertheless, the Commission had acted as a catalyst. The facade of paternal concern had been stripped away and for the next six years there was to be continuous warfare between ‘Crofters’ and `Respectables’.

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[George Meikle McCrie [1847-1895] was born in Leith, Edinburgh, the son of William McCrie and Isabella Greig.]

[Reference was made to The Little General and the Rousay Crofters by William P L Thomson: John Donald Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh]

Curquoy is the name of a farm on the north side of the Sourin Burn, high up in the valley between what was Upper Gripps and Wasdale. It was occupied by Peter Allan in 1734 and Alexander Robertson in 1798.  In the 1830’s it was where fisherman Thomas Sinclair lived with his wife Mary Corsie. Both born at the turn of the century, Thomas and Mary had five children: Barbara, who was born in September 1829; James, in March 1831; Mary, in November 1833; Thomas, in September 1837, but who died soon after; and a second Thomas, who was born in August 1838.

In 1851, when the annual rent was £1 7s 0d, farmer James Marwick lived at Curquoy with his wife Christie Groundwater, son John and daughter Mary, who were employed at home, and Christy’s widowed sister Mary. James was the son of James Marwick and Ann Mainland and was born in Westray in 1794. In 1824 he married Christian, the daughter of John Groundwater and Ann Harrold, and she was born on the island of Eynhallow in 1791. They had three children; James, born on December 13th 1824, John, on February 21st 1827, and Mary Wood, born on May 4th 1831.

The Marwick family moved to Midgarth near Knarston, and in 1861 Curquoy was occupied by blacksmith James Gibson and his family, having been moved from Flintersquoy during the clearances at Quandale. James was the son of Alexander Gibson and his second wife Margaret Craigie, and he was born on March 24th 1798. He married Mary Marwick, daughter of George and Barbara Marwick, and they had three daughters; Mary, who was born in October 1830; Maggie, in October 1832; and Anne, who was born in November 1835.

Ann died when she was nearly sixteen years of age. She was buried in the Westside kirkyard and her tombstone reads as follows:-

Erected by James Gibson, Curquoy,
to the memory
of his beloved daughter
Anne Jemima Marwick Gibson,
born on the 2nd November 1835
and departed this life
August 11th 1851.
“My race is run, my grave you see:
Therefore prepare to follow me:
A sinner saved by grace,
to the spirit home above:
When every sound of sin and strife:
Is quenched in songs of love.”

In 1861 James was in his 63rd year and wife Mary was 69. Also in the house on the night the census form was completed were Mary’s brother William, a retired ship’s captain, then 72 years of age; James and Mary’s 30-year-old daughter Mary, her husband James Gibson, a 35-year-old sailor, and their five-year-old son James; Margaret Marwick and Anne Clouston, who were domestic servants; and a visitor, Barbara Craigie, a 64-year-old farmer’s widow, and her grandson William Stevenson, who was a 6-year-old scholar.

Mary died in 1872 and husband James passed away in 1875. They were interred together in the Westside kirkyard, and the following inscription was inscribed on their gravestone:-

Erected to the memory of
James Gibson, Curquoy,
born 24th March 1798,
died 7th January 1875.
A faithful and beloved
disciple of Jesus.
Also of his wife Mary Marwick
born 24th June 1794,
died 23rd August 1872.
They were lovely and pleasant
in their lives and in death
were not divided.

By 1871 James and Mary’s son-in-law James Gibson had swapped the sea for the land and he was tenant of both Curquoy and Brittany and their grazings which covered 220 acres, costing him £25.0.0. a year in rent. In 1881 James was 56 years old and his wife Mary was in her 53rd year. They had four children: James, born in March 1856; William David, in June 1861; Mary Ann, in December 1863; and Margaret Marwick, who was born in September 1867. On the night of April 3rd 1871 when the census was carried out, there were two boarders from Edinburgh staying at the farm, 51-year-old Thomas McCrie, a paper stainer, and his brother George, classed as a 33-year-old annuitant. William David Gibson was known as Big Bill, and was a member of police bodyguard for King Edward VII. In 1897 his sister Mary Ann married Robert Irvine Gibson, son of Robert Gibson and Isabella Craigie, Langskaill, his second marriage. In 1901 Margaret, the youngest, married George William Mainland, son of John Mainland, Cotafea, and Mary Reid, Wasdale, who was born in February 1867.

Back to the census of 1891, and by that time James was a widower, for his wife Mary had passed away in 1888. He was described as a crofter, living at Curquoy with his daughters Mary Ann and Margaret. George McCrie was still living there as well, and employed as the island’s Inspector of Poor, living on private means. He had replaced Thomas Balfour Reid, the previous Clerk of the School Board, Registrar, and Inspector of Poor. McCrie was an unpopular man. Click here > George Meikle McCrie < to find out why.

James Gibson passed away in 1900. The eldest of his two sons, James, had himself died in 1889, so his brother William David returned to Rousay and took over the tenancy of Curquoy. He did not stay long though, for by the census of 1911 Curquoy was occupied by 39-year-old farm manager James Linklater from Stromness, and his wife Elizabeth Johnston Black, then 45, from Milltown, Ross-shire. They had been married for precisely 22 years, eight months, and eight days. Their children were Robert, 13, Annie, 11, William, 9, and David, who was 5 years old.

Annie Linklater, who was born at 10pm on September 12th 1899, married joiner Hugh Alexander Sinclair on January 23rd 1920. He was the son of John Sinclair, Stennisgorn, later Vacquoy, and Barbara Gibson of Vacquoy, and was born in 1901. They had a son, Hugh Paterson Linklater Sinclair, born on September 7th 1920, and the family later emigrated to Sovereign, Saskatchewan, Canada, in 1930.

Ronald Shearer was an 18-year-old ploughman living at Curquoy when he married Elsie Inkster on September 21st 1928 at Woo. She was the daughter of John Alexander Leslie Inkster and Jane Irvine, Woo, and was born in 1910. The record of their marriage was entered into the parish register by the then registrar – Elsie’s father John. Ronnie’s parents, Thomas Meil Shearer and Margaret Ann Miller were married in Stronsay on February 24th 1898, and moved to Shetland the same year. They had three daughters, Tomima, Robina [Ruby], and Ann. Their brother Ronnie was born on June 22nd 1910 when they were living at Blythoit, Tingwall, Shetland.

WASDALE

Wasdale was a farm east of Curquoy and west of Ervadale in Sourin. It was built by George Reid after he and his family were evicted from Pow on the Westside in 1848.

George Marwick Reid was the son of George Reid and Barbara Logie of Garson, and he was born in 1807. In his younger days George went on one or two trips to the whale fishing in the Davis Straits in Greenland. On March 6th 1831 he married Janet Harcus, the daughter of William Harcus and Christy Flaws, Upper Mounsay, Quandale, who was born on June 21st 1801. They raised a family of eight children. William, who was born in April 1832; George, on New Year’s Day 1834; Mary, in March 1835; John, in November 1837; Peter, in November 1838; Hannah, in December 1840; William, in December 1842; and Lydia, who was born in October 1844.

The Reids were victims of the clearances and evicted from Pow, along with many other tenants in this area, and they moved over to Sourin, where George built a farm called Wasdale – named because of its situation to the ‘west’ of Ervadale and Brendale. It is said George slept in the heather up in the hill until the house was completed. He also dug the first fields at Wasdale by hand.

The census of 1861 records the fact that by that time George was farming 36 acres of land there. Ten years later his 28-year-old son William, a master joiner, and his wife Catherine Baikie also lived at Wasdale. Catherine, born in Stromness in 1836, was the daughter of Magnus Baikie and Mary Hunter. The ceremony took place on September 17th 1863 at the Free Church Manse, where Catherine was employed as domestic servant. The officiating minister was the Reverend Neil Patrick Rose, and the witnesses were James Johnstone and William’s sister Lydia. Catherine and William had seven children: George William was born in November 1864; Mary Catherine, in July 1866; Lydia, in February 1868; Peter, in September 1869; Jessie Harcus, in April 1871; William John, in January 1873; and James Marwick, who was born in February 1875.

The area of land farmed by George at Wasdale in 1881 had increased to 50 acres. He was in his 74th year by then, and his wife Janet was 79. Their 47-year-old son George lived with them then – he was skipper of the Rousay packet Lizzie Burroughs for a year or two. Another of General Burroughs’ ventures was the founding of the Rousay, Evie, and Rendall Steam Navigation Company, which first brought a steamship service to the islands of Rousay, Egilsay, and Wyre. For thirteen years the company and its little steamer, the Lizzie Burroughs, struggled in the face of constant financial difficulties, mechanical trouble, shipwreck and the suspicion of many of the islanders. Like everything else in which Burroughs was involved, the steamer was controversial. One reason for its lack of success was her failure to gain the mail contract. Mail continued to be brought across Eynhallow Sound in a small open boat which also carried a few passengers. It was a difficult and dangerous crossing, which sadly the Reids of Wasdale were soon to find out.

Above left is an old photograph of the steam ship Lizzie Burroughs, lying off Rousay in the 1880s – and to the right a painting of the Rousay post boat that was lost between Evie and Rousay in 1893, with the loss of five lives.

In 1887 George paid £25.0.0. rent, but the following year this was reduced by the Crofter’s Commission to £18.0.0. At this time the land at Wasdale comprised 21.102 acres arable and 35.319 acres of pasture land.

The Westside kirkyard is the final resting place for a number of the Reid family. George died on March 30th 1900 aged 92 years. His wife Janet passed away on March 1st 1894, and their eldest son William died in 1843, just 10 years of age – the headstone for their communal grave being erected by their daughter Lydia. George and Janet’s son John died by drowning during the loss of the Rousay mail boat while crossing Eynhallow Sound on October 11th 1893. William Reid died on May 29th 1915 at the age of 72, and his wife Catherine passed away on March 11th 1925, when she was 90 years old.

John Louttit, born at Faraclett in 1843, was postmaster at Coatbridge and later in Edinburgh. He was instrumental in obtaining post office positions for several relatives and friends from Rousay – one of whom was Peter Reid, born in September 1869. He lived at Old Monkland, Coatbridge, Lanarkshire, and was employed as a sorting clerk and telegraphist.

Peter was 28 years old when he married Mary Arthur on July 1st 1898. She was the daughter of railway yardsman James Arthur and Margaret Dean, and she was born in 1875. They had three children: William, James Arthur, and Margaret Dean [known as Peggy]. Peter’s wife Mary died in October 1918. Two years later, in Glasgow, Peter married a second time. The bride was his cousin Margaret Reid, daughter of John Reid [who drowned with the mail boat in 1893], and Sarah Sinclair Mainland, Tratland. Peter ended his career as postmaster at Gourock, Renfrew, and died after an illness in November 1929. His daughter Peggy came to Rousay and married John Mainland, the island’s famous taxi driver, son of John and Betsy Mainland of Cott.

Later occupants of Wasdale were Sammy Inkster and his wife Violet Johnston. Samuel James Inkster was the son of John Inkster and Jane Irvine, Woo. Violet was the daughter of James Halcro Johnston, Crook, Rendall, and Margaret Ritch, Binaquoy, Firth, later Trumland Farm. They were involved in Rousay’s only double wedding, for on the same day, July 26th 1933, Violet’s brother James William Johnston married Johan [Nan] Johnston Leslie at Trumland church. Johan’s parents were monumental mason George Gerrard Leslie and Johann Johnston Sabiston, Aberdeen, who was a sister of George Harrold’s wife Barbara Sabiston, and having been a regular visitor to Rousay on holiday since childhood. At the time of the double wedding 27-year-old Sammy was farming the land at Wasdale and 23-year-old Violet was employed as a housemaid. James William was a 26-year-old research worker, living at Strathcona House, Aberdeen, and Johan, also 26 years of age, a ‘clerkess,’ living at Bedford Place in the same city. The ceremony was conducted by the Reverend Robert R. Davidson, and the witnesses were Sammy’s brother Tommy Inkster, and Isabella Craigie of the Sourin school house, and Robert Ritch Johnston and Robina Ann Johnston, Testaquoy, Wyre.

I am indebted to Margaret Green, daughter of James William and Johan for the photograph below and certain information regarding it. The wedding guests were a mixture of people from Rousay, Rendall (where the Johnstons had previously lived), and Aberdeen, and I’d like to thank the following for putting names to faces in the photograph: Margaret Green, Adele Marie Park, Sheila and Graham Lyon, Elizabeth Herdman, Clara Craigie and Margaret Gray.

Front row, from left: 1 George Leslie, Aberdeen, father of Nan. 2 James Johnston, Trumland Farm. 3 Margaret Johnston, Trumland Farm. 4 Mrs Johann Leslie, Aberdeen. 5 Bridesmaid, Isabel Grieve, Fa’doon. 6 Groom, Sammy Inkster, Wasdale. 7 Bride, Violet Johnston, Trumland Farm. 8 Flower girl, Marian Ritch, Aberdeen, a cousin of Violet. 9 Rev. Robert R Davidson. 10 Bride, Johan [Nan] Leslie, Aberdeen. 11 Groom, James William Johnston, Trumland Farm. 12 Flower girl, Joyce Ford, Aberdeen, daughter of Nan’s sister. 13 Bridesmaid, Ina Johnston, Testaquoy, Wyre. 14 John Inkster, Woo. 15 Jean Inkster, Woo. 16 Seated on grass, front left: Best man, Tommy Inkster, Woo . 17 Seated on grass, front right: Best man, Bobby Johnston, Trumland.

Second row: 1 Maggie Johnston. 2 Mr Fraser,  Feavel,  Birsay.  3  Mrs  Fraser,  Feavel. 4 Jessie Donaldson, Vacquoy. 5 George Harrold, Russness, Wyre. 6 Barbara Harrold, Russness, Wyre. 7 Jeck Yorston, Drydale, Stromness. 8 Bella Yorston, Drydale. 9 Violet Ritch, Kierfold, Sandwick. 10 Eliza Ritch, Myrtledene, Sandwick. 11 ?. 12 Maggie Jean Ritch, wife of Jamie Ritch and mother of Violet’s flower girl.  .

Third row: 1 Clara Johnston [half hidden]. 2 ?. 3 Edda Mainland, Cott. 4 ?. 5 Bella Johnston, Trumland. 6 ?. 7 Lily Fraser, Feaval, Birsay. 8 Louisa  Ritch,  Braehead,  Holm. 9 Anna Mathieson, Sourin Manse . 10 Jessie  Ford,  Aberdeen,  sister  of  Nan and mother of Nan’s flower girl. 11  Tina  Craigie  nee  Mathieson,  Wasbister  School. 12 Peggy Marwick, Ronaldsay. 13 Elsie Shearer, Curquoy, later Housegarth, Sandwick. 14 Jeannie Harcus, Knapper.

Fourth/back row: 1 ?. 2 Jim Craigie, Deithe. 3 ?. 4 Ronnie Shearer, Curquoy. 5 Thelma Shearer, Curquoy. 6 Bill Flaws, Hammerfield. 7 John Cormack, Witchwood. 8 David Craigie, Trumland. 9 Jamie Ritch, the youngest of the Ritch brothers, father of  flower girl. 10 Willie Inkster, Woo. 11 Sandy Donaldson, Vacquoy. 12 Angus Harcus, Knapper. 13 Robert Ritch, Barrhead, Holm. 14 William Ritch, Kierfold, Sandwick. 15 Jock Ritch.

[All black & white photos, unless otherwsie accredited, are courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection]

Bittany, Upper & Lower Grips, Hillside, East & West Craie,
& The Knowe of Craie

BRITTANY

Brittany was the name of the highest up of all the cottages in the Sourin valley, at the foot of the Brown Hill. Hugh Marwick in his Place-Names of Rousay says it is a fairly certain derivative of the Old Norse word brattr, meaning steep – for the hill rises steeply immediately behind the house. In Norway there was a farm-name  Brettene – ‘From the pronunciation this is the def. plur. form of  Brett – a bending upwards.’

David Inkster was the first recorded tenant of Brittany, for which he paid an annual rent of £3. In 1871 David lived there with his family and he was farming 43 acres of land in the vicinity. He was born on September 21st 1823, the son of James Inkster and Barbara Mainland of Saviskaill. He earned a living as a boat builder, and he was 26 years old when he married Janet Gibson, the oldest of seven children of Hugh Gibson and Janet Craigie of nearby Skatequoy, who was born on September 26th 1826. David and Janet had three children; Hugh, born on February 27th 1850, Janet Gibson, on Christmas day 1862, and Agnes Davie Gardner, who was born on February 23rd 1868.

Hugh Inkster [born 1850] married Eliza Robson Kirkness in 1878. She was the daughter of John Kirkness and Mary Alexander, and was born at Quoyostray in 1850. Hugh and Eliza had a son, David James, who was born on 31 December 1878. Tragically, Hugh was drowned while at the fishing in the Westray Firth on May 14th 1879, just a few months after the birth of his son. His body was recovered and later interred in the Wasbister kirkyard. Eliza had a shop at Quoyostray for many years and died in 1927 at the age of 76.

Hugh Inkster’s father David was 55 years of age when he died on the evening of September 12th 1877. He had hepatic disease and had been suffering from chronic bronchitis for seven months. His widow Janet continued living at Brittany with her daughter Agnes, who earned a living as a dressmaker. Janet passed away in 1908, and Agnes moved south to be closer to her sister Janet. Agnes worked as a domestic housekeeper at Linhope, a 22-roomed house in Powburn, Alnwick, Northumberland. She herself passed away on March 8th 1919. Janet married gamekeeper Robert William Reay in January 1899, living at Glendale, Northumberland. She passed away on February 20th 1933.

HILLSIDE

This is the name of a vanished house in Sourin, a little east of Brittany – not a trace of which exists today. In 1861 it was occupied 67-year-old Thomas Louttit and his 59-year-old wife Marian, and they farmed the adjacent 16 acres of land. Previously they had been living and working at the farm of Breckan, Wasbister. With her Christian name variously spelled, ‘Marian’ was christened Mary Ann, and was the daughter of Hugh Gibson, Sketquoy, and Janet Inkster, and she was born on April 14th 1799. She and Thomas ‘were married before witnesses’ on New Year’s Day 1828, according to their marriage certificate. Thomas passed away on July 20th 1865 aged 72 years, and is interred in the Wasbister kirkyard.

In 1871 Cecilia Leonard, a 73-year-old hand loom weaver’s widow, then classed as a pauper, lived at Hillside having moved up the hill from Whiteha’. That hand loom weaver was James Pearson, and they married on December 5th 1845. When James died at the age of 72 in 1860 Cecilia reverted to her maiden name.

GRIPS

Upper and Lower Grips were two small crofts east of Brittany, halfway between there and Curquoy. The Orkney word ‘grip’ signifies a little ditch or watercourse, on the north side of the Sourin Burn, and in a land valuation rental of 1865 the tenant was paying an annual rent of £3 for – Greenrips.

UPPER GRIPS

The census of 1841 tells of Alexander Leonard and his family living at Upper Grips. He was the son of Peter Leonard and Janet Louttit, Cutclaws, Quandale, where he was born on Christmas Day 1808. He was baptised on January 17th in the New Year, his parents surnames being spelled Lennard and Lowtit in the parish record. On January 10th 1832 he married Margaret Grieve. They had four sons: John, born in December 1832; Alexander, in January 1835; James, in November 1836; and Malcolm, who was born on September 15th 1839.

In 1851 Upper Grips was called Brigs End in the census of that year – but reverted to Upper Grips when the relevant forms were filled out ten years later. By that time Margaret passed away on March 13th 1871, and when the annual population count was carried out a few weeks later on April 3rd, widower Alexander was on record as being a farmer of 14 acres of land.

Malcolm’s father Alexander died on August 4th 1890 at the age of 82. His wife Mary died on June 23rd 1904, and Malcolm moved to Quoys with Isabella and John. Grips was then in the occupation of the Sabiston family, who had moved over to Rousay from Watten, Egilsay. John Sabiston was the son of George Sabiston and Barbara Harrold, and he was born in March 1858. In 1895 he married Margaret Inkster, daughter of James Inkster, Ervadale, and Margaret Pearson, Kirkgate, who was born in October 1861. They had five children: John Donaldson, who was born in 1894; Robert, in 1896; George, in 1898; Mary Ann, in 1899; and James, who was born in 1901.

LOWER GRIPS

Lower Grips was called Greenrips in a land valuation rental of 1865. It cost James Craigie £1.5.0. to rent in 1845. James was the son of John Craigie and Margaret Murray of Bergodel, later known as Guidal, and he was born c.1773. On December 19th 1809 he married 26-year-old Janet Grieve, and they raised a family of seven children: Janet was born in October 1810; Barbara, in August 1812; James, in August 1814; Margaret, in August 1816; Jane, in August 1823; John, in February 1826; and William, who was born in June 1828.

Janet was 75 when she passed away in 1858. Her husband James was 88 when he died just three years later. Son John took over the tenancy of Lower Grips, paying and annual rent of £3.0.0., rising to £4.0.0. by 1887 for the 6 acres arable and 3 acres of pasture land.

John, born in 1826, was 37 years of age when he married Mary Wood Marwick, daughter of James Marwick and Christian Groundwater of Millhouse, close to Woo, and she was born on May 4th 1831. They raised a family of six: Mary Christina was born in May 1865; John Marwick, in November 1866; Jessie Ann Muir, in September 1868; Maggie, in March 1872; Jemima, in July 1876; and James, who was born in July 1878.

In 1888 the Crofter’s Commission reduced John’s rent to £3. He died in 1892, and that same year his widow Jane renounced the croft and moved to Windbreck on the Westside. Two years later widower James Cooper took over the tenancy of Lower Grips, having moved the short distance from Standpretty with his daughter Mary. James later moved to Sandwick, and Lower Grips was then unoccupied.

CRAIE

East Craie and West Craie were two small crofts, situated in the face of the hill above Curquoy in Sourin. There are numerous spellings, but I will go with Craie for that was provided by the man who built them, William Robertson, to the Ordnance Survey when Rousay was ‘mapped’ in 1879-80. Hugh Marwick in his Place-Names of Rousay thought this an interesting but obscure name, and though he suggested an origin its authority was to be regarded as ‘no more than tentative’!

The record of a legal process dated 1823 is preserved in Kirkwall Sheriff Court Records Room in which John Gibson of Broland, Rousay, was prosecuted for slander by Janet McKinley, wife of John Pearson of Cruehannie. He was alleged to have called her ‘a thievish limmer’, and this he did ‘the day of the last sheep-shearing at Craya.’ This happened in the days when the hill was public common, and when the sheep of the whole district grazed on it. Mrs. Pearson must thus have been so insulted on the public sheep-shearing day when all the sheep were rounded up and confined in enclosures at Creya for shearing or ‘roo-ing.’

The name is also found in several other Orkney districts, e.g. Evie, Deerness, Orphir, and Stromness parish, and the situation of each is such that it might well have been that of the local shearing pens. The common Orkney word krue, an enclosure or pen, which occurs frequently in place-names (usually in the form kru), e.g. Cruar, Crooannie, Steincroonie (all in Sourin), and which is a Norse loan-word from the Old Celtic cró, a pen for sheep, cannot be the source of Creya. But there is another Old Norse word krá, a corner, which is sometimes confused with the preceding term. Subsequent investigation into similar Norse and Faeroese language revealed the word krogv, translated as meaning a corner or nook, a place for storing odds and ends, e.g. peats. Faeroese place-names include Kú-krogv,  ‘cow-krogv’, and Seyõa-krogv, ‘sheep-krogv’, which prove that the term has been used there for enclosures for cattle and sheep. It may be suggested therefore that in the Orkney name Creya we may see a specialised use of this term for the kind of pens into which sheep were driven for shearing. Hugh Marwick says that what he wrote above was written while he was under the impression that there was no local memory of a sheep-shearing site at Creya. He subsequently met by accident the then present tenant who informed him he had been told by an old neighbour long dead (Malcolm Leonard) that a part of the farm now cultivated and known as The Hole o’ Creya was the place where sheep were shorn in olden days.

By 1861 stonemason William Robertson was living at Crey, as it was called in the census, a house he built with his own hands – having been evicted from the Westside. More on that in a minute or two. William was the son of Alexander Robertson and Margaret Irvine of Egilsay, and was born on January 3rd 1810. In 1844 he married Elizabeth Harcus, the daughter of William Harcus and Christy Flaws, and they had four children; twins John and William born on November 16th 1846; Alexander, born on April 23rd 1849; and James, on May 10th 1851. William and his family moved here from the Brinian, and paid 12s. rent in 1867.

In 1871 William and Betsy Robertson were living at East Crey, while William Craigie and his wife had moved into West Crey, a house situated nearby with 20 acres of land. William Craigie was the son of William Craigie and Mary McKinlay, Feelie-Ha’, and he was born c.1814. His wife was Mary Kirkness, the daughter of John Kirkness and Barbara Craigie, who was born in November 1824 when they lived at Quoyostray. William paid £3.11.0 rent in 1869, rising to £4.0.0. in 1887 for the 10 acres arable and 10 acres pasture. This was reduced to £3.10.0. by the Crofter’s Commission in 1888.

During the Napier Commission investigation in Kirkwall on July 23rd 1883, the Chairman interrogated Rousay Free Church minister, the Rev. Archibald MacCallum who had been elected to stand as a delegate for the island’s crofters. He read a statement to the Commission explaining the crofters’ grievances regarding the present laird Frederick William  Traill-Burroughs. At one point he touched on the eviction of certain tenants, one of whom was William Robertson, though it was noted that these evictions actually took place in the time of the previous laird George William Traill.

The Chairman, Lord Napier, said:- The subsequent evictions you referred to are the cases of the tenant of Hammer and the occupiers of East Craye?

The Rev. MacCallum replied: Yes.

How many evictions were there?

East Craye was occupied by one crofter. He was evicted from one place which he had built and reclaimed, and then he was allowed to build in East Craye. The rent was then 10s., which has increased until it is now five times that amount.

How long was he in the place before the rent was raised in that way?

We have a statement from him here – [reads]

‘Statement by William Robertson, crofter, of East Craye, Sourin, Rousay, for Her Majesty’s Royal Commission on the Highlands and Islands:

My croft of East Craye is on the property of General Burroughs of Rousay and Viera. I am a native of the parish of Rousay, and am now seventy-two years of age. About 1845, I took a small croft at another part of the island from that where I now live, and got on that croft about a quarter of an acre cultivated when I entered on it. I paid 22s. of rent on that holding. As I improved, more rent was put upon me, until at last I was obliged to leave it altogether. I then got permission to build a dwelling on the hillside where I now live, where there was no cultivation of any kind, nor houses. I began to build, and got up with much trouble a humble cottage and outhouses suitable. I ditched and drained more than I was able, and got a little of the heather surface broken up. At this time I paid 12s.; but again, as I improved, more and more rent was laid on till I am now rented at a sum which is five times the rent I paid at first for a house I built myself. At the same time the common was taken away from me, as from all others; so that I am now not able to pay such a rent, nor to defend myself in any way, as I am wholly under the control and will of the proprietor.

WILLIAM ROBERTSON. JAMES LEONARD, witness.’

The Chairman asked: Whom was the statement drawn up by?

It was taken from his own mouth by James Robertson [his son] in his own language, and it is signed by himself.

William Robertson did not attend the session, perhaps deciding it prudent to stay away. Which was just as well, as another delegate, James Grieve was asked one question – did he agree with the statements made by MacCallum and James Leonard? Grieve replied in just two words – “I do” – and they were sufficient to result in his later eviction as sub-tenant of Triblo by General Burroughs.

Over the years at East Craie William and Betsy Robertson’s rent increased, but this was reduced to £2.0.0. in 1888 by the Crofter’s Commission. It was at this time that he renounced this croft and moved down the hill to Hanover. East Craie’s next tenant was David Gibson and his family. David was the son of John Gibson, Broland, later Knarston, and his second wife Janet Craigie, and he was born in October 1849. In 1880 he married Ann Gibson, daughter of Thomas Gibson, Broland, and Jane Grieve, Outerdykes, and she was one of twins born in December 1843. They had a son, John, born in January 1880, but he died when he was just two years of age. They had a daughter Ann, born in February 1881, who was an invalid. They had one more daughter, Jane, in 1889, but tragically she died at birth.

William Craigie died in 1895, and the next tenants of West Craie were James Dishan, who was born in Evie & Rendall in September 1847, and his wife Christina, who was born in Westray c.1848. James Donaldson Dishan was the son of James Dishan and May Rendall who, as a young man, was employed as a seaman in the merchant service. He was 28 years of age when he married domestic servant Christina Scollay, daughter of farmer Robert Scollay and Anne Kent. Though christened Christina, she was called Cirsten on the wedding certificate, and the ceremony took place at St Catherine’s Place, Kirkwall, where James was resident at the time. They came to Rousay, and settled at West Craie, but then moved down to Trumland where James was employed as a ploughman, living in a small cottage between the farm’s archway and the road, and it was known to one and all as – ‘Dishans.’

It was a surprise in my research then to find that James Donaldson Dishan had died – at Post Office Cottage, Eday, at noon on May 2nd 1910. The death certificate declared he was a ‘pauper, formerly a farm servant, married to Christina Scolley’, and that he had been suffering from bronchitis and emphysema for five years. The Rousay census for 1911 shows his wife Christina living at Gue, above Westness, and described as a 67-year-old ploughman’s widow.

The same census has no mention of West Craie – but East Craie was then home to James William Shearer and his wife Elizabeth. James was the son of Thomas Shearer and Mary Skea, and he was born at Carrick, Eday, on September 13th 1875. Prior to moving to Sourin James was employed as a ploughman and was living at ‘Trumland cottage’. Circa 1896 he married Elizabeth Wylie, daughter of fisherman Peter Wylie and Mary Laird, Hunda, Burray, who was born on August 15th 1864. Elizabeth was 77 years of age when she passed away at East Craie on the morning of August 13th 1942. James William died from heart problems at 5 Bridge Street, Kirkwall, on October 13th 1948 when he was 72 years old.

KNOWE OF CRAIE

The Knowe of Craie stands in enclosed land just above the vanished farmstead of East Craie, which itself in just above Curquoy in the Sourin valley. It was excavated by Walter G. Grant, and various pottery sherds, two scrapers, and four flint chips from the site are in the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland, presented by Grant in 1944-45.

MANSIE’S MOUNDS

DISCOVERY OF AN URN OF STEATITE IN R0USAY

NOTICE OF THE DISCOVERY OF AN URN OF STEATITE IN ONE OF FIVE
TUMULI EXCAVATED AT CORQUOY, IN THE ISLAND OF ROUSAY,
ORKNEY. – BY MR GEORGE M. M’CRIE, CORQUOY.

The cluster of mounds explored is situated a few yards to the north west of the farm house of Corquoy, and are locally known as “Manzie’s” (or Magnus’s) mounds. They have always been considered as burial-places. The measurement of the largest mound (in which the urn was found) was about 50 feet in circumference, and the top 5½ feet above the surrounding level, but there is no doubt it stood much higher within living memory. The others are smaller. A trench was dug from the north into the centre of the largest mound.

A cist was found almost in the centre of this mound, and at about the level of the surrounding ground. It consisted of a top and bottom stone (flat slabs partly naturally plane at the edges, and partly chipped into form), with four side stones, the whole neatly pieced and cemented with tempered red clay, probably from the Sourin burn some little distance off. The stone is of a hard blue nature, unlike any in the immediate neighbourhood, but like some to be found on the shores of the island. The cist was oblong in form, placed lengthways to N. and S., and measured inside about 2½ feet by 2 feet by 1½ depth. It was almost wholly filled with clay, ashes, and very minute fragments of bones, which crumbled to the touch. Marks of fire were visible on the stones, and fragments of what seemed to have been peat were among the contents. In the centre of the cavity of the cist was the urn. It stood mouth upwards, and was completely filled with clay, bone fragments, &c., of the same kind as outside. The material of the vessel is steatite, heavy and hard, but full of cracks, and rather brittle in parts. It measures 9¾ and 8 inches across the mouth, and stands 7 inches high; the thickness irregular, but averaging ¼ inch; weight about 3 Ibs. About one-third of the base was wanting when found, and a small portion of one of the sides has given way, but the piece can be accurately fitted in, being preserved.

[Mr Anderson stated that this appeared to have been a small cemetery of those peculiarly interesting interments which in his paper on the “Relics of the Viking Period in Scotland” he had correlated with a special class of interments in Norway of the later Iron Age. They are interments after cremation, and they differ from Celtic interments in having the burnt bones deposited in an urn of stone instead of the large ornate vessel of baked clay which is the invariable rule in Scotland. These stone urns, both in Norway and in this country, are usually of steatite. Some are of large size, one now in the museum being 20 inches high and 22½ in diameter. They often bear the marks of the chisel or knife with which they have been scooped out, but occasionally, as in the case of this one from Rousay, they have been smoothed and polished. The isles of Orkney and Shetland (which, as is well known, were colonised by the Norwegians in the later period of their Paganism) are the only localities on this side of the North Sea in which this class of burial has yet been found. They are therefore but little known, and up to this time no relics of distinctive character have been found with them except the urns. It is unfortunate that we have no detailed accounts of the phenomena of the burials, most of which have been investigated more with reference to the objects they have contained than to the phenomena they may have presented. In all probability the examination of these mounds during their excavation by some one who knew the differences between the phenomena of Celtic and Scandinavian burials might have detected evidence not obvious to the unskilled eye, and thus settled the question].

[Extracted from The Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, January 10, 1881. pp 71/72. Available at Orkney Library & Archive.]

[All black & white photos courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection]

[Edited map section courtesy of National Library of Scotland – Map Images maps.nls.uk/index.html]

Woo, an old farm in Sourin on the north bank of the Sourin Burn, was spelt Owe in the Early Rental of 1595, when it was skatted as a 3d land, this being the annual rent due from the tenant in occupation. Woo was jointly tenanted in 1653 by Henry Harrold and Andrew Moss and in 1738 the tenant was James Craigie.

In 1841, Woo was occupied by farmer William Mainland and his family. William was the son of Leslie and Jean Mainland of Avelshay, and he was born on March 9th 1811. On January 2nd 1835 he married Betsy Reid, daughter of Peter Reid and Betsy Marwick, who was born in Stronsay c.1810. William and Betsy had eight children – the first of which were twins, christened William and Betsy, who arrived on November 1st 1835. Jane was born in July 1837; Anne, in April 1839; John, in April 1841; James, in June 1845; Peter Mowat in December 1847; and David, who was born in April 1850. The family later moved the short distance to the farm of Banks.

Thomas Marwick was the next tenant of Woo, paying £15.8.0 rent in 1845 and £28.0.0. in 1857. He was the son of Hugh Marwick and Betsy Sinclair of Scockness, and was born in 1796. He was the second oldest of Betsy’s “ten devils.” On January 28th 1820, he married Ann Gibson, the daughter of John Gibson and Giles (Julia) Grieve of Broland, Sourin. She was born on November 29th 1800 when they were living at Hurtiso. Between 1821 and 1845 Thomas and Ann had ten children: Hugh, was born in September 1821; Elizabeth, in October 1823; John, in July 1826; Thomas, in March 1829; William Gibson, in August 1831; Mary Mainland, in August 1834; Margaret, in March 1837; Isaac, in December 1839; Isabella Ritchie, in April 1842; and Ann, who was born in October 1845.

Their mother Ann died in 1861, and was buried in Scockness kirkyard. The inscription on her tombstone reads as follows:-

Erected by Thomas Marwick
in memory of his beloved wife
Ann Gibson
Who died 21 April 1861.
“Weep nothing my friends and children dear;
Lamented I am sleeping here.”

All but two of this family emigrated to New Zealand, most of them going in the 1850’s. The others, along with their father, went in 1862 after their mother’s death.

The two who did not emigrate were John and Margaret. She married Robert Stevenson of Kirbust, Egilsay, in 1860, where they raised a family of eight children. On February 21st 1860 John married Margaret Gibson, daughter of Robert Gibson and Christian Hourston of Bigland, who was born on August 20th 1832. Between 1861 and 1879 John and Margaret brought up a family of eight children at Woo: Robert, was born in July 1861; Thomas William, born in January 1863; Margaret Ann, in February 1865; John, in September 1867; Mary Gibson, in July 1870; Samuel Gibson, in March 1873; Isabella, in June 1876; and Elizabeth, who was born in September 1879. Between 1879 and 1886 John paid annual rent of £50.0.0. for Woo and its 66 acres of land.

By 1881 he was joined by another tenant – Peter Mainland. He was the son of William Mainland and Barbara Reid of Cotafea, and he was born on January 29th 1832. On February 21st 1860 he married Margaret Gibson’s younger sister Mary at Woo and they had six children: Peter, was born in April 1863; Robert William, in June 1865; Samuel, in December 1867; David, in January 1871; Mary Christina, in May 1873; and Annie, who was born in January 1878.

By 1891, John Marwick and his family had moved down to the Glebe at Knarston, and Peter Mainland and his family had moved over to Georth, Evie. Woo was then occupied by farmer Robert Marwick. He was the son of Robert Marwick and Bell Mainland of Essaquoy. He was born on September 4th 1845, and was later known by one and all as Robbie o’ Scockness. On October 25th 1866 he married 26-year-old Ann Blalick Hourston of Tankerness, and they raised a family of seven children: Isabella was born in June 1867; Mary Ann, in July 1869; Jemima Baikie, in December 1871; Robert William, in April 1874; Margaret Johan, in August 1876; Elizabeth, in July 1879; and Jessie, who was born in November 1882. Robbie’s wife Ann died in 1892 and she was interred in the Scockness kirkyard. Daughter Isabella died at the age of 16, and her brother Robert passed away in 1899 at the age of 25, and interred in the same burial ground. It was not long before Robbie and the remaining members of his family moved into the farm buildings of Scockness – right next door to the kirkyard.

In the early 1900s a new two-storey dwelling house was built at Woo, the old house being converted for use as a shed and cattle shelter.

Woo was occupied by James Kirkness Inkster and his wife Maggie. James was the son of John McLellan Inkster, Barebraes, and Betsy Inkster, Innister, and he was born in 1877. Maggie was the daughter of Alexander Gibson, Vacquoy, and Margaret Learmonth, Westness, and she was born in Oct 1865. James and Maggie married in 1902, though had no children. In 1914 James was paying an annual rent of £25 for both Woo and nearby Burnside.

Above left is Maggie Jessie and her sister Mary Jane [Jeannie] Inkster, pictured together c.1913. – In the centre is their brother John Angus Munro Inkster. In WW1 he served as a private in the 4th (Reserve) Seaforths. He died of meningitis in Loanhead Hospital, near Edinburgh on 1st July 1918, aged 18. John’s body was returned home and buried in the Scockness Cemetery. – Seated above right is Willie Inkster and his friend James Sabiston, Gripps. c.1922.

Here is an article from the columns of The Orcadian of 1932 recording the retirement of John Inkster:

ROUSAY. POSTMAN HONOURED

Walked 65,000 miles in 35 years

Rousay publicly honoured Mr John lnkster, of Woo, at the Recreation Hall on Thursday evening, on the occasion of his retiral after 35 years’ service as postman in the Hillside district of Sourin. During that time, Mr Inkster estimates he has walked close on 65,000 miles. Mr W R Walls presided at the gathering and Rev. R R Davidson handed over a handsome chiming clock for Mr lnkster, and an umbrella for his wife.

Mr Inkster’s Career: Born on August 3, 1864, the fourth son of the late Mr and Mrs Robert lnkster, of Swartifield, Rousay, Mr lnkster, as a young man, spent some time at the fishing, and later took the tenancy of Housebay [Essaquoy] Farm. Appointed to the postal service in 1898, his round till 1914 was a daily one. During the War the service was reduced to three days per week, the daily service being resumed in 1931. Only five families occupy houses they were in when he started as a postman. Many homes he once called at are now in ruins.

Varied Activities: Apart from his work as a postman, Mr Inkster has taken a keen interest in Church and public affairs. He has been Superintendent of his Sunday School for 48 years, and an elder since 1894. In the social life of the island Mr Inkster has occupied an important part, and he is a popular chairman at social gatherings. Mr Inkster has acted as registrar for Rousay for 14 years.

He is a successful farmer also: Ten years ago he bought the holding of Woo in the Sourin valley, where he will spend his retirement. Two sons, Messrs William and Thomas lnkster, are now to work the farm. Mr lnkster won outright the silver cup, presented by Messrs Reith and Anderson, Aberdeen, for the best five lambs, at Rousay’s annual show a fortnight ago.

An Orkney-Shetland Wedding: Mr Inkster was married on December 28th 1894, to Miss Jane Irvine, a native of Shetland. Seven of eight children survive. The eldest son, John, served in the Seaforth Highlanders in the Great War and died in hospital in July 1918. The second son, William, is at home. The third son, Samuel, was a bridegroom in the double wedding recently reported in The Orcadian. He lives at Wasdale, Rousay. The fourth son, Robert, is in Canada, and Thomas, the youngest, works at home.

Maggie Jessie, the eldest daughter, is married to Mr A Donaldson, blacksmith, Orequoy. Jeannie is the wife of Mr A Harcus, miller, Rapness Mill, Westray. Elsie, the youngest daughter, is married to Mr Ronald Shearer, Curquoy, Rousay.

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Above left are brothers Sammy and Tommy Inkster, c.1930. Standing next to Tommy on the right is Billo Mainland, wearing his Home Guard uniform c.1945. Born in 1921 in Gairsay, Billo was the son of Hugh Mainland, Weyland, Egilsay, Gairsay, and Hurtiso, and Alice Craigie, Falquoy. He married Nessie Alberta (Netta) Russell, Brendale, in 1946, and they had five children: Wilma, Muriel, Eric, Thora, and Vincent. They lived at Woo – where Billo celebrates his 97th birthday today [29 12 2018]

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MILLHOUSE

Mill House, or Milnhouse, was situated half way between the General Assembly Schoolhouse and Woo, which stood on the bank of the Sourin Burn. In 1845 John Inkster’s grandfather William paid rent of £2. 5. 0. The Laird wrote in his rent book – “Must pull this house down, as the tenant poaches the salmon trout that come up the burn.” In 1851, William Inkster was living with his wife Margaret Gibson at Nether Swartifield, and the census of that year described him at 81 years old and ‘helpless.’

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HANOVER

Hanover is a house in Sourin on the south bank of the Sourin Burn above Woo. According to Hugh Marwick in his Place-Names of Rousay it is pronounced ‘haino’ver’, the usual spelling is probably due to assimilation to the German place name. In Sanday the same name occurs, though there an ‘h’ is sounded in front of the ‘o,’ thus hainho’ver. The meaning of the first element is put practically beyond doubt by its presence in another Sanday farm name, Hinegreenie, which is obviously = the green pasture: Old Norse haginn groeni . The second element in Hanover is very much less certain, but may perhaps represent O.N. ofarr or ofr– in sense of ‘above’ or ‘higher up,’ the whole thus signifying ‘the upper pasture.’

In the early 1800s Hanover in Sourin was occupied by the Marwick family. William Marwick was an under-miller, and living at Clumpy at that time was miller Hugh Marwick, though whether they were related or not I do not know. William’s parents were James Marwick and Ann Mainland, and he was born in Westray c.1781.

On March 9th 1816 he married Jane Work, and between 1816 and 1838 they had ten children, six sons and four daughters: James was born in December 1816; Ann, in October 1818; William, in October 1820; John, in August 1822; David, in July 1825; Alexander, in February 1828; Jane, in April 1829; Betty Yorston, in July 1831; Samuel, in August 1834; and Elizabeth, who was born in November 1837. William was a brother of James Marwick of Milnhouse, Sourin, who married Christian Groundwater of Eynhallow, in 1824.

The census of 1851 tells us more about the Marwick family. William was then in his 71st year and described as a pauper, and wife Jane was 58. Ann, the eldest daughter, was married, and at that time her husband John Cooper, Whistlebare, Egilsay, was in Canada, working for the Hudson’s Bay Company. Second oldest son William was a blacksmith, second oldest daughter Jane, then 21 years old, was an agricultural labourer, and thirteen-year-old daughter Betsy was an errand girl.

Thirty years on, and by 1881, blacksmith William was head of the household at Hanover. He married Helen Grieve of Nethermill, Egilsay, in 1852. Over the years in the census Helen was also called Ellen, and in 1881 Nelly. She was the daughter of Navy pensioner James Grieve and Elizabeth Davie and was born on March 15th, 1819. She was actually christened Eleanor Bews Grieve. She and William had three children; Helen, born in 1854; William Reid, in 1857; and David, who was born in 1863, earned a living as a fisherman – eventually emigrating to America.

In the early 1900s Alexander Munro paid an annual rent of £1 for Hanover’s land, while Betsy Cooper rented the house and poultry yard after she and her daughter Betsy had moved from Pretty.

FARO

Faro, or Quoyfaro, was a small croft on the south bank of the Sourin Burn, close to the Free Kirk. Its earliest known occupant was William Mowat, as recorded in a rental dated 1653. When a birth was registered there in 1822 it was spelled Quoyfaras, and seven years later Quoyferras when recording another birth.

According to the 1841 census the following people lived under three roofs at Faro. Firstly there was Betsy Craigie, a 30-year-old straw plaiter, and two children, William Garrioch, 7, and Betsy Gibson, 5. Then there was Isabella Mowat, a 70-year-old hemp spinner; and thirdly there was the Leonard family. Peter Leonard, born in November 1805, was the second of four children born to Peter Leonard and Janet Louttit who lived at Cutclaws, Quandale. On December 18th 1832, fisherman Peter married 20-year-old Eleanor [Helen] Bews, the second of seven children of Thomas Bews and Magdalene Grieve, Mid-skaill, Egilsay. She and Peter raised a family of eleven children: Thomas, who was born in September 1833, but died young; Peter, born in September 1835; a second Thomas, born in December 1837; William, in November 1840; John, in April 1843; Mary, in August 1845; James, in July 1847; Charles Reid, in November 1850; Alexander, in February 1853; Isabella, in April 1855; and Helen, who was born in April 1857.

Ten years on and in by the time the 1851 census was carried out the Leonard family had left Rousay, and were living at Quotquoy, Firth. Faro was called Quoy Faris. Still there was Isabella Mowat, then described as being 84 years old and a pauper. Also living there was another pauper, Isabella Craigie, widow of George Craigie of Hurtiso, and with her were her two surviving unmarried daughters, Janet, a 52-year-old agricultural labourer, and Barbara, a 45-year-old straw plaiter. William Garrioch still lived here, now 17 years old and described as a farm servant. Lastly, there was Betsy Costie, a 31-year-old seamstress.

FREE CHUCH, SOURIN

The old Sourin Kirk was built as the result of a momentous upheaval in the Scottish Church in 1843 when hundreds of ministers and their congregations left the Established Church and set up the Free Church of Scotland. Among the ministers who left, taking most of his congregation with him, was the Reverend George Ritchie of the Established Kirk in the Brinian. That was the beginning of the Free Kirk in Rousay.

George Ritchie was born in Glasgow in 1799. In 1851 the census tells up he was living at the Free Kirk Manse with his 39-year-old wife Isabella, and children John, 8, Isabella, 5, and James,5. There were two house servants too – Mary Baikie, 23, and Betsy Hutchinson, 15, both from Evie.

Ten years on and the manse was occupied by Ritchie’s successor, the Reverend Neil Patrick Rose and his newly married wife Mary Catherine Leslie. He was the son of farmer Alexander Rose and Elizabeth Payne, and was born in Thurso in 1832. Mary was the fifth oldest of eleven children born to John Leslie and Mary Wallace, and she was born in 1835 in Edinburgh. Neil and Mary married on September 24th 1850, and went on to have five children: John Alexander Leslie, born in January 1863; Neil Cunningham, in December 1864; Mary Wallace Leslie, in February 1868; Henry Wellwood Moncrieff, in January 1870; and Arabella Jane Leslie; who was born in December 1880.

Here is an interesting article concerning the Free Kirk from the columns of the Orkney Herald, dated April 19, 1870:

ROUSAY – A FRUIT SOIREE was held in the Free Church here on the evening of Wednesday week. There was a large attendance of people from all parts of the island – many even from the neighbouring islands of Weir and Egilshay. The services commenced at half-past seven o’clock by the choir, under the leadership of Mr Leonard, singing the 100th Psalm.  After prayer, the Chairman – Rev. Mr Rose, pastor of the congregation – rose, and spoke on the nature and uses of social meetings. The Rev. John McLellan, of the U.P. Church, then delivered an excellent address on the power of habit, concluding by giving some suitable counsels to the young. The Rev. Mr Roy, of Firth, delivered an able and telling speech on “Lighthouses and their Lessons,” which was listened to with deep attention. During the evening the choir sang several pieces of sacred music, to which Mrs Rose, who presided at the harmonium, played the accompaniments. An abundant supply of fruit and cake was served to the company by Messrs Thomas R. Reid, George Reid, John S. Craigie, and John McLellan, who acted as stewards. After spending a very pleasant evening, the meeting separated about 10 o’clock, after the benediction had been pronounced by Mr McLellan.

Rousay was one of the few parts of Orkney where crofters had organised and prepared a case for the Napier Commission, more formally known as The Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Crofters and Cottars in the Highlands and Islands, held in Kirkwall in July 1883. This political awareness owed much to the radicalism of the Reverend Rose in the Free Church in Sourin. In 1880 Rose had left the island to take a church in Edinburgh, but in the summer of 1883 he returned on holiday and was active in urging crofters to put their case to the Commission.

The Reverend Rose’s position as minister of the Sourin Free Church had been taken up by the Reverend Archibald MacCallum, and as the Crofters’ Movement centred on the Free Church community it was inevitable that he should be drawn into the conflict. In 1883 MacCallum was thirty years of age and had been in Rousay for only three years, during which time his relationship with the laird had been fairly normal. He had spoken to Burroughs about one or two cases of hardship but, when he found the laird unsympathetic, he had not pursued matters. It was the Napier Commission that turned MacCallum into a determined opponent and revealed him to be a leader of considerable ability.

MacCallum played no part in the crofters’ first meeting and he was, in fact, away from Rousay at the Free Church Assembly in Edinburgh. However, by invitation he attended the final meeting two days before the Napier hearing in Kirkwall. Only crofters were to be admitted and the factor, who attempted to gain entry, was turned away. MacCallum, however, rented a small croft near the manse and so it could be argued that technically he was a crofter. He was brought in to give an acceptable literary form to the statement which the crofters had already discussed and which James Leonard had drafted. As those present went over the document line by line, the minister objected to such phrases as a reference to Burroughs’ ‘wanton and inconsiderate inhumanity.’ His efforts met with little success although this particular phrase was replaced by a criticism of ‘the utterly inconsiderate and unrighteous manner in which we are treated by the proprietor.’ The minister had not won much of a modification but it was as far as the crofters were prepared to go.

When the crofters were at the height of their power, with their management of the School Board vindicated at the poll and their rents recently reduced by the Crofters’ Commission, the crofters’ movement received a blow from which it never properly recovered – the scandal of MacCallum’s departure. Unmarried and living alone in the damp and cheerless Sourin manse, his drinking bouts were becoming increasingly frequent. His lapses were at first a closely guarded secret in the Free Church congregation but the point was eventually reached when the problem could be concealed no longer. In December 1888 he submitted his resignation to the Free Church Synod ‘as his health did not agree with the climate conditions in Orkney.’

By the time the census of 1891 was carried out on April 5th the Free Kirk and its manse were in the capable hands of the Rev Robert Bonellie. He was the son of earthenware printer William Bonellie and Ann Nicolson, and was born in 1855 in Dysart, Fife. On April 23rd 1889 he married Marion Goodall Baillie, the 29-year-old daughter of plumber and gas fitter James Baillie and Rose Blair of Musselburgh, East Lothian. Back to the census, and the Bonellis had company at the manse – 34-year-old John Dykes Lang, a visiting Free Church minister from Hamilton, South Lanarkshire; a boarder named Augustus Althridge, a 25-year-old registered physician from England – all of whom were catered for by 19-year-old servant Jemima Baikie Marwick, daughter of Robert Marwick and Ann Blalick Hourston, Woo.

The paragraphs referring to the Napier Commission and the Rev. Archibald MacCallum were extracted from The Little General and the Rousay Crofters by William P L Thomson
and reproduced by permission of Birlinn Ltd.

[All black & white photos are courtesy of the Tommy Gibson Collection]

The name Outerdykes is a corruption of the older house name Out o’ Dykes, spelled that way in Rousay Birth Records of the early 1800s. Volume 16 of the Orkney Ordnance Survey Name Book of 1879-1880, which covers Rousay, has the name Outerdykes, and uses the island’s Inspector of Poor, Thomas Balfour Reid, as an authority for its spelling. Description remarks in the book state that the name ‘applies to an ordinary farm situate 13 chains SW from ‘Hanover’ and 25 chains SW from the ‘School.’ Today we know it as a ruined farmstead in the Sourin valley which, when it was built, was outside the old hill dyke.

Its first known occupants were farmer Robert Grieve and his family. Born c.1790, Robert married 23-year-old Ann Work in 1812. They had seven children: Jane, who was born in August 1819; Ann, in May 1821; Robert, in December 1822; Alexander, in August 1824; James, in March 1826; William, in March 1828; and Malcolm, who was born in November 1830.

Robert passed away before the census of 1851, his widow Ann, then 61 years of age, head of the household, with sons James at the fishing, William and Malcolm employed as agricultural labourers.

Wiilliam Grieve, born in March 1828, was married to Jane Flett, daughter of William Flett and Betsy Harvey, and she was born in Stromness on June 3rd 1833. In the late 1850s they decided to emigrate to Australia. Jane was pregnant at the time, and their first child, Mary, was born during the voyage in 1857. Another eleven children were to be born in their new surroundings at Walcha, New South Wales, between 1859 and 1877.

Ann herself had passed away by 1871, son Malcolm now farming Outerdykes’ 12 acres of surrounding land. He was thirty years of age when he married Frances (Fanny) Costie on April 12th 1861. Fanny was the daughter of David Costie and Christian Mowat, and was born in March 1840. They had two daughters, Ann Gibson, born in July 1862; and Jean Craigie, who was born in May 1868. In 1888 Jean married John Kent, Musland, Westray. Between 1889 and 1910 they had eleven children.

By 1881 the area of land Malcolm was farming at Outerdykes had increased to 22 acres, and his older brother James also lived there. In December 1875 he married Mary Mainland, daughter of William Mainland and Barbara Reid of Banks, Sourin, who was born on March 29th 1827. Mary was employed as a housemaid at the laird’s house at Trumland.

James had been in Australia for 25 years with his brother William but later returned to Rousay, fairly affluent by local standards. The laird, General Burroughs had approached him with a view to his taking the tenancy of one of the Rousay farms, but Grieve had boasted that he intended to buy a farm of his own and that he would not consider paying the rent Burroughs was asking. James settled as a sub-tenant on his brother Malcolm’s croft of Outerdykes. He gave very brief evidence against General Burroughs at the hearing of the Napier Commission, set up in 1883 to look at the condition of crofters in the Highlands and Islands. The Chairman said to him: ‘You have heard the statement read by the Rev. Mr MacCallum and the verbal statements made by James Leonard and George Leonard: do you concur with them?’ James replied: “I do.” – and those two words were sufficient to result in his eviction from Outerdykes. He found accommodation at Mount Pleasant in Frotoft which was situated on land outside General Burroughs’ control.

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WHITEHALL

In the early 1800s Whiteha’, just north of Triblo, was the home of handloom weaver James Pearson and his wife Cecilia. In 1845 James paid rent of £1.8.0. In 1857 he was paying £3.0.0. but they were later classed as paupers and lived there rent-free. James had passed away before the census of 1861 was carried out, his widow had a young visitor to keep her company though – seven-year-old Anne, who was George and Margaret Leonard’s daughter who lived at nearby Triblo.

By 1871, the tenancy had been taken over by Robert Grieve. He was the son of Robert Grieve and Ann Work of Outerdykes, and he was born there on December 18th 1822. He married Isabella Leonard, the daughter of Peter Leonard and Isobel McKinlay of Digro, who was born on August 3rd 1828. Married in February 1848, they had six children; William Leonard was born in 1850; Isabella Ritchie in 1854; James Calder in 1856; Robert Irvine in 1862; Mary was born in 1865, but died just two years later. She had been suffering from croup for four days, and died on March 16th 1867. Her brother Peter Leonard was born the following year, but he had just reached the age of 11 when he passed away at 8pm on the evening of January 11th 1879. According to his death certificate the cause of death was unknown, and no regular medical attendant was present.

BREVAL

Variously spelled Breval, Bravel, Brayvale, and Bravehill, this small hill croft lay on the south side of the Sourin, or Suso Burn. In 1851 it was occupied by William Work, a 44-year-old farmer and fisherman, his wife Isabella, who was 48 years of age, and Barbara Leonard, his 84-year-old mother-in-law who earned a living as a hemp spinner. William and Isabella lived at Breval and farmed its 30 acres of land throughout the 19th century, employing Mary Forbes of Stromness as a farm servant, who they later adopted.

Breval cost William £1 2s 0d to rent in 1845. In 1857 this rose to £5, £6 15s 0d in 1872 and £7 in 1887. In 1888 he paid just £4 10s 0d…..‘So reduced by the Crofter’s Commission !!!’ – wrote the laird in his rent book, much to his annoyance! William became bankrupt in 1892 and later died at Gue, Westness.

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All black & white photos are from the Tommy Gibson Collection unless otherwise stated.
My thanks to Ken Harth, Surfside Beach, South Carolina, for sharing family photos
and detailed information regarding his grandfather Kenneth.

Thanks also to Bertie Gillespie, Longhope, for information regarding
his Munro relatives who lived at Breval.