SIB FOLK NEWS - Orkney Family History Society
SIB FOLK NEWS - Orkney Family History Society
SIB FOLK NEWS - Orkney Family History Society
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<strong>SIB</strong> <strong>FOLK</strong> <strong>NEWS</strong><br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY ISSUE No 47 September 2008<br />
Kirkwall. The busiest<br />
cruise liner port in Scotland<br />
On the 10th May the first of the visiting cruise ships<br />
returned to <strong>Orkney</strong> when the Marco Polo tied-up at<br />
Hatston Pier in Kirkwall Bay.<br />
Over the year 44 vessels have visited the islands, some<br />
as many as 5 times.<br />
The smallest carried just 25 passengers; the largest<br />
over 2500.<br />
The total passenger capacity was in the region of<br />
40,000 and many disembarked to explore Kirkwall<br />
and visit the 12th century St Magnus Cathedral.<br />
Others took the tour to the 5000 year old village<br />
of Skara Brae which also allows time to visit the<br />
chambered cairn of Maeshowe, the Standing Stones<br />
of Stenness and the Ring of Brodgar.<br />
Some will return in the future, the first of many visits<br />
they will make as they fall under the spell of the<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> Islands.<br />
Perhaps we can welcome you too?<br />
The Minerva, Silver Cloud and Marco Polo visitrd Kirwall on August 7th<br />
Photograph. John Sinclair.
2 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No 47 September 2008<br />
ORKNEY<br />
FAMILY HISTORY<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER<br />
Issue No 46<br />
June 2008<br />
CONTENTS<br />
FRONT COVER<br />
Echoes of a<br />
Bygone Age<br />
PAGE 2<br />
From the Chair<br />
PAGE 3<br />
Tumbledown<br />
No 4<br />
Page 4 & 5<br />
Stromness linked<br />
to Robert Louis<br />
Stevenson<br />
PAGE5<br />
Robbie the Sholtie<br />
PAGE 6<br />
Fiery Bill Inkster<br />
PAGE 7<br />
Last Ranch<br />
PAGES 8 & 9<br />
The Spences<br />
of Cumming &<br />
Spence<br />
PAGE 10<br />
I found my<br />
Tumbledown<br />
PAGES 12–16<br />
DNA in Genealogy<br />
PAGE 17<br />
In memory of<br />
Walter Sinclair<br />
PAGES 18 & 19<br />
HBC Blankets<br />
PAGE 19<br />
News from<br />
Janette Thomson<br />
PAGES 20 & 21<br />
The Abernethys<br />
of Stromness<br />
PAGE 21<br />
James Cambell<br />
Bruce Inkster<br />
PAGE 22<br />
An encounter with<br />
Moby Dick<br />
PAGE 23<br />
Can you identify<br />
the Photographs<br />
PAGE 24<br />
Membership etc<br />
Alan Clouston<br />
From<br />
the chair<br />
With the summer over, the <strong>Society</strong> now looks forwards<br />
to our forthcoming winter programme. How quickly<br />
this summer appears to have gone! I recall a story<br />
when I was a small boy about how quickly “time flies” - it was said to have<br />
originated in a well known house in the parish of Stenness when the “man o’ the<br />
hoose” retorted, “Heh-heh Time Flies” after his wife had flung the clock at him. I<br />
hope that summer has been reasonable for you and you now find the time to get<br />
back into your family history.<br />
Ancestral tourism is certainly alive in <strong>Orkney</strong>, as the office has continued to<br />
welcome visitors from all over the world. On occasions simultaneous enquiries<br />
result in the instant meeting of family kin. There is no doubt that returning to<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> to find that link to Orcadian ancestry is as popular as it has ever been. If<br />
you have experienced a worthwhile visit why not send our SFN editor your story.<br />
The <strong>Society</strong> will not be promoting any special events during 2009, which is<br />
Scotland’s Year of Homecoming. With existing demands, we recognise that the<br />
best service we can provide for visitors is to ensure we can cope with the normal<br />
users as well as those who will, throughout the homecoming year, wish to access<br />
the <strong>Society</strong>’s resources and pick the brains of our stalwart researchers and<br />
volunteers.<br />
The <strong>Society</strong> will celebrate its first event of the programme, being the Annual<br />
Dinner, in September. The series of monthly events is being planned and the<br />
programme will appear as soon as possible on the OFHS website. The training<br />
events programmed for members in <strong>Orkney</strong> will take place over the autumn.<br />
May the autumn and the lead up to Christmas be a positive time for you all.<br />
Sept 2008
Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
Overlooking the ‘Gateway to the New World’ and steeped<br />
in history, the Hall of Clestrain, although not quite tumbledown,<br />
is and has been uninhabited for 50 years. It is recognised<br />
by Historic Scotland and the Scottish Civic Trust as<br />
an ‘A’ listed building, a critical ‘at Risk’ building.<br />
The land of Clestrain was once part of the vast estates of<br />
the Honeyman family and the original house was ransacked<br />
in 1725 by the infamous <strong>Orkney</strong> pirate John Gow who was<br />
to end his days hanging from a rope at Execution Dock in<br />
London.<br />
The original building was replaced in 1768 by an entirely<br />
new Georgian building built by Patrick Honeyman, third<br />
Laird of Graemsay.<br />
In 1813 John Rae was born at the Hall of Clestrain. Recently<br />
the BBC TV docurama<br />
‘Passage’ related<br />
the stories of the endeavours<br />
of Rae, considered by<br />
many to be the greatest<br />
Arctic explorer of all time.<br />
The programme highlighted<br />
his service as a medical<br />
doctor to the Hudson’s Bay<br />
Company, his charting of<br />
northern Canada, his discovery<br />
of the ‘North West<br />
Passage’ and his uncovering<br />
the fate of the Franklyn<br />
expedition. This later<br />
discovery was to deny Rae<br />
Dr John Rae<br />
By Alan Clouston - Member No 339<br />
his place in history as Victorian<br />
<strong>Society</strong> attempted<br />
to conceal the horrific truth of what actually happened to<br />
Sir John Franklyn’s illfated 1845 expedition.<br />
The Hall was also highlighted in the BBC2 ‘Restoration’<br />
series in 2004, with hopes of it being restored into community<br />
use as a heritage facility to tell the John Rae story and<br />
within its grounds to erect a new Boat Hall and other facilities<br />
to house <strong>Orkney</strong>’s boat collection telling stories of ‘<strong>Orkney</strong><br />
and the Sea’. This project continues to be advanced and<br />
hopefully the Hall will not be left to ‘tumble down’ and will<br />
be restored for the use of future generations.<br />
Are you perhaps related to the Rae family in some way?<br />
Do you have any stories or inforemation about Rae’s siblings<br />
and their families?<br />
If so Alan Clouston would be delighted to hear from you.<br />
You can contact him at alan.clouston@virgin.net or at the<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> office.<br />
Space does not allow for the inclusion of the census details of the servants<br />
who worked at the Hall between 1821 and 1901. If these are of interest to you<br />
Alan will e-mail a copy on request.<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
HALL OF CLESTRAIN 1821 1841 1851 1861 1871 1881 1891 1901<br />
Name age age age age age age age age<br />
John Rae (head) 40<br />
Margaret Rae (wife) 30<br />
James Rae (son) 15<br />
Jess Rae (daughter) 10<br />
Marion Rae (daughter) 10<br />
William Rae (son) 10<br />
Richard Rae (son) 5<br />
John Rae (son) 5<br />
Thomas Rae 1<br />
William Mackay (head) 30 42 53 62<br />
Fanney Mackay (nee Sinclair) 35 43 54 67<br />
Jennet Mackay (daughter) 15<br />
George Mackay (son) 11<br />
James Mackay (son) 9<br />
Isabella Mackay (daughter) 6 15<br />
William Mackay (son) 4 13 23<br />
Margaret Mackay (d’ter) 1 11<br />
John Mackay (son) (head) 9 28 39<br />
Betsy Mackay (daughter) 6 17 35<br />
Frances Mackay (daughter) 4 14 33<br />
Richard Mackay (head) 36<br />
Christina Mackay (wife) 37<br />
Richard Mackay (son) 7<br />
John Mackay (son) 5<br />
Francis Mackay (son) 2<br />
Jane Robina Mackay (d’ter) 5 wks<br />
James Baillie (head) (ret’rd) 77<br />
Margaret Baillie (wife) 69<br />
James Baillie (son) (head) 37<br />
Jemina Baillie (wife) 29<br />
John W Baillie (son) 6<br />
Jessie Baillie (daughter) 3<br />
William B Baillie (son) (head) 43<br />
Mary Baillie (wife) 33<br />
James S Baillie (son) 12<br />
Frances M Baillie (daughter) 10<br />
William D Baillie (son) 9<br />
Isabella J Baillie (daughter) 7<br />
Eleanor M Baillie (daughter) 4<br />
Alexina J Baillie (daughter) 2<br />
Thomas L Baillie (son) 1 mth<br />
3<br />
Peter Maxwell (head) 30<br />
Ellen Fotheringham ( hlf sister) 41
4<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
Scottish Association of <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> Societies<br />
19 th Annual Conference<br />
Saturday 26 th April 2008 in Motherwell Concert Hall.<br />
This year’s SAFHS Conference was hosted by Lanarkshire<br />
<strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> in association with Glasgow<br />
and West of Scotland <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong>.<br />
On the Friday night, 25 th April, North Lanarkshire<br />
Council kindly put on a Civic Reception and Dinner which<br />
was hosted by Provost Tom Curley. It was in the Civic<br />
Centre, Motherwell. As I was the only OFHS member to<br />
enrol for the Conference I was invited to represent <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
<strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong>. When Mr Bob Stewart, chairman<br />
of the Lanarkshire <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong>, replied to the<br />
welcome and presentation by Provost Tom Curley I got a<br />
special welcome as the furthest travelled guest. A lovely<br />
meal was served by College students after which an enjoyable<br />
time was spent talking to old friends and meeting new<br />
ones. The company began to break up at 9.30pm.<br />
Then at 9.30am, the next morning, we congregated in<br />
the spacious Concert Hall for the <strong>History</strong> Fair and in the<br />
Civic Theatre for the lectures. After registration each<br />
delegate received a Visit Scotland carrier bag full of genealogical<br />
goodies. Coffee and biscuits were also readily<br />
available. On entering the hall we found that many of<br />
Scotland’s family history societies and some other history<br />
groups were already fully prepared for visitors to<br />
their stalls. There were twenty one family history societies<br />
represented. The most northerly was Highland FHS.<br />
Because of the size of the hall many other historical and<br />
heritage groups had been encouraged to attend. Again<br />
there were about twenty one of them. I bought a couple<br />
of books and I confess to have spent some time at an “Old<br />
Nan Scott reports<br />
Postcard” stall that had a big bundle of <strong>Orkney</strong> postcards<br />
for sale. If anyone is interested I can pass on an address.<br />
The Conference was opened by Gilbert Cox, Lord Lieutenant<br />
of Lanarkshire. He had been at the Civic Reception<br />
the night before and had expressed an interest in family<br />
history researches. The first speaker was Dr Irene O’Brien<br />
whose subject was “Scottish Poor Law”. She is well known<br />
all over the Scottish Archive scene and is a Senior Archivist<br />
in Glasgow City Archives. She told us how the Poor<br />
Law Act came into being in1845 and continued until 1948.<br />
She went on to tell us of the records that had to be kept to<br />
comply with the law such as names, ages, birthplaces, dependants,<br />
marital histories, other relations and addresses.<br />
She also told us where they could be found. It was very interesting<br />
how several of the examples that she chose to use<br />
came from <strong>Orkney</strong>. Later I discovered that she knew our<br />
Alison Fraser and that the <strong>Orkney</strong> Archive had been very<br />
helpful with her research. In conclusion she said the Poor<br />
Law had given us a very important source of information.<br />
It recorded the lives of a particular level of population and<br />
drew attention to the huge numbers of applications.<br />
The second lecturer was Guthrie Hutton who worked<br />
with BBC Scotland for 32 years. He left in 1994 and has<br />
since written a number of local history books. Many of<br />
these have been about mining or canals. The subject of his<br />
talk was “Forth and Clyde Canals”. I found his talk very<br />
interesting and before I knew it I had filled four pages in<br />
my notebook. I had recently read a book on life on a barge<br />
and have had two holidays on the Caledonian Canal whenA<br />
The Civic Reception Dinner was hosted by Provost Tom Curley of North Lanarkshire. On his left is Bob Stewart, Chairman of the Lanarkshire <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> and on<br />
his right is the Glasgow & West of Scotland FHS Chairman, Eddie Nairn and the Lord Lieutenant of Lanarkshire Mr Gilbert Cox MBE. JP. who opened the conference..
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 5<br />
Fwe had to handle our own boat. I think we got a complete<br />
history of the building and then the closing of each<br />
section. The talk was peppered with dates, names of the<br />
places connected by the canal and names of the engineers<br />
involved. In 1995 a bid for Lottery Funding was made to<br />
help re-design the Forth & Clyde Canal as a Millenium<br />
Project. There was only the one “<strong>Orkney</strong>” interest in<br />
this talk when we saw a slide of the trial run of a newly<br />
launched canal “Princess” boat with Donald Dewer and<br />
Jim and Rosie aboard. Though the only Orcadian there<br />
I doubt if I was the only one who knew who Jim and<br />
Rosie were!<br />
The Mutchs on the left. The Bishops on the right<br />
I missed the third scheduled talk as I had an exciting<br />
time introducing two couples who had the same <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
connection. I had met the first couple, the Mutchs, who<br />
actually lived in Motherwell, two years ago when they<br />
were researching Scollays at the Bisgeos in Westray.<br />
Shortly before that I had got to know the other couple,<br />
none other than the Bishops, at a SAFHS meeting in<br />
Edinburgh. Bruce Bishop is now deputy chairman of<br />
SAFHS and his wife Janet is editor of the SAFHS Bulletin.<br />
This is the kind of thing that makes genealogy<br />
worthwhile.<br />
I later learned that the third speaker, Campbell<br />
Drysdale, who was going to speak on the “Scottish Mining<br />
Museum”, had suddenly taken ill and was in hospital for<br />
a few days. The fourth speaker, David Webster, was able<br />
to stand in using another talk that he happened to have<br />
handy. He was an eloquent speaker, had been in business<br />
in Sweden and was fluent in Swedish too. His scheduled<br />
talk was entitled “Wine Bags and Mutton Eaters”. This<br />
turned out to be the results of an amazing study of the<br />
Scottish Diaspora. He gave the many reasons why Scots<br />
would leave home and in his studies he has come on Scottish<br />
names in lights all over the world. He gave us a long<br />
list of powerful and notable positions that had been held<br />
by Scots in foreign countries over the years.<br />
While the last talk was going on stall attendants began<br />
clearing up and so the 19th SAFHS Conference closed at<br />
4.30pm. I was pleased to have been able to go. As I have<br />
been more familiar with the east of Scotland in the past<br />
going west was a new experience. I met with a lot of kindness<br />
and friendliness both at the Conference and wherever I<br />
went over the week-end.<br />
Jean Shirer in charge of the Aberdfeen & North East of Scotland FHS stall<br />
The 20th Annual Conference is to be in Aberdeen in 2009.<br />
Some details appear below. We will try to keep you up-todate<br />
in the newsletter or our website. I do hope some of<br />
you will be able to attend. I will certainly try to be there.<br />
SCOTTISH ASSOCIATION OF FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETIES PROGAMME INCLUDES<br />
20th ANNUAL CONFERENCE<br />
Saturday 25th April 2009 9.30am to 4.30pm<br />
KING’S COLLEGE Conference Centre ABERDEEN<br />
Enjoy A programme packed with interesting speakers covering a range<br />
of fascinating family history subjects.<br />
Conference Tickets £10. Lunch available at £12. Complimentary Civic<br />
Reception at the Beach Balllroom, Aberdeen. Friday 24th April, 7.30pm<br />
For Bookings and full Conference details contact<br />
ABERDEEN & NE SCOTLAND FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
158 -164 KING STREET, ABERDEEN, AB24 5BD<br />
•Women in <strong>Family</strong><br />
<strong>History</strong><br />
•Digging deeper: NHS<br />
services to support<br />
<strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong><br />
•Hospital Records for<br />
Genealogist<br />
•Military <strong>History</strong><br />
Plus stalls, raffles etc
6<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
WHAT’S IN<br />
A PLACE NAME ?<br />
Concentrated in its small geographical area, <strong>Orkney</strong> has<br />
a particularly rich and varied history of place names. Interest<br />
in the subject increases with time as people try to<br />
understand something of the meaning that place names<br />
convey about the lay of the land and who owned it, what<br />
it was used for, how it was divided up and developed,<br />
changes that took place over the centuries and all that<br />
still goes on.<br />
When family groups stayed a long time in one place, lasting<br />
centuries in some cases, they became closely linked to<br />
their environment to the extent that the family took the<br />
name of the land; thus the old area of Delday in Deerness<br />
gave the surname Delday; similarily the Skeaton district<br />
in Deerness has its continuity in the surname Skea. Both<br />
of these are good old Orcadian surnames to this day.<br />
It may be that before populations increased and surnames<br />
became essential, an older form of identification<br />
was used, and not only in <strong>Orkney</strong>. The first name of an<br />
adult man was followed my his place-name, usually the<br />
portion of land where he lived, and the two names were<br />
linked by o’ for short. So everyone would know where John<br />
o’ Grind, Davie o’ Fea, Robbie o’ Holland all belonged to in<br />
a parish. When there was little movement of people from<br />
outwith a parish, or indeed within it, there was no need<br />
for surnames.<br />
Fast-track now to the late 20th century – the troubles<br />
in Northern Ireland are in full swing and an Irishman<br />
brings his family safely to <strong>Orkney</strong> for security. In time he<br />
gets to know the County and some of its native people and<br />
expresses surprise to an Orcadian that so many Irish are<br />
living in <strong>Orkney</strong>. The Orcadian is equally surprised and<br />
asks how he has come to this conclusion. ‘Well’ says the<br />
Iriishman,’there is John o’ Newark, Billy o’ Donesquoy,<br />
Tam o’ Vestlebanks’. In the next few minutes of conversation<br />
all the ‘resident Irish’ were changed irrefutably into<br />
indigenous Orcadians.<br />
It is also said that a touch of class distinction was practised.<br />
If the head man of a family was both the occupier<br />
and proprietor of his land, the the word ‘of’ was used instead<br />
of the abbreviation o’, hence Alfred of Braebister.<br />
While static populations gave rise to certain family, and<br />
place names, the opposite is true. The largest early influx<br />
came with the Norse in the Viking Age with long-lasting<br />
effects, effects that fascinate people to this day. Then<br />
came the Scots and others, among them the mapmakers<br />
who Scotticised / Anglicised wonderfully descriptive and<br />
meaningful Old Norse names, leading us nowadays to<br />
have to delve into the past to appreciate their true mean-<br />
By Edna S. Panton. Member No 1094<br />
ing. We are fortunate to have William Thomson’s recent<br />
book on the subject to fill the gap.<br />
Within living memory <strong>Orkney</strong> has had its fair share<br />
of population upheaval during the Second World War<br />
and for the previous generation, the First World War.<br />
The story which follows is a very small instance of how<br />
a combination of people, circumstance and environment<br />
can result in a place-name carrying a depth of history<br />
behind it.<br />
Visualise a tiny triangular patch of land, wet and<br />
marshy, where buttercups grow, which is such poor ground<br />
that it has never been cultivated. As such it has always<br />
been known as the ‘Myrrin’ belonging to Grind in the<br />
south-end of Deerness. Then came the First World War;<br />
a local man, James Sutherland, fought in the trenches in<br />
France and suffered the effects of gas. He was sent to a<br />
hospital in Leeds where he met a local girl, married and<br />
brought her back to Deerness. In the 1920s he built a<br />
small home on the ‘Myrrin’, and named it ‘Armlea Cottage’<br />
after a district in Leeds, and everyone understood<br />
the reason for the attractive namer. Several occupancies<br />
later, Dr William Emslie bought the cottage for his<br />
family’s use at weekends and in the summertime. Both<br />
he and his wife belonged to Aberdeen and they renamed<br />
it ‘Persleyden’ which was and is a lovely area by the city<br />
and River Don. Once again a name had been taken from<br />
the original area of the owners and one that they liked.<br />
In the 1960s Agnes J. Petrie of Stonehall, Deerness,<br />
retired from the farm after over 40 years of life there.<br />
She bought Persleyden for her retirement home and had<br />
21 years in it. During that time she toyed with the idea<br />
of changing the name on the basis that it had no <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
connections and that she, an Orcadian born and bred,<br />
wished to have one with more local meaning. She was<br />
supported in this by my late husband, Norman A Panton,<br />
himself an Aberdonian, but who felt quite strongly<br />
about it. The onus fell on me to come up with a suitable<br />
name, one that would last, with hints of Old Norse<br />
if possible. The obvious was to call it ‘The Myrrin’, but<br />
on thinking on its interpretation, wet boggy and marshy<br />
ground, the answer was ‘No’. A natural spring would<br />
have given us the name ‘Keldur’, Old Norse for spring<br />
but that was rejected as a hard-sounding name. We also<br />
considered Old Norse names surrounding the shoreline<br />
of ‘Stonehall’; ‘Taracliff’, ‘Myzgar’, ‘Mahon’s’ and Rattans<br />
Gates’. ‘Dingeshowie’ and the field name ‘Suli’ were also<br />
possibles but the field of ‘Suli’ is in use to this day and<br />
we could not have kye being sent to the cottage insteadA
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 7<br />
Fof the field. ‘Myzgar’, with a modern spelling, is still<br />
used in the parish and most of the others with the exception<br />
of ‘Taracliff’ did not sound right. Well we took the<br />
prefix ‘Tara’ and my husband suggested adding ‘homn’<br />
which he heard meant haven in Old Norse. ‘Tarahomn’, we<br />
thought, had the right ring about it and for good measure<br />
we even put up a stone with the name at the front of the<br />
cottage. In a few years, we thought, probably no more than<br />
one hundred, people might be calling the cottage by its<br />
new name.<br />
But a little bit of the jigsaw remained a mystery. What<br />
is the Old Norse meaning of ‘Tara’? Several people, including<br />
our own Rev. Harold Mooney, had tried to solve it but<br />
it proved elusive. Then out of the blue we heard the word<br />
‘Tara’ for the first and only time. We were watching a TV<br />
documentary on ‘The Year of the Bear’ with filming on the<br />
south shoreline of Shetland. One of those taking part was<br />
a well-known Shetlander, Mrs Rhoda Boulter. She spoke<br />
of her sister playing on this shoreline and how they used<br />
a ‘tara-heuk’. We both sat bolt upright and that evening<br />
I wrote to Rhoda Butler c/o BBC Lerwick. In two weeks<br />
came a letter of explanation. Sadly just two weeks later<br />
Rhoda had died.<br />
Rhoda, however, told us that ‘tara’ being connected<br />
to ‘Taracliff’ meant ‘where the waters meet and swirl<br />
around’. And that is how it is; ‘Taracliff’ faces southeastwards<br />
and in a southeasterly gale the waters certainly<br />
meet and swirl with a vengeance.<br />
So there we had it at last. ‘Tarahomn’; the haven at the<br />
meeting of the waters. It is a comfortable name, close to<br />
home, with Old Norse overtones, all rolled into one.<br />
There can be much to a place name. L<br />
3 interesting items from Peter Leith<br />
James Coats<br />
The Paisley<br />
philanthropist<br />
Sir James Coats and<br />
the Stenness connection<br />
Eva Donald, member 1209,<br />
was seeking information in<br />
Sib News No 45 about the<br />
Paisley philanthropist<br />
and especially his<br />
generous gifts to<br />
Stenness which<br />
included ‘a thoroughly<br />
equipped<br />
library’ reading<br />
glasses for the<br />
p a r i s h i o n e r s who required<br />
that aid and school-bags for the children. Now, thanks to<br />
Peter Leith member 65, we have a picture of one of the<br />
schoolbags and it seems in fairly pristine condition. Also<br />
in the picture is the register of the Stenness Coats Library.<br />
From the size of the ledger the library appears to have<br />
been a well used facility.<br />
Putting <strong>Orkney</strong>, South Africa, on the map.<br />
Peter Leith, member No 65 was interested in the article<br />
‘Putting <strong>Orkney</strong> on the World Map’ which appeared in<br />
Sib News No 46, June 2008.<br />
He points out, however that Item 6 referring to <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
South Africa is not strictly accurate and has sent the<br />
following information extracted from a leaflet that came<br />
from <strong>Orkney</strong>, South Africa.<br />
This indicates that Thomas Smith Leask, an Orcadian<br />
Putting <strong>Orkney</strong>,<br />
South Africa,<br />
on the map<br />
FREE<br />
palaeography<br />
tutorial<br />
fortune hunter who came to South Africa in 1862,<br />
bought the Witkoppen farm situated on the banks of<br />
the Vaal River and began to mine gold on it. He registered<br />
the farm as the <strong>Orkney</strong> Gold Mining Company.<br />
He and a fellow director A M Campbell kept the mine<br />
active until 1892 and extracted 1228 ounces of gold<br />
from it.<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> was to be proclaimed on 20 March 1940 on this<br />
very farm of Witkoppen where Leask and Campbell<br />
had dug for gold.<br />
The leaflet goes on to state that “It can be accepted<br />
that the name <strong>Orkney</strong> was derived from the <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
Islands. ‘Orkn’ is the old Icelands for a sea lion and<br />
‘Ey’ is the old Norse for islands. This is why a sea lion<br />
was chosen as an emblem for the town.<br />
Interested in reading old documents?<br />
Peter tells me that if you are interested in reading<br />
old handwriting, a FREE interactive website with an<br />
online palaeopgraphy tutorial is available at:www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/palaeography<br />
The National Archives is the national archive for England,<br />
Wales and the central UK government and it<br />
contains 900 years of history, from the Domesday Book<br />
to the present, with records ranging from parchment<br />
and scrolls through to recently created digital files and<br />
archived websites.<br />
Increasingly these records are being put online making<br />
them universally accessible. L
8<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
I FOUND MY<br />
ANCESTRAL HOME<br />
By Peter Thorley. Member No 1124<br />
Our second visit to <strong>Orkney</strong> in 2004 was a co-ordinated<br />
event in which my wife and her two sisters rendezvoused<br />
with two cousins from Chicago Illinois, all descendants of<br />
Benjamin Stout, first coxswain of the Longhope Lifeboat.<br />
During our visit we were royally hosted by fellow cousins/OFHS<br />
members Fred & Liz Johnston of Stromness<br />
and Angus & Margaret Heddle of Longhope.<br />
During our trip we visited the ancestral home, Newhouse<br />
on Brims. Newhouse is situated on the hill overlooking<br />
Upper Salwick and the Longhope Lifeboat station<br />
(now the Lifeboat museum) with spectacular views<br />
over The Ayre, Aith Hope and the Pentland Firth.<br />
I believe that Newhouse was built by Benjamin following<br />
his marriage to Harriet Taylor Robertson of Osmandswall<br />
in 1859 although the earlier census returns<br />
don’t name the dwelling, 1891 being the first census in<br />
which it is named. Having visited the site, considering<br />
the size of the dwelling and its lack of facilities, I was<br />
amazed that Benjamin & Harriet were able to successfully<br />
raise 10 children there (an eleventh child died in<br />
infancy).<br />
Census returns of Benjamin and family are as follows:-<br />
1861 1871 1881 1891 1901<br />
Name AGE AGE AGE AGE AGE<br />
Benjamin Stout 30 40 51 60 71<br />
Harriet Stout 24 33 44 52 63<br />
Sutherland Stout 1 11 21 - -<br />
Catherine Ann Stout 9 * - -<br />
John Stout 8 18 - -<br />
Isabella Stout 6 16 - -<br />
Wilhelmina Stout 3 13 - -<br />
Georgina Stout 1 11 - -<br />
Harriet Stout 9 19 -<br />
James Alick Stout 6 16 26<br />
Mary Alice Stout 4 14 24<br />
Benjamin Edward Stout 2 12 22<br />
*Working at Hope Hotel, South Ronaldsay<br />
Benjamin’s occupation is recorded as Farmer/Fisherman<br />
as were many of the residents of Brims at that<br />
time;he also retained a lifelong connection to the Longhope<br />
Lifeboat.<br />
He was Coxswain of the Lifeboat for 26 years, retiring<br />
at the age of 70 in 1900. He was awarded the RNLI<br />
Silver medal in 1891 for his gallantry in connection with<br />
the rescue of crew from the S.S. ‘Victoria’ of Sunderland.<br />
Eleven of the rescued crew were Germans and the Emperor<br />
of Germany presented a gold watch to Benjamin<br />
and £24 to the crew of the lifeboat.<br />
The six oldest of Benjamin & Harriet’s offspring emi-<br />
‘Newhouse’ on Brimms—My Ancestral Home<br />
grated to the USA in the 1880’s all settling in Illinois.<br />
The seventh child Harriet joining them in the 1890`s.<br />
The American contingent of our visiting group, Bonnie<br />
Johnson and her sister Lori Milam, are descendants of<br />
Benjamin’s daughter Isabella.<br />
The three youngest children stayed in the UK, James<br />
Alick Stout lived and worked around Edinburgh & Fife<br />
and is believed to later<br />
have moved to Dorset<br />
in England; Mary Alice<br />
Stout stayed on Walls,<br />
marrying John Taylor<br />
Norquay in 1907; Benjamin<br />
Edward Stout<br />
(my wife’s Grandfather)<br />
moved to Methil in Fife<br />
where he worked as a<br />
Customs Officer.<br />
Harriet died in 1904<br />
and Benjamin passed<br />
away at the age of 81<br />
in 1911. Newhouse<br />
The 3 Benjamins. Benjamin Edward (b.1878),<br />
his son (standing) Benjamin Stout (B. 1905),<br />
and grandson Benjamin (B. 1930)<br />
remained in the Stout<br />
family and was occupied,<br />
almost continuously, by<br />
them except for a short<br />
time in the 1920s when a Johnston stayed there for a<br />
few years. The last Stout connection with Newhouse<br />
was John Norquay, a son of Mary Alice Stout who lived<br />
there until the 1950s. After he left, the house remained<br />
unoccupied and eventually became uninhabitable. It is<br />
evidently up for sale so hopefully may one day be rebuilt<br />
or restored as a family home. Finally, if anyone can add<br />
to, improve the accuracy of the above or have any “Stout”<br />
family history information to share, I would be very<br />
pleased to hear from them at pthorleysa@hotmail.com<br />
The ‘Stout’ visitors with whom we made contact on our visit ion 2004.<br />
Standing L-R Wilma Harford (nee Stout), Bonnie Johnson (nee Milam), Margaret<br />
Heddle, Lori Milam, Angus Heddle, Doreen Hoyle (nee Stout).<br />
Sitting is Carrie Thorley (nee Stout).
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 9<br />
“November’s sun with slanting ray,<br />
Beam’d feebly on the wintry morn.”<br />
By the autumn of 1822 more than a quarter of a century<br />
had passed since worshippers from Shapinsay<br />
first made the journey by sea from the village of<br />
Elwick (present-day Balfour) to Carness, a point on the<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> mainland about three miles or so north of Kirkwall,<br />
to attend services at the Secession Church in the<br />
town.<br />
The Secession Movement enjoyed immense popular appeal<br />
in <strong>Orkney</strong> following a long period when evangelical<br />
teaching had been virtually non-existent. Ministers of<br />
the Established Church were proverbially indolent and<br />
inefficient, remiss in their duties, and some of them not<br />
very exemplary in their lives. Writing in 1795 George<br />
Barry, the somewhat controversial cleric in Shapinsay,<br />
said “[that owing] to the extreme ignorance of the people,<br />
the communion had not been administered for fifty years<br />
and only once or twice in a hundred years.” There is little<br />
evidence to show that this deplorable situation noticeably<br />
improved during Barry’s own incumbency (1793-1805) as<br />
he seems to have been primarily pre-occupied with gathering<br />
material for his voluminous work, The <strong>History</strong> of<br />
the <strong>Orkney</strong> Islands, which was published in Edinburgh<br />
(1805), the year of his demise at age 57.<br />
It was against this background of spiritual degeneration<br />
that John Russell (or Rusland), 1 a tailor in Kirkwall<br />
and eldest son of a Shapinsay farmer, inspired a group of<br />
fellow tradesmen to form the first Secession Congregation<br />
there.<br />
In August 1796, a meeting-house was opened for public<br />
worship and was filled to overflowing Sunday after Sunday;<br />
one observer described it as having the appearance<br />
of “well-packed herring barrel.” At least three of John<br />
Russell’s brothers were also members of the Secession<br />
Church, including this writer’s great-great-great-grandfather<br />
Arthur (born 1780) and Alexander, a tailor and<br />
general merchant, who was ordained an elder on 16 October<br />
1804. Another elder ordained that day was William<br />
Borwick, also a merchant in Kirkwall, who came originally<br />
from the parish of Harray. Sometime around 1820,<br />
Borwick had retired from business and taken the tenancy<br />
of a farm on the island of Shapinsay.<br />
There is nothing to suggest that the 3rd of November<br />
1822 was different from any other Communion Sunday and<br />
we know that several boats filled with devout islanders left<br />
Shapinsay that morning “to worship at a distant fane.”<br />
By Peter Groundwater Russell Member No 161<br />
Who could have foretold what terrible tragedy was to<br />
befall this happy band of pilgrims? George Bell, farm<br />
manager of Sound, gave a graphic account of what happened<br />
later that day, in a letter he wrote to the laird,<br />
Captain William Balfour, who was staying in Edinburgh.<br />
Bell did not apportion blame but simply said it was “the<br />
provealing (sic) hand of Providence.”<br />
There was no disorder or confusion among the peaceful<br />
and well-disposed worshippers; no anticipation of danger<br />
or alarm as they clambered into their small boats for the<br />
homeward journey. A favourable wind was blowing from<br />
the southwest, ideal for returning to Shapinsay, and in<br />
less than half-an-hour they would have expected to land<br />
safe and sound at the little harbour of Elwick.<br />
The boat concerned,<br />
probably a North Isles<br />
yole, was described as<br />
being sixteen feet in<br />
length and carried sixteen<br />
passengers, namely:<br />
William Borwick;<br />
four of his children,<br />
Helen (only child of his<br />
first marriage to Helen<br />
Hourston, from the<br />
parish of Sandwick),<br />
Euphemia, Margaret<br />
and William (children<br />
by his second wife,<br />
Euphemia Laughton,<br />
from the parish of<br />
Holm); Thomas, son<br />
of George Bell, above,<br />
and Janet Currie; Thomas,<br />
son of Andrew<br />
Groat and Elizabeth<br />
Maxwell; Thomas, son<br />
A North Isles yole, similar to the vessel that<br />
foundered. <strong>Orkney</strong> Photographic Archive.<br />
of James Heddle and<br />
Helen Nicolson; Magnus<br />
and William Laisk<br />
(or Leask); Elizabeth (wife of William Laisk), Peter and<br />
William, children of Peter Peace and Elizabeth Tullock;<br />
James, son of Thomas Shearer and Marion Hepburn;<br />
Thomas, son of William Shearer and Margaret/Marabel<br />
Shearer; and Mary Smith.<br />
William Laisk, an experienced seaman, was steering<br />
and Thomas Heddle was handling the foresail; the aft<br />
sail was not unfurled. George Bell wrote, “No person inA
10<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
Fthe Boat, as far as I have been informed by them that<br />
has survived, were in the least apprehensive of any danger<br />
nor were it otherwise with those on land.” On reaching<br />
the ‘String,’ that potentially treacherous stretch of fastflowing<br />
water between Carness and Shapinsay, the boat<br />
capsized.<br />
William Borwick,<br />
Jnr, said one of the<br />
passengers took ill<br />
and William Laisk<br />
let go of the rudder<br />
(tiller) and stepped<br />
from his place. Perhaps<br />
he went to the<br />
aid of his wife, Elizabeth<br />
Peace, who<br />
is thought to have<br />
been carrying their<br />
unborn child. How-<br />
Where the tragedy happened<br />
ever, according to William Peace, “the boat was overtaken<br />
by a sudden squall.” It has even been suggested that the<br />
boat was upset by a killer whale, which, though possible,<br />
as large cetaceans have often been sighted in <strong>Orkney</strong> waters,<br />
is highly improbable because if there had been the<br />
slightest reason to suspect that this was the case then<br />
contemporary accounts would almost certainly have mentioned<br />
the fact.<br />
Using modern data, the Hydrographic Office computes<br />
high water at Kirkwall on 3 November 1822 as at 1242<br />
GMT and the age of the moon as 19 days, indicating almost<br />
neap tides, so the full strength of the ebb running<br />
west or even west-north-west through the String would<br />
have been felt around 3.00 p.m., which is around the time<br />
the worshippers were making their return crossing. These<br />
tidal conditions when ruffled up by a strong wind from<br />
the southwest would almost certainly create turbulence,<br />
making a “sudden squall” the most likely cause of this fatal<br />
incident.<br />
Whatever the explanation, all sixteen passengers were<br />
thrown into the water but Thomas Bell, William Laisk,<br />
Thomas Heddle, Peter and William Peace, and James<br />
and Thomas Shearer, managed to scramble onto the hull.<br />
They remained there for some considerable time and<br />
called to other boats for assistance. The boat then turned<br />
completely over and again all seven managed to regain<br />
the hull. Apparently there was great panic and confusion<br />
because the other boats were equally heavily laden and,<br />
understandably, were afraid to venture too close in fear of<br />
capsizing themselves.<br />
It was fortunate therefore that Alexander Russell,<br />
referred to above, an elder for the Shapinsay District,²<br />
showed more courage and determination, although before<br />
he could reach the stricken boat it turned over yet again.<br />
This time only the two Shearer boys reached the safety of<br />
the hull. Somehow, William Peace managed to get hold of<br />
an oar, which kept him afloat, and all three were rescued<br />
by the people in Russell’s boat.<br />
William Bell, another son of Balfour’s farm manager,<br />
heard the commotion as the boats passed Cliffdale (incorporated<br />
into Balfour Castle in 1847). He had been at the<br />
old pier of Sound to fetch in some horses and witnessed<br />
that the unfortunate passengers were in the water a long<br />
time before they received any assistance. Bell ran back<br />
to the pier, recruiting James Work, an old servant of the<br />
laird; an un-named “boy of James Work in Widewalls;”<br />
and William Currie, brother of Mrs Bell, along the way<br />
to help him launch a boat to rescue young William Borwick,<br />
who throughout this time had been clinging to the<br />
stern sheets (wooden boards) of the stricken yole.<br />
The remaining twelve all drowned in the cold, dark<br />
waters of the String.<br />
Peter Peace, Snr, was in another boat and, later,<br />
when the rescued William was laid at his feet, he fervently<br />
exclaimed, “I thank God for one.” After all, he had<br />
been bereaved of a son, a daughter and a son-in-law. Mrs<br />
Borwick had lost her husband, two daughters, a stepdaughter<br />
and three servants.<br />
Mary Smith’s body was found next morning on the<br />
small island of Helliar Holm, between the Reef and the<br />
Bought. Euphemia (or Euphan) Borwick was discovered<br />
at Burness on 28 November. Her half-sister Helen’s body<br />
was found on the south side of Shapinsay on Christmas<br />
Eve, “a beautiful morning.” William Borwick, Snr, was<br />
found on 4 January at Headgoe and was identified by<br />
his watch, spectacles and penknife. Thomas Bell’s body<br />
was found the same day between Linton and the North<br />
Hill, “his Cloath all torn off except his shirt Band of his<br />
Pantilouns, Galoses, Boots and Stockings.” Both Borwick<br />
and Bell’s bodies were quite whole with the “exception of<br />
their heads being away.” Was it these gruesome discoveries<br />
that gave rise to the ‘killer whale theory’? William<br />
Borwick was interred on the fourth but Thomas Bell not<br />
until the next morning, although his body was “lodged<br />
in the Tomb all that night.” Headstones erected to the<br />
memory of the Borwicks and Bell can be seen close to the<br />
northwest corner of the roofless ruins of the Old Kirk.<br />
On the fifth of January 1823 the remains of Thomas<br />
Groat and Magnus Laisk were washed ashore on Shapinsay.<br />
Writing on 16 January, George Bell said, “There<br />
are none of the rests Bodys has yet been found and any<br />
hopes of their being found we having had a continued<br />
gale of Easterly wind for about twelve days the middle of<br />
which the last Bodys<br />
were found.”<br />
The tragic disaster<br />
of 1822 had a<br />
most profound effect<br />
throughout the whole<br />
of <strong>Orkney</strong> and did<br />
more than anything<br />
else to encourage the<br />
Shapinsay members<br />
of the Kirkwall Congregation<br />
to press for<br />
Old Church and graveyard<br />
a church of their own which, for one reason or another,<br />
would take another nine years before their prayers were<br />
answered.<br />
But what became of the four survivors? A
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 11<br />
FWilliam Broadfoot Borwick (born 1808), named after<br />
the first Secession Church Minister in Kirkwall, was just<br />
14 years of age in November 1822 and this harrowing<br />
incident turned his mind in the direction of the Christian<br />
ministry. Having obtained his licence in the United<br />
Secession Church he was called to the parish of Rousay,<br />
then to City Road, Brechin, before finally accepting Overgate<br />
in Dundee. Borwick retired to Newport-on-Tay, Fife,<br />
where he died on 15 June 1870. He is buried in the Western<br />
Cemetery, Perth Road, Dundee. His widowed mother returned<br />
to Kirkwall where she lived in Victoria Street until<br />
her death, age 75, in 1858.<br />
From the time of his near miraculous deliverance William<br />
Balfour Peace (born 1805), named after the laird, began<br />
to take an even more active interest in the affairs of<br />
the congregation and was ordained<br />
an elder for the Shapinsay District<br />
in 1839. He remained in office until<br />
he was evicted from Shapinsay<br />
for the honourable and courageous<br />
stand he made in the acrimonious<br />
“New Kirk” Elders Affair (1847).³<br />
The family moved to Laing Street,<br />
Kirkwall, where William set up<br />
in business as a builder and joiner<br />
and within five years he was<br />
ordained an elder of the United<br />
Presbyterian (formerly Secession)<br />
Congregation. William Peace died<br />
in 1878 following a long and painful<br />
illness and was interred in the<br />
grounds of St. Magnus Cathedral<br />
where an impressive monument<br />
marks the spot.<br />
James Shearer (born 1799) was appointed one of the first<br />
four elders of the United Secession Congregation of Shapinsay,<br />
which was organised in 1831. Although he was still<br />
in office during the afore-mentioned “New Kirk” Elders Affair<br />
he escaped eviction from the island and subsequently<br />
Mr & Mrs James Shearer Photograph provided by OFHS member Gloria Cant<br />
emigrated to South Australia of his own volition with his<br />
wife, Frances Liddle, and five children. They travelled on<br />
board the Caucasian, which sailed from Plymouth, Devon,<br />
The Barossa Valley as it is today<br />
on 11 November 1851. James was the first Scots settler<br />
at Black Springs, present-day Springton, in the fertile<br />
Barossa Valley. He died 2 September 1883 and is buried<br />
at South Rhine, Springton.<br />
Thomas Shearer (born 1801), left Plymouth with wife<br />
Janet Shearer (sister of James Shearer, above) and<br />
three children just three days before his brother-in-law,<br />
on the Adelaide, and settled near Truro, South Australia.<br />
He died 28 March<br />
1875 and is buried in<br />
Truro Cemetery.<br />
There is no doubt in<br />
my mind that their<br />
traumatic experience<br />
that November afternoon<br />
gave all four<br />
survivors a greater<br />
sense of purpose and<br />
determination than<br />
might otherwise<br />
have been granted<br />
Photo Credit Carolyn Ruth<br />
them. L<br />
Notes:<br />
1. Rusland, or Russland, an old <strong>Orkney</strong> surname of local<br />
origin from the parish of Harray, was anglicised to<br />
‘Russell’ in Kirkwall and Shapinsay around the turn of<br />
the 19th century.<br />
2. Around 1830 Alexander Russell (born 1774) fell foul<br />
of his fellow elders of the Secession Church in Kirkwall<br />
and was dismissed from office – but that’s another tale<br />
waiting to be told! He died 21 May 1854 and was laid<br />
to rest in the grounds of St. Magnus Cathedral, where<br />
the headstone erected to his memory and that of his first<br />
wife, Margaret Work, can be seen today.<br />
3. A full account of this lamentable incident can be found<br />
in The Laird The Factor and The Elders: Change and<br />
Stress in Shapinsay 1847 by Paul J. Sutherland, CSYS<br />
<strong>History</strong> Dissertation, Kirkwall Grammar School, 1985.
The <strong>Orkney</strong> <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> Annual Outing was held<br />
on Sunday, 15 June 2008, when a group of approximately 25<br />
members boarded a bus at the old bus station in Kirkwall<br />
and set off for the Stenness Community Centre via the Old<br />
Finstown Road.<br />
George Gray was the first of several commentators who<br />
entertained the group throughout the day, providing information<br />
about buildings on the route, as well as their occupants,<br />
past and present, as the bus travelled through St<br />
Ola and Finstown to the end of the Harray Road. Adrianne<br />
Leask then took over commentator duties until we reached<br />
our destination at the<br />
Stenness Community<br />
Centre for morning tea<br />
and coffee with shortbread<br />
and scones.<br />
After our morning<br />
break, we set off for<br />
Stromness, while Adrianne<br />
continued her<br />
commentary through<br />
Stenness. On reaching<br />
Old Ferry Terminal Building<br />
Stromness, we were met<br />
by Jim Troup, retired<br />
teacher and commentator on matters of historical interest<br />
in Stromness. Jim started by introducing us to a building<br />
which was familiar to many of us as the Ferry Terminal<br />
Building at Stromness Harbour. This building houses office<br />
space on the ground floor with flats above and contains the<br />
garage used by Brass’s Taxis. Jim explained that the building<br />
had been constructed in the eighteenth century by a local<br />
businessman for the purpose of checking goods in order<br />
to collect taxes and dues payable<br />
on imported goods passing<br />
through <strong>Orkney</strong> during<br />
time of war. However, in peacetime,<br />
ships reverted to passage<br />
through the English Channel<br />
rather than around the north of<br />
Scotland and the income from<br />
taxes and dues diminished considerably.<br />
The cost of the construction<br />
of the building had<br />
been considerable for the time<br />
and the businessman, facing<br />
bankruptcy, took passage to the<br />
Carolinas. The building, considerable<br />
in terms of cost, was also<br />
considerable in terms of size for<br />
its time and location, being challenged<br />
in that regard only by the<br />
Parish Kirk in Church Road.<br />
Jim then led us a few short<br />
Miller’s Close<br />
Stenness, Stromness and Orphir – a grand day’s outing!<br />
paces to a lane off John Street. After climbing some steps at<br />
the top of the lane, we stood before an eighteenth century<br />
merchant’s house known as Miller’s House, now operated<br />
as tourist accommodation (13 John Street), where Jim commented<br />
on the construction of the house and the possible<br />
use of stones from an earlier construction within the fabric<br />
of the building. A plaque on the house states “Miller’s<br />
House. Earliest dateable house in Stromness belonging to<br />
the merchant family of<br />
Miller.” Written stonework<br />
on the façade of the<br />
house includes a marriage<br />
entablature and joint coat<br />
of arms of John Miller and<br />
M Nisbet dated 1716. A religious<br />
statement (“God’s<br />
providence is my inherit-<br />
ance”) is also written on<br />
stonework above the door-<br />
way and it is this which possibly indicates the inclusion of<br />
stonework from another property dating from an earlier<br />
period.<br />
We then proceeded along Victoria Street, with stops outside<br />
25 Victoria Street (Orcadia Cuts), opposite the site of what<br />
is now the Pier Arts Centre; the Post Office; and the Royal<br />
Hotel. Jim weaved a story of the operations of an eighteenth<br />
century merchant woman called Mrs Christina Robertson<br />
to reflect the<br />
connections<br />
between the<br />
m e r c h a n t s<br />
of Stromness<br />
and the<br />
Hudson’s Bay<br />
Company during<br />
that time.<br />
For example,<br />
Mrs Robertson<br />
operated a<br />
Mrs Robertson’s pier, now Maritime College building<br />
By Elaine Sinclair, Secretary, Member No 1211<br />
Decorated stonework above door<br />
warehouse on<br />
a pier next to<br />
what is now the Maritime College Building (down the lane<br />
from Argos Bakery), supplying barrels of coal, gallon casks<br />
of whisky, supplies of sherry and even drams to local customers,<br />
whilst also supplying provisions to ships. She also<br />
operated whaling vessels sailing to the Greenland/North<br />
American coasts.<br />
Jim diverged, interestingly, into local sewage issues during<br />
the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, explaining<br />
that Stromness became a burgh in 1817, but it wasn’t until<br />
the Police Acts of the mid-nineteenth century that the<br />
burgh was able to raise or attract budgets to deal with is-<br />
sues such as sewage disposal.<br />
Containers (we would know them as skips nowadays)<br />
were placed at six sites around the town, including one near<br />
the water supply at Pumpwell Park and one opposite the<br />
modern Royal Hotel. Residents were encouraged to place all<br />
their wastewaste into these containers rather than throwing<br />
waste onto the shore or in other dump sites and there<br />
was a plan to sell the waste to local farmers. Mr Fortescue of<br />
Swanbister, Orphir, arranged to take these containers, but<br />
he only collected them, by cart, every six months, with resulting<br />
poor health conditions, as we would perceive them<br />
today. Eventually, he arranged to send a schooner to collect<br />
the waste at one time.<br />
We then proceeded down a lane<br />
off Victoria Street to a building<br />
(now a house) where the remains<br />
of an archway could be seen in<br />
the modern arrangement of the<br />
stone façade – Jim explained that<br />
this building had been the stables<br />
and coach house associated with<br />
the merchant’s trading operation<br />
which had existed at the site,<br />
using the pier associated with<br />
that particular lane. Number 94<br />
Victoria Street, when viewed from the street, appeared to<br />
have only two levels – street level and attic level. However,<br />
when viewed from the pier down the lane at the back of the<br />
property, it contained another storey at a lower level. The<br />
merchant, Robert Graham of Breckness, had used the lower<br />
level at the rear of the property as a warehouse facility for<br />
his operations. His initials<br />
“RG” were clear in the<br />
stone façade at the front<br />
of the property on Victoria<br />
Street.<br />
We paused at the bottom<br />
of Church Road while Jim<br />
explained that the Parish<br />
Kirk, situated to the<br />
left of the road, had been<br />
constructed in 1717 and a<br />
Old Parish Kirk, now StromnessTown Hall<br />
Robert Graham’s initials<br />
monthly market had been<br />
held in Church Road, not-<br />
withstanding the slope or “cant” of the road, which must<br />
have made display of goods particularly difficult.<br />
Our group proceeded to Graham Place, where we stopped<br />
outside the house of Alexander Graham, while Jim explained<br />
that the space which we see today was, in Alexander Graham’s<br />
time, occupied by another two houses jutting out into<br />
what we perceive today as the open street. Housing was an<br />
issue in the eighteenth century as it is today and the Gra-<br />
ham family, while<br />
occupying rooms in<br />
one of the houses,<br />
owned and rented<br />
rooms in around four<br />
houses to tenants.<br />
The plaque on the<br />
front of the house<br />
today reads “Alexander<br />
Graham’s house<br />
who led merchants<br />
to oppose tax liability to the Royal<br />
Burgh of Kirkwall” which, ultimately,<br />
led to the creation of the<br />
Burgh of Stromness.<br />
The discussion of housing continued,<br />
as Jim explained the necessity<br />
for households to have small<br />
enclosures to grow vegetables or<br />
dispose of waste – dunghills. As<br />
we reached Dundas Street, Jim discussed one James Tait<br />
of Orphir, who was a contemporary of William Tomison of<br />
South Ronaldsay (Hudson’s Bay Company and Tomison’s<br />
Academy) and was in charge of<br />
posts over the winter seasons<br />
for the Hudsons Bay Company.<br />
James constructed housing at<br />
what is now numbers 57 to 61<br />
Dundas Street with a view to assisting<br />
his pension in old age by<br />
renting out rooms. On his death,<br />
his will provided for the support<br />
of financially poor scholars from<br />
Stromness and Orphir.<br />
We proceeded to a house called<br />
The Haven in Alfred Street and<br />
Jim explained that this had been<br />
constructed by David Geddes, who<br />
became the first agent in Strom-<br />
ness for the Hudson’s Bay Comp<br />
a n y<br />
Stromness graphic by John Sinclair<br />
Alexander Graham’s house at Graham Square<br />
The Haven, Alfred Street<br />
around 1791. Discussion then ensued<br />
as to why the lands where<br />
the Company operated were<br />
known as the North West or Nor’<br />
Wast. Churchill, the most northerly<br />
of the Company’s posts, was<br />
on the same latitude as Melsetter<br />
House in Walls and was marginally<br />
south of Stromness. However,<br />
the weather conditionsA
14<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
Fin North America at those latitudes are much colder<br />
than those experienced in Britain, which enjoys the<br />
warming balm of the Gulf Stream. Ships would arrive<br />
at the posts once a year and men would receive<br />
items from home and send items to their families or<br />
friends, including letters and requests for clothes or<br />
items which they knew could not be filled for a year.<br />
It was essential to have an agent in their home location<br />
to handle their wages and mail.<br />
Jim then touched<br />
again on the operations<br />
of Mrs Christina<br />
Robertson, who<br />
required men to op-<br />
Greenland Right Whale<br />
erate her whaling boats in<br />
the North Atlantic. The boats<br />
used by the men to pursue<br />
the whales tended to be twenty<br />
four foot long and required<br />
to be rowed in icy conditions.<br />
They pursued the Greenland<br />
Right Whale, which tended<br />
to be slow moving and had<br />
an extremely thick, blubbery<br />
skin.<br />
As we reached Southend,<br />
we arrived at a house with a<br />
plaque which read as follows<br />
– “Mrs Humphreys House.<br />
Temporary Hospital 1835 –<br />
36. For scurvy ridden whale<br />
men who had been trapped in<br />
the ice for months.” Jim explained<br />
that, as weather patterns<br />
in the early nineteenth<br />
century altered, areas of sea<br />
which had previously been<br />
relatively free from ice froze<br />
over and some ships became Mrs Humphrey’s House<br />
trapped for months. When the men arrived home,<br />
they required medical attention and several houses<br />
around the town were pressed into service for<br />
the nursing of the men, including Mrs Humphrey’s<br />
house.<br />
Our excursion through Stromness ended at the<br />
Museum, where we were collected by our bus and<br />
returned to Stenness Community Centre for lunch.<br />
Thereafter, we proceeded through Stenness, enjoying<br />
further commentary from Adrianne, to Orphir<br />
where Alan Clouston took over commentary duties.<br />
We enjoyed a bus tour through Orphir, past Houton,<br />
to the <strong>Orkney</strong>inga Saga Centre and cemetery near<br />
the shore. Continuing to the village of Orphir, we doubled<br />
back and travelled over Scorrabrae, down onto<br />
the Stenness/Orphir road again and back through<br />
the village<br />
to the Germiston<br />
Road<br />
to the site of<br />
the Battle<br />
of Summerdale,<br />
the<br />
last battle<br />
on <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
soil.<br />
Our trip<br />
c o n c l u d e d<br />
with our<br />
return to<br />
Kirkwall and everyone agreed that it had been a<br />
very enjoyable day. Thanks must go to Hazel Goar,<br />
Davina Brown, Alan Clouston, George Gray and<br />
Adrianne Leask for the organisation of the event<br />
and the research put into the commentaries which<br />
were provided.<br />
Elaine Sinclair<br />
Secretary<br />
Member No. 1211<br />
Round Church – Orphir<br />
Jim Troup weaves his tale of Stromnesss and the Hudson’s Bay Company
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 15<br />
Some helpful websites from Ray Millar No 1277<br />
I have felt for some time that there are a number of<br />
websites that have been created by members of the<br />
OFHS that may not be generally known about.<br />
This is a great pity because the research that has gone<br />
into producing these sites is enormous and I’m sure<br />
that their authors would only be too pleased to make<br />
them known to fellow researchers and hopefully help<br />
folk find their roots.<br />
If Dave Higgins, the webmaster would be prepared<br />
to add these websites onto the OFHS website’s<br />
“members’ useful links” page this would be one<br />
suggestion and I’m sure the sites mentioned below<br />
will help members both old and new. There are<br />
sites that I have not mentioned which are equally<br />
as informative and these could be added<br />
periodically if their owners<br />
expressed a wish to have<br />
them known.<br />
Robert Marwick’s<br />
excellent site www.<br />
rousayroots.com contains,<br />
as the name suggests,<br />
information from the parish of Rousay and of many<br />
that emigrated abroad including census returns and<br />
photos.<br />
Robert Whitton’s site<br />
www.robertwhitton.<br />
eu will be of interest<br />
to anyone researching<br />
a family that has<br />
any connections<br />
with Graemsay. His<br />
records have extensive<br />
coverage of all families from that island, many Hoy<br />
families and everyone called Ritch or Rich who<br />
originated from Scotland.<br />
Dave Annal’s site<br />
http://homepage.<br />
ntlworld.com/dave.<br />
annal researches the<br />
Annal<br />
name world wide<br />
but with a focus on<br />
South Ronaldsay. It<br />
also contains a photo gallery of family gravestones<br />
from various churchyards and cemeteries on South<br />
Ronaldsay and other parishes on <strong>Orkney</strong>. Also,<br />
another South Ronaldsay and Burray website of great<br />
interest is http://www.<br />
southronaldsay.net by<br />
Lisa Conrad.<br />
Marion Mcleod’s site<br />
http://uk.geocities.<br />
com/marionmcleoduk<br />
focuses on well known<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> names such<br />
as Harcus, Paterson,<br />
Smith, Redland and<br />
Wishart and also<br />
contains some lovely<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> scenes.<br />
Mike Rendall and other<br />
researchers have created<br />
a website ( http://<br />
genealogy.northernskies.net/<br />
) covering<br />
the Feas in both<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> and Shetland<br />
and their descendents<br />
from further afield. A<br />
related website on the<br />
Grays ( http://genealogy.northern-skies.net/gray.<br />
php?number=1 ) covers those in the North Isles,<br />
looking at connections between Westray, Papa<br />
Westray and Eday as well as the Allan family from<br />
Westray.<br />
Finally my own<br />
website http://www.<br />
C<br />
raymillar.co.uk/ began<br />
with research of my<br />
Eday ancestors but has<br />
evolved to over 7000<br />
individual names from<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> and beyond.<br />
It contains images and<br />
inscriptions of all the<br />
gravestones from both Kirkyards on Eday. It also lists<br />
all the Eday Old Parish Records of Births, Baptisms<br />
and Marriages. There are lists of Baptism Ministers,<br />
Population Stats. and Land Rentals.<br />
The amount of detail and presentation on the above<br />
“amateur” websites is a credit to all fellow members<br />
who have spent hundreds of hours producing them.<br />
Hopefully the above sites will give people a taste of<br />
what is out there in the world of Cyberspace!
16<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
A hero to his men<br />
A tyrant to his tenants<br />
A ‘potted history’ of Lt. Gen. Frederick Traill Burroughs by John Sinclair No 588<br />
Frederick Traill Burroughs came into the world in 1831 at Fatehgarh<br />
military post on the banks of the Ganges in India. He was<br />
the eldest of the five children born to General Frederick William<br />
Burroughs and Caroline de Peyron.<br />
In 1840 young Burroughs, aged 9, was to accompany his uncle<br />
George William Traill back to England. Traill had just retired from<br />
the Bengal Civil Service and it was he who arranged for his nephew’s<br />
education at Blackheath and in Switzerland.<br />
While in Switzerland, Burroughs learned of Traill’s<br />
death and of his inheritance of the uncle’s estate on the<br />
island of Rousay in <strong>Orkney</strong>.<br />
The following year, when he was 17, he joined the 93rd<br />
Sutherland Highlanders.<br />
He was short for his age; about 5ft and he never grew<br />
much beyond that. Like many short men he may have suffered<br />
from the Napoleon syndrome. Conventional wisdom<br />
is that Napoleon overcompensated for his short height by<br />
seeking power, war and conquest and Burroughs was to<br />
show similar tendencies. What he lacked in height he certainly<br />
made up for in courage in his distinguished military<br />
career.<br />
Thin Red Line, painted by Robert Gibb 1881 showing the 93rd Sutherland Highlanders<br />
with the Russian Cavalry at Balaclava. Picture source Wikimedia Commons.<br />
In 1854 he was in the Crimea and fought with the 93rd<br />
at the Battle of Alma where an Anglo-French force defeated<br />
General Menshikov’s Russian army which lost<br />
around 6000 men. On the 24th October he formed part<br />
of ‘The Thin Red Line’ who routed the Russian Cavalry<br />
charge at Balaclava. The regiment was also in the front<br />
line at Sebastopol and they were preparing to assault the<br />
town with, it is said, Burroughs leading the first wave of<br />
the Highland Brigade. They were to find, however, that<br />
the Russians had abandoned the town on the 11th September,<br />
blowing up the defences and all shipping in the<br />
harbour.<br />
Captain Burroughs was also one of the first through<br />
the breached walls of the Residency garden at the besieged<br />
town of Lucknow in the 1857 Indian Mutiny.<br />
Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
He was recommended<br />
for the VC by his men but due to internal military<br />
politics the medal was awarded to another officer.<br />
In 1864 he was promoted<br />
to Lieutenent Colonel and<br />
commanded the 93rd during<br />
the bitter fighting in<br />
the North West Frontier.<br />
He returned with the<br />
regiment to Britain in<br />
1870 and after a spell in<br />
command at Edinburgh<br />
Castle he retired from the<br />
army in 1873.<br />
Burroughs visited<br />
Rousay in 1870 along with<br />
his new wife Eliza (Lizzie)<br />
Doyly Geddes and they<br />
were well received by the<br />
islanders.<br />
For some time he was to<br />
enjoy an amiable relation-<br />
Gen. Burroughs. <strong>Orkney</strong> Library Photo Archive<br />
Lady Burroughs. <strong>Orkney</strong> Library Archive<br />
ship with the people of Rousay but it was not to last. Burroughs<br />
decided to increase his land holding by buying up<br />
other parcels of land. He also commissioned the architect<br />
David Bryce to design and build a Scottish baronial style<br />
Trumland House. Photographed 1972. <strong>Orkney</strong> Library Photo Archive<br />
mansion which, by the time it was finished and furnished<br />
in 1876, cost £12,000. A
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 17<br />
FThe problem was that Burroughs was not a wealthy man<br />
and to increase his income he simply raised the crofters’<br />
rents and if they could not pay he evicted them.<br />
This was carrying on the tradition started by uncle<br />
George William Traill who had evicted about one quarter<br />
of the island’s population from his Westness estates<br />
to make way for sheep rearing. While his was a policy<br />
being actively pursued in the Scottish Highands, the<br />
clearances in Rousay were the only ones ever to take<br />
place in <strong>Orkney</strong>.<br />
Frederick Traill Burroughs was determined to clear<br />
all crofters off his land and speaking before the 1884<br />
Napier Commission which was founded to investigate<br />
the excesses of the Clearances he said<br />
‘I think they (the people) have as much right to my<br />
commons as I have to their clothes; the land is mine, and<br />
the coats and<br />
hats theirs, and<br />
I cannot see how<br />
they can claim<br />
the pasture. It<br />
did never belong<br />
to them.’<br />
Any tenant<br />
who gave evidence<br />
before the<br />
visiting Royal<br />
The life of the <strong>Orkney</strong> crofter. Crushing clods; the<br />
oxen, one probably borrowed from a neighbour, pull a<br />
flagstone flagstone on which the ‘operator’ stands.<br />
A Tom Kent photograph. <strong>Orkney</strong> Library Photo Archive.<br />
Commission was<br />
evicted. There is<br />
little doubt that<br />
he was determined<br />
to clear<br />
every tenant from his estate and but for the passing of<br />
the Crofters’ Act of 1886 he would have succeeded.<br />
Burroughs is remembered in the islands as the worst<br />
of the <strong>Orkney</strong> lairds; some achievement when most of<br />
the lairds are remembered as notorious exploiters of the<br />
people.<br />
Perhaps Burroughs simply couldn’t handle the civilian<br />
situation. He had spent a lifetime in the army where his<br />
commands would have been instantly obeyed and then<br />
he came up against the stubbornness of the Orcadians.<br />
Despite this he is credited with a number of firsts on<br />
Rousay; the building of Trumland Pier; first ploughing<br />
match; first school picnic; opening of island schools; a<br />
steamship service; a Post Office; a resident doctor, etc.<br />
Outwith <strong>Orkney</strong> there were still honours to be had.<br />
He was appointed honorary colonel both of the Warwickshire<br />
Regiment and his own regiment which had<br />
now amalgamated to form the Argyll and Sutherland<br />
Highlanders. In 1904 he was knighted by King Edward VII.<br />
Despite the years of acrimony on Rousay, the local paper, The<br />
Orcadian, reported that after his Royal investiture he was<br />
welcomed back on Rousay by his tenants singing ‘He’s a jolly<br />
good fellow.’<br />
Just before chairing a regimental dinner to mark the fiftieth<br />
anniversary of Balaclava he took ill but soon recovered<br />
and by the end of the year he moved to London. He was soon<br />
to suffer a relapse, however, and died on the 9th April 1905 at<br />
the age of 75.<br />
Lieutenant General Frederick Traill Burroughs was buried<br />
at Brompton Cemetery, London. One of the pall bearers was<br />
the Lord Lieutenant of <strong>Orkney</strong> and Shetland. The mourners<br />
included at least one Admiral and three Generals.<br />
A memorial service was held in Rousay and there is a<br />
plaque to his memory in St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall,<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong>. L<br />
If you have a tale to tell, why not tell it in our December issue.<br />
Send it to me (a Word doc would be appreciated to save me retyping)<br />
at— johnsin@gotadsl.co.uk—by November 11th and I’ll do<br />
the rest. Photos welcome too. Good quality JPEGS are perfect.
18<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
The Strange End of John Fubbister<br />
By John Gottfred<br />
The true story of a most remarkable incident at Pembina River Post in !807<br />
It was four days after Christmas<br />
in the year eighteen- hundred and<br />
seven at the little fur post huddled<br />
next to the Pembina River in<br />
southern Manitoba.<br />
Hanging low in the winter’s sky,<br />
the watery sun shone bleakly<br />
through the ice crystal fog, and the<br />
snow lay deep around the aspens<br />
standing lonely sentinel along the<br />
frozen river. Only the occasional<br />
crack of a tree bursting with the<br />
cold penetrated the silence.<br />
These were the darkest days of<br />
winter, when the men were confined<br />
by darkness and cold to<br />
their cramped shelters for more than sixteen hours a day.<br />
Many a strange tale is told of the queer happenings upon<br />
such lonely days. Why did not David Thompson give up<br />
the game of checkers after losing a game to the Devil incarnate<br />
on such a long winter’s night? Yes, strange things<br />
indeed happened to the<br />
minds of men in such<br />
isolated and lonely<br />
haunts.<br />
Alexandre Henry [the<br />
younger], the chief<br />
of the post, was worried.<br />
Early that afternoon<br />
a breathless messenger<br />
had straggled<br />
into the little outpost<br />
with the news that the<br />
Sioux had attacked<br />
the Saulteurs at Grand Fourches, and had<br />
killed the company’s friend, the great chief<br />
Tabashaw. Such news boded ill for business, and might<br />
also jeopardize the lives of his men.<br />
Henry’s thoughts were interrupted by a tapping at the<br />
door. Fearing more bad news, he motioned to one of his<br />
clerks to admit the messenger. The door opened, and an<br />
icy blast of air rushed into the little room. On the threshold<br />
stood John Fubbister, one of the men working for<br />
Henry’s HBC rival, who had been visiting for the new<br />
Year festivities. Still barely a boy, the little <strong>Orkney</strong>man’s<br />
eyebrows were covered with frost, his eyes were moist,<br />
and he suppressed a shiver as his nose dripped. ‘Damn<br />
your eyes man, shut the door!’ Henry bawled at the clerk.<br />
Grabbing Fubbister by the shoulder and hauling him in-<br />
side, the clerk put his shoulder to the<br />
rough panelled door and slammed it<br />
against the freezing wind.<br />
‘Well man, speak up, what is it?’<br />
Queried Henry to the trembling<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong>man.<br />
A knot of pain flashed across Fubbister’s<br />
forehead, and he blurted out<br />
‘Please sir, I... I’m not well sir. Might<br />
I warm meself by your fire sir?’ Under<br />
Henry’s basilisk gaze, John’s<br />
eyes fell to the floor.<br />
One of the clerks by the fire spoke up<br />
indignantly. ‘Mind your place Fubbister.<br />
You and your mates should<br />
be cozy enough in your quarters!’<br />
Henry motioned for the man to be silent. He could read<br />
what was in the minds of his clerks. After all, who<br />
would want to abandon their place at the hearth to a<br />
man who might bring God-alone knew-what contagion<br />
into their midst? Henry recollected all he had feared<br />
about John Fubbister.<br />
He had joined the<br />
HBC two years previous,<br />
hailing from the<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> Isles. Fubbister’s<br />
boss Hugh<br />
Heney, had said that<br />
he had done good service<br />
although he was<br />
still a lad. Still it was<br />
an unusual request.<br />
Perhaps it was the<br />
Christmas spirit still<br />
coursing through Henry’s veins, or perhaps it was a<br />
sudden pity as another bout of pain wracked John’s<br />
body, but regardless, he motioned John towards the<br />
fire. ‘It’s all right. Sit down and warm yourself, man.’<br />
Avoiding the eyes of his clerks, Henry climbed up the<br />
steep stairs to his warm room above, his thoughts once<br />
again returning to the responsibilities at the post.<br />
Sir! Mister Henry sir!’ Henry awoke with a start. He<br />
had dozed off, slumped over his tiny desk, pencil in<br />
hand. He leaned over to peer down the stair ladder<br />
at his clerk below. ‘What the Devil is it now?’ He queried.<br />
‘Fubbister would speak with you if you would so favour<br />
him.’<br />
Fearing that the worst might befall the man, Henry A<br />
‘The Strange End of John Fubbister’ is just one of a series<br />
of stories on people, places and events that has appeared in<br />
the Northwest Journal. The stories are presented in fictionalised<br />
form, and often contain commonly held beliefs about the events<br />
described, regardless of their accuracy. A short explanatory note<br />
at the end of the article gives the known facts of the story.<br />
This article is protected by Canadian copyright and is the<br />
property of the Northwest Journal ISSN 1206 - 4203.<br />
It is included in our newsletter with all reproduction requirements<br />
observed.
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 19<br />
Fstepped down into the common room, his mind already<br />
forming some words of comfort for his stricken charge.<br />
Fubbister was sprawled on the hearth. A keening sound<br />
escaped his lips. He cursed, and grimaced with pain, and<br />
tears coursed down his cheeks. Upon the sight of Henry<br />
he reached out his hands, and begged for mercy.<br />
Henry stopped in his tracks, exchanging glances with his<br />
stern-faced clerks, standing over the stricken man. What<br />
was to be made of this? ‘He’s done for, I reckon’ said one.<br />
‘Never seen such a display’, exclaimed the second.<br />
Fubbister clutched at Henry’s trouser leg, his grip like<br />
steel. ‘Hear me sir,’ he begged through tears and clenched<br />
teeth. ‘Take pity upon a poor, helpless, abandoned wretch!<br />
Treated cruel have I been sir! Oh God!’ He shuddered as<br />
his body was wracked with another seizure. ‘I’m having a<br />
baby sir!’<br />
The men stood thunderstruck, staring at the figure on the<br />
floor. Impossible! An <strong>Orkney</strong> girl? Here?<br />
‘He’s mad,’ said one of the clerks, slowly shaking his head.<br />
‘The fever’s gone to his head, sir.’<br />
‘‘I’m not mad, damn you!’ screamed the figure on the<br />
hearth. I’m a girl!’ And so saying, he reached up, and<br />
tearing open his jacket, revealed a pair of round white<br />
breasts.<br />
One can imagine the confusion of the next moments as<br />
these rough and bush-hardy veterans faced a situation<br />
that none of them had ever prepared for. Bears, hostile natives,<br />
drownings and freezings were all a matter of course,<br />
but <strong>Orkney</strong> girls whelping on one’s hearth were quite beyond<br />
the pale.<br />
Damning his eyes for him, Henry sent one of his men to<br />
fetch a midwife, while the other rushed to fetch a blanket<br />
and boil water, or whatever it is that one does in such moments<br />
of crisis. Meanwhile, Henry knelt next to a person<br />
he had just recently known as John Fubbister, and heard<br />
the amazing tale of Isabel Gunn.<br />
She was born in the <strong>Orkney</strong>s, and as a young woman, she<br />
had been debauched by one John Scarth, who had subsequently<br />
decamped for Hudson’s Bay. This resourceful and<br />
amazing woman, learning that her lover was bound for<br />
the wilds of Canada, had signed on with the HBC as a<br />
man, and obtained passage to the Northwest. She had<br />
successfully maintained her cover for nearly two years<br />
before her condition revealed her true nature.<br />
Within the hour, Isabel was delivered of a fine, healthy<br />
baby boy, whom she named James. Both mother and son<br />
were in excellent health and soon recovered enough to<br />
travel, so they were packed off in Henry’s cariole that<br />
very afternoon to Grandes Fourches, where she was reunited<br />
with her lover.<br />
And so ended the career of John Fubbister, and likewise,<br />
the amazing true story of Isabel Gunn, the first European<br />
woman to give birth in the Northwest.<br />
Isabel Gunn was born in Tankerness, <strong>Orkney</strong> in 1781.<br />
Her lover was John Scarth from the parish of Firth. To<br />
avoid being separated, Isabel disguised herself as one John<br />
Fubbister, and signed on with the HBC in June, 1806 at<br />
Stromness, <strong>Orkney</strong>. The pair sailed to Albany on Hudson’s<br />
Bay aboard The Prince of Wales that summer. In 1807 she<br />
was assigned to a brigade under the command of Hugh<br />
Heney and traveled to the Red River area, where she gave<br />
birth to her son, James. After the birth, she returned to<br />
Albany, took the name of Mary, and worked as a nurse and<br />
washerwoman until being sent home in 1809. She died a<br />
pauper at Stromness, on November 7, 1861.<br />
Bibliography<br />
Henry, Alexander (the Younger). The Journal of Alexander<br />
Henry The Younger 1799-1814. The Champlain <strong>Society</strong>,<br />
University of Toronto Press, 1988. ISBN 0-9693425-<br />
0-0. Volume 1, pp. 299-300.<br />
Henry, Alexander (the Younger). New Light on the Early<br />
<strong>History</strong> of the Northwest : The Manuscript Journals<br />
of Alexander Henry... Elliot Coues (ed.) Reprint-Ross &<br />
Haines : Minneapolis, 1965. Originally published 1897. p.<br />
426.<br />
Van Kirk, Sylvia. Many Tender Ties : Women in Fur-<br />
Trade <strong>Society</strong>, 1670-1870. Watson & Dwyer : Winnipeg,<br />
1980. ISBN 0-920486-06-1, pp. 175-177.<br />
Copyright 1994-2002 Northwest Journal<br />
ISSN 1206-4203 L<br />
Robert trawled up this gem from WWII<br />
The “Isles” class trawlers were a class of trawler used by<br />
the Royal Navy and Canadian Navy during the Second World<br />
War. Length 164 feet , Beam 27.7 feet and Draught 8.6 feet<br />
with a speed of 12 Knots and a complement of 40.<br />
A total of 168 ships of this class were built and were mainly used<br />
on harbour defence duties and minesweeping. Twelve Isles<br />
class trawlers were lost during the war. As one might expect<br />
many of these ships had Orcadian names including:- HMS<br />
Eday, Egilsay, Fara, Flotta, Hoy and my main interest HMS<br />
Graemsay (T291) built at Ardrossan Dockyard, launched 3 rd<br />
August 1942.<br />
Robert Whitton, Member No 218 Edinburgh,<br />
Scotland
20<br />
Did<br />
you know<br />
Interest in genealogy is<br />
certainly growing but<br />
despite this you will find<br />
that most people can go<br />
no further back than their<br />
grandparents and very few<br />
beyond their great-grandparents<br />
about whom they<br />
know very little.<br />
In contrast many can give<br />
the detailed pedigree of<br />
their dogs for generations<br />
back.<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
The General Register Office for Scotland<br />
made available the Modern Day Indexes up<br />
to 2006 for births and deaths both in their<br />
office and on the Scotlands People website on<br />
23 January 2008. This now means that even<br />
though recent actual records are not available<br />
on line the indexes are and you can therfore<br />
identify potential records to examine if<br />
you should wish to visit, or have a researcher<br />
visit on your behalf.<br />
The National Archives of Scotland are undergoing<br />
a renovation of their premises and<br />
are working with the General Register Office<br />
of Scotland and the Court of the Lord Lyon<br />
to create a new family history centre. Full<br />
information of this exciting development can<br />
be found at http://www.scotlandspeoplehub.<br />
gov.uk/ As access to the building is likely to<br />
alter you should check in advance to ensure<br />
that the records you need are available.<br />
If you are new to researching material at<br />
these locations you may find the following<br />
information helpful.<br />
Don’t Go Un-Prepared<br />
(Fail to prepare – Prepare to Fail)<br />
Accessing the records at National Archives of<br />
Scotland can be a bit daunting and it is suggested<br />
that if you intend to visit you obtain<br />
one of the comprehensive guides available<br />
on their web page http://www.nas.gov.uk/default.asp<br />
and also check out the indexes to<br />
save time when you arrive. Note that different<br />
records can be held at 2 different locations<br />
so it is important that you identify what you<br />
wish to search and find out what is available<br />
together with the relative references before<br />
you travel. Note that the General Register<br />
House is at present separate from the General<br />
Registrar of Scotland Office where the<br />
Births deaths and marriage are located.<br />
General Register House<br />
General Register House can be found at the<br />
east end of Princes Street in Edinburgh’s city<br />
centre. Two search rooms are housed there:<br />
the Historical Search Room and the Legal<br />
Search Room. The Historical Search Room<br />
is used for researching family, local, national<br />
and international history. The Legal Search<br />
Room is used for certain types of legal and<br />
Know your way around<br />
West Register House<br />
and Register House<br />
Edinburgh<br />
By Robert Whitton. Member 218<br />
commercial research, primarily using the<br />
public registers and adoption records.<br />
West Register House<br />
West Register House is situated in Charlotte<br />
Square, off the west end of Princes Street.<br />
The search room here is known as the West<br />
Search Room, where you can consult court<br />
and government records and maps and<br />
plans. The main classes of records available<br />
at West Register House are, Modern government<br />
files: records of the Scottish Office and<br />
Scottish Government; Court records: Court<br />
of Session; High Court of Justiciary (after<br />
1800); sheriff court records (excluding wills);<br />
divorces (to 1983), Records of the former nationalised<br />
industries and transport: rail and<br />
canal systems, coal, gas, electricity and steel<br />
industries; Business records and Maps and<br />
plans.<br />
Case Study<br />
I wished to research a Light House Keeper<br />
called James Ritch who was born on Graemsay.<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> on the 5th October 1854 (Articles<br />
about his wife Mary Mowat have previously<br />
appeared in previous editions of <strong>SIB</strong> News).<br />
I had located James, a brother of my Great<br />
Grandfather, in the various census records<br />
and had already located his birth, christening,<br />
marriage and death records. These gave<br />
a hint as to where he lived but I wished to<br />
know which Light Houses he had worked on.<br />
The web page for the Bell Rock Lighthouse<br />
confirmed that he had been there, but I wanted<br />
exact dates. I went to the Northern Lighthouse<br />
Board Offices at 84 George Street, Edinburgh<br />
and was given an information sheet<br />
that told me that their archives had been<br />
placed with the National Archive of Scotland.<br />
Much information about the NLB can be accessed<br />
at www.nld.org.uk<br />
The main Northern Lighthouse Board records<br />
are held at West Register House where access<br />
can be given to the actual records but these<br />
are held in a depositary on the west side of<br />
Edinburgh so 2 days’ notice is required. The<br />
staff records are available on microfilm at<br />
the General Register House, Edinburgh. The<br />
building is being renovated but having A
Issue No.47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 21<br />
Ffollowed the clear diversion signs I arrived<br />
at the reception. As this was a first visit I had<br />
to sign in and receive a visitor’s pass. I was<br />
then directed to the cloakroom (I didn’t have<br />
a cloak!) where coats etc have to be deposited<br />
along with mobile phones, bags etc. You will<br />
need a £1 coin (refundable) for the locker.<br />
Your notebook and pencils then need to be put<br />
in a clear plastic bag, which is supplied. NB<br />
although the GRoS allows pens, as the access<br />
to microfiche there has stopped and it’s onscreen<br />
access only, the NAS has very valuable<br />
documents and only allows pencils. You need<br />
to walk up a stair though the Legal Search<br />
Room to the Historical Search Room where at<br />
the Enquiry Desk you can obtain a Reader’s<br />
Ticket. (I then had to go back to the cloakroom<br />
to collect my Photographic Identity e.g. Bus<br />
pass, Passport or Photo Drivers Licence and<br />
my proof of address e.g. Gas/Electricity Bill<br />
or Bank Statement). I was then allowed to go<br />
into the Historical Research Room and at their<br />
Enquiry Desk I checked in and had a seat allocated.<br />
I then used a computer terminal to<br />
order the document required. Luckily I had<br />
researched this before (see notes below) and<br />
had the reference number. My seat number<br />
ensured that the document was delivered to<br />
the correct place. When the box of microfilm<br />
arrived I exchanged it for my readers ticket<br />
and was shown where the microfilm readers<br />
were located in the Legal search room I had<br />
originally walked through. Luckily I knew<br />
how to work the machine but the one beside it<br />
had a printing facility (need cash for that and<br />
mine was locked away in – yes you guessed it,<br />
the Cloakroom!). I found my James Ritch in<br />
the index at the beginning and fast-forwarded<br />
to his page where I obtained the facts that: -<br />
The NLB records show an Assistant Keeper<br />
who entered service 11th July 1860 at the<br />
Bell Rock for 3 1/2 years then on 2-12-1863<br />
transferred to Girdleness, Aberdeen for 3<br />
years until his death. I also checked the pages<br />
for Hoy High and Hoy Low and examined who<br />
else were Keepers there. When I returned the<br />
Microfilm I was returned my reader’s ticket<br />
and then retrieved my Jacket etc before signing<br />
out. Next visit should be easier as all I<br />
need to do is to bring my ticket! A good days<br />
work.<br />
The items I searched were: -<br />
Records of Principal Keepers. Section 1,<br />
Assistant Keepers. Section 2,<br />
List of Keepers in each Lighthouse Section 3.<br />
Ref No Year Joined<br />
NLC4/1/1 1837-1852<br />
NLC4/1/2 1822-1869 on same film<br />
NLC4/1/3 1869-1912<br />
NLC4/1/4 1912-1921<br />
NLC4/1/5 1922-1958<br />
Have you got<br />
Isle of Man<br />
connections in your<br />
family tree?<br />
Has any member come across the tale of a<br />
Manxwoman in their family? Mary Ann<br />
Wareing, later Sutherland arrived in <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
in 1840 or 41 and I am hoping that someone<br />
from the OFHS can tell me more about her<br />
family.<br />
She was my grandmother’s grandmother<br />
and when I was a wee girl I was told that<br />
she was an Englishwoman from Liverpool<br />
who eloped with a seaman to the <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
Islands. Alas for romance, I found Mary Ann<br />
Wareing in the 1841 census, aged 12 and<br />
already living in Kirkwall. She did not marry<br />
John Sutherland, also of Kirkwall, until<br />
June 1851. I then lose track of the family<br />
until the marriage of their daughter Minnie<br />
Alice Sutherland to William Gillespie in<br />
1877 in Edinburgh, when John Sutherland<br />
is described as an artist (deceased). He may<br />
of course have been a weekend painter and<br />
Minnie Alice was indulging in a spot of social<br />
climbing. I have no idea when they moved<br />
to Edinburgh despite checking the English<br />
censuses.<br />
Mary Ann Wareing was born in the Isle of<br />
Man, the daughter of James Wareing and<br />
Mary Ann Lawton. In 1841 she lived at<br />
Bridge Wynd, Kirkwall together with a 25<br />
year old woman called Mary Ann Houston,<br />
described as a merchant seaman’s wife, and a<br />
10 month old baby Sarah Houston, both born<br />
in England. I suspected that the older Mary<br />
Ann might have been the eloper, but not so.<br />
Mary Ann Slater, (daughter of Moses Slater<br />
and Sarah Wareing) married David Houston<br />
in Liverpool in 1838. Their daughter Sarah<br />
Wareing Houston was born there in 1840.<br />
Through genesreunited I have been in touch<br />
with a Houston descendant, and found that<br />
David and Mary Ann had other children,<br />
then emigrated to Australia in 1849.<br />
The tale was obviously much exaggerated<br />
in the telling, but I now know that I have<br />
a smidgen of Manx blood instead of real<br />
English blood. It’s still fascinating to think<br />
of little Mary Ann leaving home at 12 to look<br />
after a relative’s baby.<br />
I’m still hopeful of filling in the gaps so if<br />
anyone can remember any family tales of a<br />
Manx great, great grandmother or auntie I<br />
would be glad to hear from them.<br />
With many thanks. Madeleine Ulyett, 21<br />
Esplanade, Hornsea, East Yorks. HU18 1NQ<br />
or e-mail me at uly_mac@hotmail.com<br />
Did<br />
you know<br />
On midsummer day in the<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> Islands, the sun is<br />
above the horizon for 18<br />
1/4 hours.
22<br />
<strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY Issue No. 47 September 2008<br />
S E R G E A N T<br />
JAMES<br />
SUTHERLAND<br />
By Stan Sutherland – Member No 225<br />
James was born on 31st January 1890 at Whanclett<br />
Farm on the island of Flotta in <strong>Orkney</strong>. He was the<br />
eldest son of James Sutherland, a farmer’s son and<br />
Margaret Sutherland (née Simpson). James junior grew<br />
up on Flotta but at the age of twenty he left Flotta for<br />
Glasgow where, on the 1st April 1910, he boarded the<br />
9.599 ton steamship Hesperian, bound for Boston, USA.<br />
Whanclett Farm, Flotta<br />
James Sutherland enlisted<br />
in the American army in Illinois<br />
and was drafted into<br />
the 305th Infantry Regiment,<br />
part of the United States 77th<br />
Division. It was New York’s<br />
National Army division (the<br />
American equivalent of a British<br />
New Army division), and<br />
was organised at Camp Upton,<br />
New York starting 25th August<br />
1917. The 77th Dision was the<br />
first National Army division to<br />
arrive in France, between 13th<br />
April and 13th May 1918<br />
D F C<br />
Upon arrival in France<br />
most of the 77th Division<br />
trained with British units<br />
in Picardy and Artois, but<br />
the artillery was sent to<br />
Bordeaux to train with the<br />
French. On the 19th June<br />
the 77th Division moved<br />
to the Baccarat sector in<br />
Lorraine, where it relieved<br />
the 42nd American Division<br />
and sent units into<br />
the line to serve with the<br />
61st French Division. The French began to withdraw a<br />
month later and the 77th held a ‘quiet’ sector until 4th<br />
August.<br />
77th Division relieved<br />
the 4th American Division<br />
on the 11th/12th<br />
August, in the Vesle<br />
Sector. This was a more<br />
active sector and, before<br />
it was relieved by the<br />
8th Italian Division<br />
on 15th/16th September,<br />
77th Division had<br />
advanced to cross the<br />
River Vesle and had<br />
reached the River Aisne.<br />
77th Division was<br />
allocated an important<br />
opening role in America’s<br />
greatest battle of<br />
World War 1, the Meuse-<br />
Argonne offensive,<br />
which started on 26th<br />
September and continued<br />
until the end of the<br />
war. 77th Division attacked<br />
on the left of the<br />
American First Army,<br />
with the 1st Cavalry<br />
Division of the French<br />
Fourth Army on its left.<br />
Sadly, James Sutherland<br />
was killed during<br />
the fierce fighting in the<br />
Argonne Forest which<br />
made 77th Division<br />
famous, when a group of<br />
men from several of its<br />
units was cut off for five<br />
days behind German<br />
lines near Binarville<br />
and became known as<br />
the ‘Lost Battalion’.<br />
‘Liberty’ Patch of the 77th<br />
American Infantry Division<br />
SUTHERLAND, JAMES<br />
Sergeant, U.S. Army<br />
Company E,305th<br />
Infantry Regiment<br />
77th Division A.E.F.<br />
Date of Action<br />
October 3rd 1918<br />
Citation<br />
The Distinguished Service Cross<br />
is presented to<br />
James Sutherland, Sergeant,<br />
U.S. Army, for extraordinary<br />
heroism in action in the Forest<br />
of Argonne, France,<br />
October 3rd, 1918.<br />
Displaying exceptional devotion<br />
to duty and conspicuous courage,<br />
Sergeant Sutherland led<br />
his platoon up the steep slope<br />
of a ravine, under murderous<br />
machine-gun fire in an attack<br />
on a series of strong enemy<br />
machine-gun nests; and in so<br />
doing was seriously wounded
Issue No. 47 September 2008 <strong>NEWS</strong>LETTER OF THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY 23<br />
The 77th Division’s<br />
Great War casualties<br />
totalled 1,992 dead and<br />
8,505 wounded. It advanced<br />
71½ kilometres<br />
against resistance,<br />
more than any other<br />
American division<br />
and served 66days in<br />
active sectors, equal<br />
to the Regular Army<br />
2nd Division and<br />
exceeded only by the<br />
1st and 3rd Divi-<br />
The <strong>Orkney</strong> Herald<br />
sions. Before James Sutherland<br />
died in the Argonne fighting on 3rd October1918, aged<br />
28, he had been promoted to Sergeant and awarded the<br />
distinguished cross.<br />
James Sutherand is buried in Grave 19, Row 5, Plot<br />
F in the Meuse-Argonne Cemetery, which is the largest<br />
American military cemetery in Europe with 14,246<br />
graves<br />
Meusse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial<br />
193206<br />
Gunner<br />
James Taylor<br />
suTherland<br />
rFa<br />
Sadly another young<br />
Sutherland was also to lose<br />
his life in the killing fields of<br />
France.<br />
Gunner James Sutherland,<br />
a cousin and boyhood friend of Sergeant Sutherland, was<br />
born in St Mary’s, Holm, on 13th October 1890, the second<br />
son of John Sutherland, a tailor and journeyman, and<br />
Maggie Sutherland (née) Taylor, who were both born and<br />
married on Flotta. Another son Daniel, and a daughter<br />
Maria, were born while the family was living in the old St<br />
Andrew’s schoolhouse. The family moved to Flotta before<br />
the 1901 census, when they were living at Whanclett.<br />
James completed his schooling on the island and then<br />
found employment there as a postman. An elder brother,<br />
John, had left the island and emigrated out to Australia.<br />
Gunner James Sutherland was a driver in 84th Battery<br />
Royal Field Artillery and was the second Flotta<br />
soldier to die in the German Lys Offensive in April 1918.<br />
His battery, part of the independent 11th Army Brigade,<br />
was supporting the 154th French Division, which had<br />
just taken over part of the Lys front between Bailleul and<br />
Wytschaete from British troops before it was heavilly attacked<br />
there on the 25th April.<br />
James Sutherland was killed in action that day, aged<br />
27. He is buried in Grave III.G.159 in Bailleul Communal<br />
Cemetery Extension, Nord, France<br />
DNA and the Westray Dons<br />
Margaret Polack (nee Hewison), writes to say how interested she was<br />
in James Irvine’s artcle on DNA in Genealogy which appeared in the<br />
June issue of our newsletter.<br />
It brought to mind the research done some years ago into <strong>Orkney</strong> DNA<br />
and the Viking migration and she thought that similar investigations<br />
had also been undertaken on the Westray /Spanish connection.<br />
With a name like Hewison this is of especial interest to her<br />
and she wondered if it had been confirmed whether there<br />
was any truth in Dennison’s theory that Westray families,<br />
known as Dons, were descended from mixed marriages with<br />
sailors of the Spanish Armada whose ships had foundered<br />
as the made their way back to Spain round the North of<br />
Scotland.<br />
Does any reader recall the research and its outcome?<br />
If so Margaret would like to hear from you. You can contact<br />
her at maggiehewison@btinternet.com
MEMBERSHIP<br />
subscriptions etc<br />
THE ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> was formed<br />
in 1997 and is run by a committee of<br />
volunteers.<br />
It is similar to societies operating worldwide<br />
where members share a mutual interest in<br />
family history and help each other with research<br />
and, from time to time assist in special projects<br />
con-cerning the countless records and subjects<br />
available to us all in finding our roots.<br />
The main objectives are:<br />
1 To establish a local organisation for the study,<br />
collection, analysis and sharing of information<br />
about individuals and families in <strong>Orkney</strong>.<br />
2 To establish and maintain links with other<br />
family history groups and genealogical societies<br />
throughout the UK and overseas<br />
3. To establish and maintain a library and other<br />
reference facilities as an information resource for<br />
members and approved subscribers.<br />
4.To promote study projects and special interest<br />
groups to pursue approved assignments.<br />
We are located on the upper floor of the<br />
Kirkwall Library next to the archives department<br />
and are open Mon–Fri 2pm–4.30pm and Sat<br />
11am–4.30pm.<br />
Our own library, though small at the moment,<br />
holds a variety of information including:<br />
The IGI for <strong>Orkney</strong> on microfiche.<br />
The Old Parish Records on microfilm.<br />
The Census Returns on microfilm transcribed<br />
on to a computer database.<br />
<strong>Family</strong> Trees.<br />
Emigration and Debtors lists.<br />
Letters, Articles and stories concerning <strong>Orkney</strong><br />
and its people.<br />
Hudson’s Bay Company information.<br />
Graveyard Surveys (long term project).<br />
This material is available to members for ‘in<br />
house’ research by arrangement.<br />
Locally we have monthly Members’ Evenings<br />
with a guest speaker.<br />
We produce a booklet of members and interests<br />
to allow members with similar interests to<br />
correspond with each other if they wish.<br />
We also produce a newsletter 4 times a year and<br />
are always looking for articles and photographs of<br />
interest. A stamped addressed envelope should be<br />
included if these are to be returned. Back copies of<br />
the magazine can be purchased at £1 per copy.<br />
We can usually undertake research for members<br />
who live outwith <strong>Orkney</strong> but this is dependent on<br />
the willingness of our island members giving up<br />
their spare time to help.<br />
Membership of the <strong>Society</strong> runs from<br />
1st March to 28th/29th February and<br />
subscriptions should be renewed during<br />
the month of March. All subscriptions should be<br />
sent to the Treasurer at the OFHS address below.<br />
New members joining before the 1st December<br />
will receive back copies of the three magazines for<br />
the current year. From 1st December new members<br />
will receive membership for the remainder of the<br />
current year, plus the following year, but will not<br />
receive the back copies of the magazine.<br />
The present subscription rates are as follows:<br />
ORDINARY<br />
<strong>Family</strong> membership (UK only) £10.00<br />
FAMILY MEMBERSHIP<br />
Spouse, Partner and Children under 18 £15.00<br />
SENIOR CITIZENS<br />
Single or couple (UK only) £7.00<br />
OVERSEAS<br />
Surface Mail £12.50<br />
OVERSEAS<br />
Air Mail £15.00<br />
Overseas members should pay their fees in<br />
sterling or its equivalent. If it is not possible to send<br />
pounds sterling please check the exchange rate.<br />
Our bank will accept overseas cheques without<br />
charging commission. Receipts will be issued with<br />
the next magazine. Members residing in the United<br />
Kingdom may pay their subscriptions by Bankers<br />
Order and if they wish can have their subscriptions<br />
treated as gift donations. Forms will be sent on<br />
request.<br />
Cheques should be made payable to:<br />
ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
and forwarded to<br />
ORKNEY FAMILY HISTORY SOCIETY<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> Library & Archive<br />
44 Junction Rd, Kirkwall, <strong>Orkney</strong> KW15 1AG<br />
Telephone 01856 873166 extension 3029<br />
General enquires should be addressed to the office in writing or to<br />
Treasurer George Gray (e-mail: george.gray24@tiscali.co.uk)<br />
General Secretary. Elaine Sinclair (sincs01963@yahoo.co.uk)<br />
Research Secy. Adrianne Leask (e-mail: amerswyck@talktalk.net)<br />
Editor. John Sinclair (e-mail: johnsin@gotadsl.co.uk)<br />
<strong>Orkney</strong> <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong> website— www.orkneyfhs.co.uk<br />
The <strong>Orkney</strong> <strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> <strong>Society</strong><br />
is a Registered Charity in Scotland SCO26205<br />
Articles in the newsletter are copyright to the <strong>Society</strong> and<br />
its authors and may not be reproduced without permiss-<br />
ion of the editor. The <strong>Society</strong> is a registered charity in<br />
Scotland and a member of the Scottish Association of<br />
<strong>Family</strong> <strong>History</strong> Societies. The <strong>Society</strong>’s newsletter, Sib<br />
Folk News is registered with the British Library under<br />
the serial number ISSN 1368-3950.