During the service Coll Kennedy introduced Wyatt to the congregation. He said that Wyatt, too, had been evicted from home and kirk by a landowner who would not recognise the people’s wish to have a ‘free’ church.
Wyatt felt a fraud standing with Coll Kennedy after the service while departing members of the congregation came to offer him their sympathy. The Eskaig school was an acceptable alternative to the kirk, while the schoolhouse provided him with accommodation that had to be superior to a cave!
Later, when the last worshipper had gone on his way warmed by religion and a ‘wee dram’ of Tam Vass whisky, Wyatt put his thoughts into words for the benefit of his fellow-preacher.
Coll Kennedy gave Wyatt a lop-sided grin. ‘Oh, I’m not complaining. Matters could be far worse. Do you read Robbie Burns?’
When Wyatt nodded affirmation, Coll Kennedy said: ‘Then, you may recall the grace he composed at the request of the Earl of Selkirk.
‘Some hae meat and canna eat,
And some would eat that want it,
But we have meat and we can eat,
And so the Lord be thankit.’
We have much to be thankful for, Wyatt. Many of our ministers are old men, and they’ve been cast out in the open with their families.’
The grin returned again. Coll Kennedy found it difficult to take the world seriously for long. ‘Besides, what man in his right senses would complain about being accommodated in the finest distillery in the land?’
The cave was quite large and reeked of peat and whisky. Tam Vass was a small, bright, wrinkled man who looked and smelt as though he had been pickled in whisky and hung up to dry in the smoke of a peat fire.
Much of the apparatus for the still was hidden within the cave, smoke from the fires escaping as best it could. As a result much of the cave was hidden by thick acrid smoke. However, it was clearer close to the cave entrance, the smoke tending to hang close to the roof, awaiting an opportunity to flee on the wind that blew along the glen.
Within the cave, their activities hidden from view, two men could be heard talking as they worked. As Tam Vass disappeared into the smoke, Coll Kennedy explained that the unseen men were putting whisky in small barrels, ready for transportation. When darkness fell men would arrive with donkeys to carry the whisky over the mountains beyond Glen Gloy. On the other side was Loch Lochy. Here a rendezvous had been arranged with a boat traversing the Caledonian Canal. The whisky would ultimately find its way to discerning customers in the lowland towns and cities.
‘What if the landowner were to have the cave raided? He’d make the most of your being here.’
‘He’d also deprive a great many of his fellow-gentlemen of the finest whisky they’re ever likely to taste. Oh, no! He and his men stay well away from Glen Fintaig. I’m safer here than I’d be anywhere else – and the accommodation suits my temperament. Ah! There you are, Tam.’
Tam Vass reappeared, apparently impervious to the thick acrid smoke. In his hand he held a large stoneware jug which he set on the floor in front of the preachers.
Coll Kennedy sat down cross-legged in front of the jug, and Wyatt followed his example.
‘Where’s Mad Macquarrie?’ Wyatt could not see the strange dog-owning man, but he could easily be hidden by the smoke.
‘He’s gone.’ Tam Vass handed each man a small wooden drinking-cup known as a quaich. Carved from a single block of wood, each cup was elaborately decorated and made with a solid ‘ear’ on opposite sides, in order that it might be held more easily. ‘Macquarrie enjoys good whisky as much as any man, but he’s not happy around people. He’s returned to his dogs.’
‘What’s his story?’ Wyatt held his quaich up for Tam Vass to fill from the jug.
‘Macquarrie’s story?’ Tam Vass filled his own quaich, placed the jug on the floor of the cave between them, then sat on the floor facing his two guests. ‘Nobody knows anything for certain about Mad Macquarrie. He’s been up in these mountains for a great many years. There were stories of a strange being roaming the area surrounded by the devil’s hounds for a long time before anyone caught a glimpse of Macquarrie. Where he came from no one knows. Some romantics say he’s the bastard son of a duke, his mother a servant who ran away to escape the family’s anger. Another rumour has it that he’s from a good family, but was outlawed for killing his brother in a fight over a girl. There could be some truth in it, at that. He’s an educated man and he has a terrible temper when he’s roused. Yet I’ve never known him so much as raise his voice to those dogs – and he’d climb Ben Nevis rather than talk to a woman.’
‘He’s a strange man,’ Wyatt agreed, accepting more of the truly excellent whisky from the jug, held this time by Coll Kennedy. ‘I’ve heard tales of men living like Macquarrie, but have never met one before.’
‘He’s not the first in these parts,’ said Tam Vass, settling back against the cave wall. ‘There was a man lived over your way, Preacher Jamieson. Somewhere up around Beinn an Tuim. He’d lived there many years and was an old man when I was a boy. It was whispered he was a son of Charles Stuart, his mother the daughter of a family who hid the prince after Culloden. There was another….’
Talk and whisky were passed around among the three men until long after darkness blanketed the mountains. It was good company, and the whisky was far more potent than any sold by the innkeepers of the land. Wyatt did not even remember retiring to a bed of heather, laid in a niche in the cave wall. At some time during the night he thought he heard men tramping to and fro along the length of the cave, but it might have been no more than the thumping inside his head that remained with him for much of the return journey to Eskaig.
Wyatt was halfway between Corpach and Eskaig when he saw a number of men on the slope of the lochside mountain. They were in a line from the loch to where the undergrowth ended some way up the slope, systematically working their way towards Corpach. They were probably searching for a lost animal, a calf, or even a sheep, but it was unusual to see so many men involved in such a hunt.
Then Wyatt noticed that each man carried some form of weapon. In most cases it was no more than a long stout stick, but a few wielded ancient claymores, while at least two carried muskets. It always alarmed Wyatt to see Highlanders carrying muskets in public view. There was a long history of discontent in the mountains, and the carrying of firearms was forbidden by the authorities unless a good reason could be given. The authorities often used the possession of firearms as an excuse to bring the power of the law to bear upon whole communities.
It was possible there was justification for the men to be armed. Foxes sometimes became troublesome and over-bold, raiding outlying cots and crofts and killing livestock. When this happened a hunt would be organised and carried out with high spirits and a great deal of noise. These men were going about their business unsmiling, and with a grim efficiency.
‘What are you hunting?’ Wyatt recognised one of the men closest to him and called his question.
When the man appeared puzzled, Wyatt shouted: ‘I’ve been away since early yesterday morning. Visiting the minister at Letterfinlay. Is there a rogue fox around?’
‘No, Minister, it’s not a fox. It’s men…. At least, that’s what their own kind would call them. Up here we call them something else.’
Now Wyatt really was alarmed. A manhunt would not have been sanctioned by anyone in authority.
‘Who are you hunting, and why? What’s all this about?’
There was an exchange of glances between the nearest men before the one who had spoken before called: ‘We’re after two men, Minister. Two Irish soldiers by the sound of it. One of the crofters came down from the mountains to call us out. Every able-bodied man for miles around is out looking for them, too. They violently ill-used a girl who was rounding up cattle in the mountains.’
‘Who is the girl?’ Suddenly the looks that had passed between the men became meaningful. ‘Is she all right?’
‘We don’t know how she is, Minister. All we know is i
t was the Ross girl.’
Wyatt headed straight into the mountains, all his other problems put aside, his thoughts in a turmoil. He had warned Eneas Ross and Mairi that the Irish soldiers were in the area. He should have made more of the hatred the Irish soldiers felt for the Scots. It was small consolation to tell himself he had never expected them to attack a lone woman – attack Mairi.
The incident had outraged the whole community. There were more men in the mountains than Wyatt had ever seen before. Long lines of them combed through the undergrowth of the lower slopes, while others searched the tumbled rock places about the mountain-tops. More than once the searching men changed direction to intercept and identify the lone preacher hurrying towards the Ross home. Each greeting upon recognition was followed by the same question: ‘Have you seen anything of the Irishmen?’ And each band of searchers included at least one armed man.
Wyatt was thinking more clearly now, and he warned the men against confronting any large bodies of soldiers or of taking the law into their own hands if the attackers were found. Both warnings undoubtedly fell upon deaf ears, but they needed to be said, and repeated. The incident involving Mairi was serious enough in itself. Its repercussions could spell disaster to the whole of the Highlands.
When Wyatt came in sight of the Ross croft, he slowed for a moment. He had not thought of what Mairi’s reaction might be at seeing him – or even whether she would be well enough for him to see her. He was still undecided when Magdalene Ross came into the garden of the croft with a bowl of vegetable waste which she threw out for the chickens.
When she saw Wyatt she put a hand to her brow, squinting against the light of the sun until she identified him. She did not wave but placed the bowl on the ground and stood waiting for him to reach her.
Magdalene Ross had been crying. Her face was blotched and puffy, her eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot.
Taking hold of the woman’s hands in a gesture of sympathy, Wyatt said: ‘I came as soon as I heard. How is she?’
As Magdalene shook her head, her eyes filled with tears. ‘She’s been badly beaten. Her face…. But it’s in here where she has the worst pain….’ Magdalene Ross put a hand to her breast, then clutched at Wyatt. ‘I’ve seen this happen many times in my own country. First with the French and then … yes, with English and Scots soldiers, too. But that was war. Such things happen. But here! She went out to find the cows, a happy beautiful girl. She came home crawling and badly beaten. Why? Why did it happen?’
Magdalene Ross’s words might have been a knife plunged deep into Wyatt’s stomach and twisted. In that moment there was no Christian compassion in his heart. Had the two Irish soldiers suddenly appeared before him, he would have killed them where they stood.
There was a sound in the doorway, and Wyatt turned. He saw Mairi standing there. She appeared tired and drawn, but a brief expression of pleasure crossed her face when she saw him – and there was not a trace of bruising there.
‘Wyatt! Oh, my dear. It’s good to see you.’ Mairi ran to him and hugged him. ‘I can’t think of anyone I’d rather see just now. Come inside and talk to Tibbie. Tell her that what’s happened doesn’t matter. That everything will be all right. Tell her no one blames her for what happened….’
‘Tibbie…?’ Wyatt stood in stupid confusion and repeated: ‘Tibbie…?’
‘You have heard what happened to her? The Irish soldiers you warned Father and me about? They’re animals. No, worse than animals for what they did to Tibbie. I hope the men catch up with them and kill them both….’
Forty-four
THE SEARCH BY the Highlanders spread in the manner of a disturbance on a still pond. When word of the rape of Tibbie Ross reached other communities their menfolk turned out to join in the search and pass on the message: ‘Find the Irishmen.’ Within twelve hours mountains, glens and lochsides were being combed by grim-faced men as far as thirty miles from Eskaig.
As swiftly as it had begun, the search was called off. No reason was given, and men returning to their homes said nothing. Wives did not ask. A deep secret silence settled over the mountains.
For a week the Highlands waited. Then the bodies of two deserters from the Irish regiment were pulled from the water at the southern end of Loch Lochy. Both men had been stabbed to death.
Official reaction to the death of the two Irish soldiers was exactly what Wyatt had feared. Their desertion was forgotten, and the two men were given a funeral with full military honours, as though they had fallen in battle. The eulogy recited at the graveside even hinted that the men might have been abducted before being brutally murdered.
The result was an immediate increase in tension between the resentful local population and vengeful Irish soldiers. The soldiers needed little encouragement to recall the wrongs, imagined or otherwise, their people had suffered at the hands of Highland ‘occupation’ troops in the past.
Incidents between soldiers and Scotsmen increased, and fights were frequent in the taverns and drinking-houses of Fort William. Far more serious was the manner in which the Irish regiment was used to support the authorities in the new wave of clearances being carried out in the Highlands about Fort William.
High in the mountains south-west of Loch Lochy the cottars gathered together in a confused and pathetic group and refused to accept the clearance notices being brought to them by a timid sheriff’s officer. Making no attempt to call attention to the office he held, the official scurried back to Fort William, greatly exaggerating the resistance of the cottars in order to justify his lack of success.
Within hours the old bogy of a Highland insurrection had been resurrected yet again and wild rumours circulated in the town. At dawn the next day, sheriff’s officers headed for the mountains once again. This time they were accompanied by a magistrate, the sheriff-substitute and the factor. As an escort they took with them forty Irish soldiers, who marched out of Fort William to the steady beat of a drum.
High in the mountains the sound of the drum drew the cottars. At a narrow and shallow ford they gathered to plead their case, women well to the fore.
A woman walked to the centre of the ford and begged the sheriff-substitute to return to Fort William and leave them to live their lives in peace. The plea was made in Gaelic and understood by only two of the assembled officials. It was certainly not a language that had been studied by the mounted factor. Encouraged by the presence of the troops, he rode into the stream, heading towards the cottars’ self-designated spokeswoman. When he reached the middle of the shallow but swift-flowing stream, the woman made another appeal in her unintelligible language.
The factor’s horse, made nervous by the fast-running stream, would not stand still. When its hoof turned a pebble beneath the water the animal stumbled, fell against the woman and knocked her off balance.
Not all the cottars gathered on the far bank saw the manner in which the incident occurred. As the woman floundered to the bank Gaelic abuse was hurled at the horseman and suddenly a stone sailed through the air from the assembled Highlanders. It hit the horse on the face. Startled, the animal backed, slipped and fell, ducking its rider in the icy water.
The factor surfaced to a howl of delighted derision from the cottar women. The sight of the wet and bedraggled factor caused almost as much amusement in the ranks of the Irish soldiers, and this might have been the end of the incident. Unfortunately, another volley of stones sailed through the air, hurled by half a dozen children of no more than twelve or thirteen years of age, standing behind their parents.
As the missiles landed in the water about the bedraggled factor and his threshing horse, the angry man shouted at the amused soldiery: ‘What the hell are you standing there doing nothing for? Can’t you see what they’re doing? Or are you waiting for me to be killed before you take any action?’ Another hail of missiles sailed through the air, and this time one struck the factor on the shoulder.
The officer in charge of the Irish soldiers immediately ordered them ‘into line, at the double’.
The men obeyed swiftly, and when they had formed a single long line they were ordered to take aim over the heads of the cottars.
Moments later the order ‘Fire!’ was given. A volley of shots rang out, echoed from the surrounding mountains.
As the smoke cleared and the last echo rolled away two of the cottars could be seen lying up on the ground. One was a woman who had been standing in the forefront of the crowd. Her death might have been the result of a deliberate disregard of orders, or due to a faulty charge in a soldier’s gun.
The second death was almost certainly an accident, but no less of a tragedy. A young girl standing well back from the crossing had been struck by an almost-spent musket-ball, fired above the heads of the cottars.
As the cottars stood their ground in stunned disbelief, a shout went up for the soldiers to cross the river and disperse them. The Irish soldiers needed no urging. They splashed across the shallow ford, spurred on by the sight of cottars fleeing before them.
The stronger and more able-bodied of the cottars were able to reach the safety of the surrounding rocky heights. Others, not so fortunate, were clubbed down by musket-butts. If resistance was offered, be it by man, woman or child, the offender was beaten to the ground before being dragged back to the river and placed in the charge of the sheriff’s officers.
At the end of half an hour, the last of the hot and triumphant soldiers returned to the riverbank. The still-wet factor looked about him at the two bodies and eight injured prisoners, three with broken limbs. Well satisfied with the morning’s work, he offered his congratulations to the soldiers’ commanding officer.
‘It’s exactly what was needed to show them we’ll stand no more nonsense. I’ll have little trouble with this lot after today.’
‘I trust you’re wrong, Factor. Our men haven’t been brought all this way to do no more than fight a handful of women. Your own militia could have attended to that. I trust you’ll be able to offer us something rather more worthwhile before we have to return.’
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