Monday, February 02, 2009

The sea cliffs of Hirta


On board the MV Cuma again, we were soon rounding the eastern ramparts of Oisebhal on Hirta. We were bound for Boreray and the stacs and thence to Harris.


The NE coast of Hirta has the highest sea cliffs in the British Isles. Behind the low lying Sgeirnan Sgarbh in the fore ground, rise the cliffs of Conachair 430m.


Looking back, the notched ridge of Dun shelters the Village Bay.


This is the Gap between Oisebhal and Conachair, down which the St Kildans lowered themselves in the hunt for fulmars.


As the Cuma pulled away from Hirta, Soay came into sight behind Mina Stac. Like the St Kildans 78 years previously we were now leaving Hirta. Our acquaintance had been short but nonetheless we knew we were now leaving a very special place in our wake.

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Sunday, February 01, 2009

No 3, The Street and the silent poem of the people of St Kilda


It was early June 2008. Leaving the burial ground, I walked slowly back down the village street of empty windows and doors. On the way, I heard a high pitched birdsong and there, jumping in and out of gaps in a blackhouse wall, was a St Kildan wren. This subspecies is a survivor of the pre-Ice Age population of Scottish wrens. The ice sheet, which enveloped Scotland, did not reach as far as St Kilda.

Cheered by the song of this hardy survivor, I continued on my way down the street towards the jetty and our waiting boat. I had nearly passed No. 3 before I realized that it was the museum, devoted the island's last human inhabitants. Looking back at the 19th century buildings, only the distant antennae for the missile tracking system gave hint that this was now the 21st century.


This photo was taken from the same spot in 1886, some 122 years before. It shows members of the Gillies family outside No. 3, The Street.


Inside, the renovated house's two rooms have been converted into a single room museum of island life.


A slate on the wall commemorates former residents of the house. I have already mentioned Malcolm MacDonald, who lived in this house until he left the island in 1924.


Malcolm's father was also called Malcolm MacDonald and this tourist photograph, with the family cow, now hangs in the house he once called home.

After the MacDonalds left, and by 1930, there were only 36 inhabitants left. Their numbers were depleted by emigration, their self sufficiency weakened by age and a succession of poor summers. Finally, they petitioned the British government, asking for evacuation. They left on 27th August and brought thousands of years of occupation and history to an end. Sadly there is no written history and little oral history left by the islanders themselves. Life was too harsh and survival took all their efforts. What we know of them is largely through the cameras and pens of wealthy tourists, who viewed them as curiosities. Despite this lack of island literature, the modern visitor can hardly fail to be moved by a silent poem of the people of St Kilda. You might hear it as you wander through the empty ruins of thousands of years of human survival, on the edge of the world.

By now the increasing wind was sending gusts scudding across the Bay. The MV Cuma was the only boat remaining and we knew Murdani, her skipper, would be anxious to set sail for the shelter of Loch Resort on the distant west coast of Harris. We only had a morning to explore St Kilda. We saw much and learned a great deal about the island and the people who lived there. However, we left feeling we had only scratched the surface of this remarkable island's secrets and past.

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Footnote. The following books have provided the information referred to in these recent pages:

Sir Donald Monro, "A description of the Western Isles of Scotland called Hybrides" 1549,(manuscript published 1774).
Martin Martin, "A late voyage to St. Kilda, the remotest of all the Hebrides, or Western Isles of Scotland", 1698.
Martin Martin, "A description of the Western Islands of Scotland circa 1695", 1703.
Tom Steel, "The life and death of St Kilda", 1975 revised edition 1988.
Alan Small, "A St Kilda Handbook", 1979.
Geoffrey Stell, Mary Garman, " Buildings of St Kilda", 1988.
WR Mitchell, "Finlay MacQueen of St Kilda", 1992.
David Quine, Colin Baxter, "St Kilda", 2002.
Andrew Fleming, "St Kilda and the Wider World", 2005
John Randall et al, "The Decline and Fall of St Kilda: Proceedings of an international conference" 2005.

Saturday, January 31, 2009

Life and Death on St Kilda


From the Gap below Oiseval on the NE coast of Hirta I turned my back to the sea and the wheeling fulmars. I made my way back down to the village.


From above I could see that what I had thought was a vegetable enclosure behind the village, is actually the burial ground.


It is the site of the ancient Christ chapel though no trace of it remains.
Photo JLW


Most of the grave stones are rough hewn with no inscription.
Photo JLW


Others are more elaborate and carved from imported stone, a sign that the Victorian St Kildans' contact with tourists had given them access to money.
Photo JLW


Although this was the remotest inhabited part of the British Isles, its very remoteness attracted wealthy Victorian tourists. They have left a photographic record of the islanders from about 1860. This is Rachel Gillies, whose grave stone is in the photo above. This photo is in the island museum.


Some of the gravestones are quite recent. Malcolm MacDonald left the island in 1924 and spent most of his life in London. He always missed the island home of his youth. He visited St Kilda again in 1967 and found it very hard to leave for a second time and return to London.
Photo JLW


His name, and that of his father, is still just legible on the faded pupil roll in the school house.

Malcolm did make one final trip to St Kilda. His ashes were buried next to the remains of his ancestors. It is likely to be one of the last internments on this island, at the edge of the world, which was inhabited for thousands of years but now stands silent, as a museum to the past.

For a moment, as the wind blew round the walls of the burial ground, I thought I could hear distant voices. But it was only the cries of the sea birds and I turned back to the village street.

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Friday, January 30, 2009

130 fulmars per year.


The cliff ledges of Hirta are home to thousands of pairs of fulmars. At one time fulmars were confined to the St Kilda archipelago but since the end of the 19th century they have spread to Scotland and the rest of the British Isles.


This pair are nesting on a bed of sea pink and sea campion but fulmars do not construct a nest for their single egg. They do not begin breeding until they are 8 to 10 years old and can live to over 50.


Superficially fulmars look like gulls but are actually petrels, related to shearwaters and albatrosses. They have a graceful stiff winged flight and glide for long distances skimming the waves with their wingtips. They protect their nests by projectile vomiting a nasty oil.


Fulmars formed a staple of the St Kildans' diet. Each person would eat about 130 fulmars per year. The men scrambled over the crags catching the birds and collecting their eggs. If you follow this link to the Scottish Screen Archive you can see a dizzying clip, shot in 1923, of St Kildans going over the cliffs in search of fulmars at this very spot.

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Thursday, January 29, 2009

Between a pox and a hard place on Stac Lee.


From the cliffs on the NE coast of Hirta it is less than 7km across the Atlantic to Boreray and its two satellite stacs. They are Stac Lee and Stac an Armin (in the shade behind). They are the highest stacks in the British Isles. The islanders kept sheep on Boreray and also visited these islands for the sea bird harvest in August. Amazingly there are also about 50 cleitean on Boreray and about 80 on Stac an Armin!

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There were also bothies on all three. The one on Stac Lee can still be found. It is just below the dark "V" under the left of the white stained summit cap of the island. The island and stacs are too exposed to leave a boat, so work parties were dropped off by a boat from Hirta, which would return when a signal indicated the work was done.

In 1729 a smallpox epidemic was started after a St Kildan had died on Harris from smallpox the previous year. As his clothes were still good, they were brought back to St Kilda and the smallpox gripped the population. At the time, three adults and eight boys were marooned on Stac Lee because there were no surviving adults, strong enough to man the boat from Hirta, to rescue them. They remained on this windswept rock for 9 months, through the winter and into the next summer, until the factor's boat from Harris relieved them. When they returned to Hirta, they found only one adult and 18 children had survived the epidemic from the population of nearly 200.

Remarkably St Kilda was repopulated in the 1730's from Harris, Uist and Skye. Life may have been tough on St Kilda but it was even worse for many on these other islands. The incomers were taught how to climb the cliffs and harvest birds by the few survivors. By 1758 the population had risen to 88 but it would never again reach 200. The decline had started.

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Wednesday, January 28, 2009

A Rock at the Edge of the World: St Kilda


The slope up to the Gap ended abruptly. At my feet the ground fell away into vertiginous nothingness. The cliffs on the north coast of Hirta are the highest sea cliffs in the British Isles. This truly was the edge of the St Kildan's little World but it was upon the cliffs that their survival depended. They harvested eggs and birds, especially young gannets, fulmars and puffins from the huge breeding colonies on the cliffs.

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Tuesday, January 27, 2009

The mysterious enclosures of An Lag, St Kilda.


As I entered the hidden hollow high above the village, the slope levelled off and I was drawn towards some large, stone walled enclosures.


From up here, there was no sign of the village or the bay far below. Only the distant Atlantic could be seen through gaps in the rocky ramparts of distant Dun.


After the enclosures the slope steepened towards the Gap between Oisebhal (293m) to the SE and Connachair (776m) to the NW. Lines of cleitean marched boldly up the slope and I was soon perspiring in the hot June sun as I rested by each.


Nearing the top, I turned to catch my breath. Then I saw for the first time, the true complexity and apparent randomness of the enclosures. At first, I thought they were sheep fanks (stone pens) but they looked like they were designed to keep animals out rather than in. The exterior of the walls is vertical but the interior is sloped. It is thought they were built relatively late in St Kilda's history, probably about 1830. No one really knows their purpose or why they were built in such a way but one theory is that they were to shelter growing vegetables and crops.

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Monday, January 26, 2009

Cleitean on the climb to An Lag, St Kilda.


Leaving the village street on St Kilda, I proceeded up the hill towards the head wall. On the way I passed more cleitean.


Some of them appeared to grow out of the slope of the steep ground.


Some had two roofs of slabs forming a handy storage space well above the ground and out of reach of animals.


Inside they were remarkably dry. There is evidence that the survival of Soay sheep is enhanced by their use of cleitean in winter


Once through the head wall of the village the ground steepened. Looking back, the view included the spread of Village Bay, with Dun behind, and the houses nestling round the crescent of its shore. MV Cuma remained at anchor but all the other tour boats had left in the face of the increasing southerly wind.


The steep ground gave way to an area of flatter ground which was not visible from below. It is called An Lag Bho 'n Tuath.

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Sunday, January 25, 2009

The village street, St Kilda.


Leaving the Factor's house we approached the village proper and arrived at No 1 St Kilda. The first 6 houses of the type built in the early 1860's have been restored by National Trust for Scotland work parties.


The 1860s houses were built after a hurricane in October 1860 stripped the roofs off of most of the blackhouses which were built in the 1830's which were built using the gift from Sir Thomas Acland. In this view looking back down the street you can see the older blackhouses between the more modern gabled houses.


In the fireplaces of many of the houses, a simple stone commemorates the last residents.


This is No 16, the last of the 1860's houses.


Beyond it you can see blackhouse "V". It has thick walls with rounded corners not to catch the wind. It is built end on to the sea and the low door which served for both animals and people is on the side. In winter the beasts stayed in the downhill part of the house. The dung stayed there (until spring) but their heat rose. There are no windows. After the new houses were built most of the blackhouses were used as byres but some of the old folk returned to them as they were warmer and quieter than the modern houses with their galvanized iron roofs.


Looking back down the street towards No 1. Three figures high in the gap on the horizon give scale.


The relationship between the houses, the blackhouses and the cleitean can be seen in this telephoto view from outside No 12.

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Saturday, January 24, 2009

Oiling the wheels of commerce on St Kilda.


Leaving the church and the school, we made our way back up the hill to the street which connects the village with the store. Before we arrived at the cottages, we came across the factor's house. This was built in the 1860's and was the residence of the factor from the MacLeod estate on Skye. He visited the island about three times during the summer months. His job was to take payment in kind for the crofters' rent. For many years bird oil was the islander's most valuable export and the islanders had no problems paying their rent. The islanders would also barter tweed, dried fish, mutton and feathers in exchange for essentials such as meal.

In the late 19th century the discovery of paraffin on the mainland had rendered the oil extracted from birds near worthless and by 1930 the islanders had built up rent arrears of over 500 pounds. MacLeod tolerated this and evicted no one. His last factor was John Mackenzie. He was a popular figure on St Kilda as he brought stores including paraffin to the island for which no charge was made. After what was sometimes a token gathering of goods in exchange for rent he would distribute sweets and engage in long conversations with the villagers.

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Friday, January 23, 2009

St Kilda school days.


Leaving the St Kilda church by a side door, we entered the school room which was completed in 1900. The long silent room was brightly lit with windows front and back. The children's desk had a neat row of slates (very similar to those I used on starting school in the Highlands in the late 1950's). The teacher's desk overlooked that of the pupils. On the wall hung maps of Canada, the World and South Africa.

Although a school had been established on St Kilda in 1709 it was not until 1809 that a teacher was appointed by the Society for the Support of Gaelic Schools. He remained on the island until a resident minister was appointed in 1829. Education was then the responsibility of successive ministers until 1884 when the Ladies Committee of the Highland Society started to send missionary teachers out to the island.


On the teacher's desk a ledger lay open at the school roll. There were names of 50 children who had entered the school from 1892 until the late 1920's. The pages have been damaged by 116 years of dampness but some lines of copperplate writing in India ink are still legible. The final column lists "reason for leaving".

Drowned : This was the sad death on 2nd October 1906 of Norman Gillies.
Died
Left the island
Died
Went to Glasgow
Left the island
Left the island
Over 14
To help parents with home industries
Over 14
Over school age
Sick in hospital, Glasgow



The children had names like Niel (sic) Gillies, Margaret MacQueen, Rachel MacDonald, John Ferguson, Catherine Gillies, Rachel Gillies and Flora Gillies. This photo (from a display in the schoolroom) was taken in 1927. The man was a missionary teacher sent from the mainland.

Although the children learned about far away places such as Australia (and many left the island to go there) they received little instruction on sustenance farming which was vital to their survival. In many ways the charity of the educators failed the islanders. It did nothing to make their lives easier but it opened their eyes to opportunity elsewhere.

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Thursday, January 22, 2009

No saints on St Kilda!


The door of the church on Hirta on St Kilda is on the end away from the sea and the prevailing wind. It is a plain building, with little ornamentation. This is not only because of the relative poverty of materials on St Kilda but because of the zealous form of Protestant Christianity which was practiced here in the 19th century. There are of course no figures of Jesus on the cross, or of Mary or the Saints....


.... talking of which, even the name St Kilda is a misnomer. There was no St Kilda. It was a later corruption of the name "Skildar", which appeared on the Nicolay Rutter (chart) published in 1583. One theory is that Skildar is from the old Norse word for shield. From a distance, the cliffs of the St Kilda archipelago look like shields rising from the sea.

The earliest written reference to the islands was to "Hirta" in 1549. Sir Donald Monro, High Dean of the Isles, wrote a manuscript: "A description of the Western Isles of Scotland called Hybrides" following a tour made in 1549. Here is a quotation from his description: "The inhabitants thereof ar simple poor people, scarce learnit in aney religion, but M’Cloyd of Herray, his stewart, or he quhom he deputs in sic offfice, sailes anes in the zear ther at midsummer, with some chaplaine to baptize bairnes ther, and if they want a chaplaine, they baptize ther bairns themselfes."


This is the view from the pulpit, which is reputed to be the biggest in all of the Western Isles. From it, the minister would preach long, long sermons. He also had a remarkably clear view of the door, so there was no escape!

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Wednesday, January 21, 2009

A St Kilda tale of a bell and a spirit of generosity.


This brass bell hangs on a wooden frame by the church door. Although it is dated 1861 it is actually a replica of the original bell which was used to call the St Kildans to worship. This new bell was cast in Greenock for the rededication of the church which took place in 1980.


This photo, which is part of a display in the schoolroom, dates from post 1900. The bell hung outside the church from 1864 until 1930, when the island was evacuated. The original disappeared some time after this. It had been the ship's bell of the SS Janet Cowan, which had been built in Quebec in 1861. She was wrecked in Village Bay on 7th April 1864. She had been en route from Calcutta with a cargo for the jute mills of Dundee on the east coast of Scotland.

The St Kildan's were at the end of their winter and would have had little food to spare. Despite this, they fed and sheltered Captain MacKirdy and his crew for a week. When the weather improved the wrecked sailors then borrowed a boat from the villagers and set sail for Harris, where they left it in West Loch Tarbert. Eventually they made their way back to their home port of Greenock. The grateful captain and crew collected nine pounds which they sent to the selfless villagers. The ship's owners paid for the village boat to be returned to St Kilda, together with a cargo of flour and grain.

One of the St Kildan ministers lasted less than a year (Lachlan MacLean, 1903). I wonder if it was this gentleman? He doesn't really seem to have captured the enthusiasm of the St Kildans!

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