Tales from Barra

by John Lorne Campbell

  In the ninth century came the Norsemen, who left their mark in the form of Viking burials, popular traditions and place-names like ‘Breibhig’ (Broad Bay),’ ‘Alla’asdail’ (Elves’ Milking-place), ‘Hellisay’ (Cave Island) and so on. Grettissaga tells how, around 871, the Viking Onund expelled from Barra the Irish King Cearbhall (Carroll). From that time on the Norsemen retained possession until the Kingdom of the Hebrides was re-Gaelicised under the Lords of the Isles from the thirteenth century onwards. Local traditions point to Norse-speaking communities having survived on the small neighbouring islands, the last such being on Fuday, which was extirpated by ‘Mac an Amharuis.’6 Viking galleys continued in use amongst the islanders until suppressed by the Privy Council of Scotland in the early seventeenth century as a means of disarming the local Hebridean chiefs who had risen to power following the breakdown of the semi-independent Lordship or Kingdom of the Isles at the end of the fifteenth century.

  During these times the MacNeils of Barra, who at one time appear to have had ambitions in the direction of annexing the Isle of Coll, were allies of the MacLeans; but from the seventeenth century onwards, they became associated with the MacDonalds of Clanranald, their neighbours in South Uist.

  This Lordship, which probably gave the islands the best (and only native) government they ever had, was an institution very much valued by the Hebrideans, who made several attempts to restore it during two generations after its suppression. Finally the islands lapsed into a barbarous anarchy during the second half of the sixteenth century, with third parties egging on internecine clan warfare in the hope of ultimately benefiting, a strife which was worsened by the collapse of all religious sanctions in the Isles following the Scottish Reformation of 1560. From this state of affairs emerged an official Government policy towards the Isles that was almost entirely repressive so far as the language, religion and traditional institutions of the Islemen were concerned.

  During the time of the Lords of the Isles the first historical reference to the famous MacNeils of Barra occurs. This was in 1427, when the Lords of the Isles, who of course were MacDonalds, gave a charter of Barra to ‘Gilleownan Roderici Murchardi Macneil,’ i.e. Gille Eóghanain mac Ruairi ’ic Mhurchaidh ’ic Néill (Gilleonan son of Roderick son of Murdo son of Niall). This is the reason why a seventeenth-century South Uist poetess flyting with the Barra woman Nic Iain Fhinn, refers to ‘little stony Barra’ as:

  ‘Deirc a fhuair sibh bhuainn an asgaidh

  Nuair a chunnaic sinn nur n-airc sibh.’

  ‘Alms which you got from us [i.e. the MacDonalds] for nothing, when we saw you in want.’

  Reckoned from the Niall mentioned in this charter, General Roderick MacNeil of Barra, last male chief of the direct line, who died in 1863, was the sixteenth of the line. The Clan genealogists, however, did better than that: according to Martin Martin, the Chief who lived at the end of the seventeenth century was accounted the thirty-fourth of lineal descent who had possessed the island. This descent was linked up, by the Gaelic shenachies, with the Uí Néill of Ulster, including the famous Kings Niall of the Nine Hostages and Niall Frasach (so called because of several extraordinary showers which fell in his reign). Of course, there is no historical proof of this descent, and the MacNeils of Barra may well have been originally a Norse family which later Gaelicised its family tree, but in any case, the family was sufficiently old and distinguished, and the Coddy was always proud of his connection with the Clan MacNeil through his paternal grandmother Mary MacNeil, daughter of Neil MacNeil of Greian.

  Even in historical times there are difficulties over the MacNeil of Barra pedigree, and these difficulties are not lessened by the total disappearance of the family papers, including the famous Barra Register, which was a Gaelic Chronicle of the family similar to the Red and Black Books of Clanranald. It is possible that these papers still exist somewhere: it is known that the Barra Register was in the possession of members of the MacNeil of Vatersay family towards the end of the nineteenth century. This family was a collateral branch of the Chiefs’ house, and its original progenitor may well have been Niall Uibhisteach, the rightful heir of the estate who was dispossessed by Niall Òg in 1613, and forced, as Fr Cornelius Ward records in 1625, to sign away his lawful rights in Niall Òg’s favour.

  Niall Uibhisteach and Niall Òg were both sons of Ruairi an Tartair (‘Noisy Rory’), a famous old warrior who flourished at the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries. Apparently Niall Uibhisteach was the son of a legitimate marriage with a daughter of MacDonald of Clanranald (as his name implies), and Niall Òg was the son of a liaison with Mary MacLeod heiress of Dunvegan and widow of Campbell of Auchinbreck.7 There was a good deal of strife between the sons of the two mothers (as occurred in other similar cases in the Isles), and a complaint was made to the Privy Council of Scotland in 1613 that Niall Òg had imprisoned his father and half-brother and had seized control of the estate. This situation was apparently never rectified.

  Ruairi an Tartair referred to was a famous pirate and is said to have instituted a search for Rocabarraidh (i.e. Rockall) in the belief that it was inhabited by men who owed him allegiance, and to have raided the West Coast of Ireland. During his time the Barramen continued to make religious pilgrimages to Croagh Patrick in Mayo, and when the Irish Franciscan Fr Cornelius Ward visited Barra in 1625 at the invitation of one of the local gentry, he reconciled a large number of persons without difficulty, the usurping chief excepted. He in due time was reconciled by Fr Hegarty in 1632, and the family remained staunch Catholics until after the ’45 – the clansmen ever since, except one or two families. In the 1650’s the famous Vincentian Fr Dugan, who is still well remembered in local tradition, made similar visits. There is thus no foundation for the story told to Martin Martin around 1690 by the minister of Harris, that the Barramen had been Protestants before the Restoration of the Stuarts in 1660.

  To return to Ruairi an Tartair. It had been frequently said that owing to a piracy he had committed on a ship of Queen Elizabeth of England, Roderick MacKenzie, Tutor of Kintail, a well-known Highland diplomat of those times was commissioned to apprehend him.8 This was carried out by the aid of wine, and Ruairi was kidnapped and taken to Edinburgh and brought before King James VI and I, who asked him (through MacKenzie) why he had commit ted such a crime. To which Ruairi replied that he was only avenging King James’ mother, Mary Queen of Scots, whom Elizabeth had judicially murdered. Taken aback by this reply, King James allowed him to go free, on condition of accepting the Tutor of Kintail as his feudal superior.

  The drawback to this story is that it is chronologically impossible. Roderick MacKenzie became Tutor of Kintail in 1611, and the only time King James visited Edinburgh after succeeding to the English crown in 1603 was in 1617, by when Ruairi an Tartair was a very old man languishing in irons at the hands of his unfilial and illegitimate son Niall Òg. However, there certainly is foundation for the story. The MacKenzie chroniclers mention that the Tutor of Kintail had dealt with a recalcitrant MacNeil of Barra; but they do not say which MacNeil. Indisputably the Tutor of Kintail got a Charter of Barra in 1621 ‘for services rendered.’ I incline to the belief that Niall Òg was the person he really brought to heel.

  An interesting and well-authenticated story of the MacNeils of Barra which has, curiously, not survived in local tradition9 as far as I have been able to discover, is that of the occasion when John MacLeod of Dunvegan sent a boat containing a King’s Messenger and several men to collect a debt of 85 merks (£56 13s. 8d. Scots or £4 14s. 5d. sterling) from Roderick MacNeil of Barra in 1675. When the party arrived at Kismul they found the gate locked against them and were greeted with stones and shots from the battlements. Driven off, they took refuge on Fuday, where MacNeil’s men, headed by his brother James – a person who is not mentioned in the MacNeil clan histories – and Iain mac Néill Uibhistich (presumably a son of the dispossessed heir of 1613), Baillie of Barra, pursued them, hid their oars, caught the King’s Messenger and
deforced him of his summons, and then released him, telling him never to show himself in Barra again.

  Deforcing a King’s Messenger was a serious offence, and MacNeil, his brother James and various other persons alleged to be involved, were tried in Edinburgh in 1679 for it. Owing to lack of evidence, MacNeil, who was alleged to have been seen in Kismul Castle in disguise watching the King’s Messenger being driven off, was acquitted, but his brother James was sentenced to be fined £1000 (Scots) of which 500 merks were to be paid to the clerk of the court for the King’s use, and 1000 merks to be paid to John MacLeod of Dunvegan, and to be imprisoned until these sums were paid, as they presumably were by the chief. It must be said that the fact that MacLeod went to the length of employing a King’s Messenger to collect a very small debt from MacNeil of Barra indicates that there must have been bad feeling between the two already, so that more probably lies behind this story than meets the eye. An interesting allusion in the official account of the case is to Alexander Shaw (? Shein), schoolmaster. There was no official school on Barra in 1675 as far as is known, and Shaw may have been a ‘hedge schoolmaster’ on this Catholic island. In 1703 the names of Donald and Angus Shaw are found in a list of the leading Barra Catholics, along with those of the Chief and his five children and two brothers, and the MacNeils of Vatersay, Tangusdale, Greian (who may be the ancestors of Coddy’s grandmother) and Vaslin.

  From 1621 until it was redeemed by General MacNeil shortly before the sale of Barra in 1838, the feudal superiority of Barra was held – apart from a brief interlude in the short reign of James VII and II – by, firstly, the MacKenzies and secondly, the MacDonalds of Sleat, the annual duty paid by the MacNeils being £40 and a hawk. In the event of the MacNeils being forfeited for, e.g. rebellion, the estate would have reverted to their feudal superiors. This very nearly happened in 1746 owing to the intrigues of the then MacNeil with the Jacobites, and his open training of men to join Prince Charles’ army. The Chiefs and Clan were always Jacobites, and fought at Killiecrankie and at Sheriffmuir for this cause, and would undoubtedly have joined Prince Charles in 1745 had the Jacobite army not got so far away on the mainland. As it was, arms and money were landed for the Jacobites on Barra, and the then Chief trained men openly in the winter of 1745–46 with the hope of joining the Prince’s army. All this was known to the authorities, and when receipts signed by MacNeil of Barra were found on a Spanish agent captured in 1746, no further evidence was needed to justify his arrest. He was taken to London along with other prisoners but later on was released. It has been said he turned King’s Evidence, but research in the State Papers Domestic has not confirmed this allegation so far.

  After the ’45, it seems that MacNeil of Barra’s heir, Roderick, abandoned the Catholic religion and obtained a commission in the army (for which Catholics were then ineligible) and was killed at the siege of Quebec (see p. 82). The Vatersay family had already become Protestant around 1727, after a second marriage to a MacLeod of Greshornish, and had intrigued thereafter with the SPCK for the foundation of a Protestant school on Barra – a thing which could only have been embarrassing and irritating to their Chief. Nevertheless, they were intriguing with the Jacobites in 1745. The Vatersay family obviously possessed a good deal of influence with the chiefs in the eighteenth century and may have thought, at one time, of claiming the estate as Protestant heirs, under the Penal Laws.

  Roderick MacNeil of Barra succeeded as owner and chief in 1763 and lived until 1822. He was thus laird for practically his whole life. During his time emigration to North America started and for a time was much opposed by the estate, as the people, whose labour was needed for the kelp industry, were being deluded by ridiculously rosy pictures of life across the Atlantic drawn by emigration agents who had a financial interest in obtaining as many passengers as possible. Kelp provided big incomes for island landlords at this time, whose power was so great that they were even able to forbid the local fishermen from trading their fish direct with Glasgow or Greenock merchants.

  This Roderick MacNeil married Jean, daughter of Cameron of Fassiefern, and had two sons and five daughters. In 1806 he drew up a Deed of Entail designed to keep Barra in his family for ever, and to prevent debts and family settlements from accumulating on the estate. This Deed names as his heirs his sons and their male heirs, whom failing his daughters and their male heirs, whom failing his sister and her male heirs, whom failing Roderick MacNeil, tacksman of Brevig. This Roderick of Brevig is the ancestor of the late Wallace MacNeil of Vernon River, Prince Edward Island, and of Colin MacNeil, his brother; the family claim to be descended from Gilleonan, the second son (or the first son passed over) of Roderick MacNeil of Barra who flourished c. 1688. The MacNeils of Earsary, whose representative, Mr Robert Lister MacNeil, now owns Kismul Castle and part of the mainland of Barra, assert, however, that the Brevig family is descended from an earlier generation and that their (the Earsary) family derives from James, second (of only two) sons of the Roderick MacNeil of Barra referred to. This debate between the Brevig and Earsary families ignores, it may be said, the claims of the Segraves, the descendants of General MacNeil of Barra’s only child Caroline (the heirs of line) and of the senior male descendants of his sisters, the Campbells of Achallader (who may be considered heirs male of Entail), so that, given all the available evidence, the professional genealogists have quite a pretty knot to disentangle regarding the appropriate arms for the different descendants of this ancient race.

  Kismul Castle, it may be said, was abandoned as an inhabited dwelling around 1700. Generations earlier, a seer had foretold how it would one day become the home of otters and seabirds, thereby earning the displeasure of the then MacNeil of Barra. George Wilson, who visited Barra in 1841, on a voyage around the coasts of Scotland, says that an old woman living in Barra was named to him as a person whose mother had been born within the Castle. The Castle dates, according to the Ancient Monuments Commission, from the fifteenth century.10 After its abandonment, the MacNeils of Barra eventually built the Mansion and walled garden at Eoligarry. There are interesting allusions in some of the Coddy’s stories to life in Kismul.

  Colonel Roderick MacNeil of Barra died in 1822. His will, made in 1820, together with the Deed of Entail executed in 1806, tied the estate up very tightly; apparently he was not confident in the financial discretion of his heir, Roderick MacNeil, who had fought at Waterloo, and later became a general. After making elaborate provision for management of the estate by trustees in order to reduce the burden of debt on it, Colonel MacNeil burdened it afresh with large settlements in favour of his younger children. His successor referred to himself as having been literally tied to the stake;11 and when the price of kelp failed he was put in an impossible situation. Unhappily, guided by the advice of persons ignorant of the country, he resorted to one money-making scheme after another, organising fisheries, starting a glass factory at Northbay and impounding his tenants’ cattle – one agent or factor succeeded another on the estate until things got into inextricable confusion and Barra had to be disentailed and sold to pay off his creditors, including presumably his younger brother and sisters, in 1838. Hot tempered and tyrannical as General MacNeil of Barra appears to have been, he is remembered with affection locally by comparison with the absentee régime, associated with rack-renting, evictions and all the petty tyrannies of unsupervised subordinates, that followed him. The years of 1822 to 1886 were, indeed, a time of poverty and oppression in Barra, as in the Highlands and Islands generally. This was relieved by the passing of the Crofters Act in 1886, granting fair rents, security of tenure and compensation for improvements. No one can nowadays visualise the petty tyrannies that were possible in the days when Island estates were governed by the representatives of absentee landlords and the people were completely without these indispensable rights and without a democratic franchise.

  As has been said, the Coddy’s maternal grandfather, Robert MacLachlan, came to Eoligarry from Mull as gardener in the time of General MacNeil, and his pa
ternal grandfather, Angus MacPherson, came to Craigstone from South Uist in 1819 to do joinery work there for the priest of Barra, Fr Angus MacDonald. There after the fortunes of his family were bound up with those of Barra, which suffered severely from the ruin of the local inshore fishery which followed the coming of the steam trawlers from Fleetwood around the turn of the century, against which the under-policed three-mile limit was a completely inadequate protection (in Norway, for example, waters like those of the Minch are totally closed to trawlers). In more recent times this loss has been followed by the equally disastrous closing of the herring curing stations on Barra. The policy of Westminster Governments appears to be to concentrate life in the Scottish islands in a few urban centres and let the outlying districts die.

  Sea communications with Barra remained so inadequate and uncomfortable down to 1929 that very few strangers had visited the island before that time. This, no doubt, helps to account for the preservation of its Gaelic traditions, already referred to. After the improvement in these communications, Coddy took full part in the development of the tourist traffic to the island.

  Today, with the failure of the fishing, the lack of local industry and with the growth of a civilisation which cannot easily provide rural communities with the amenities enjoyed by towns, Barra is left to rely on pastoral agriculture, the tourist traffic (for which the season is brief) and some lobstering and cockle gathering – and even the lobsters are encroached on by large boats from the mainland. It is a sad future for the community to which the Coddy belonged and for which he did so much service. Perhaps things might have been better had there been a different disposition towards the remote parts of Scotland at headquarters. It is equally possible that, but for the sympathy for and interest in Barra that the Coddy’s personality was able to arouse amongst strangers, things might have been considerably worse. At any rate, nothing can rob Barra of its beauty, or of the memory of its splendid tradition of folk-song and story; and many of us have to thank the Coddy for an introduction to all of these. We may therefore wish that his memory be long preserved.