Prince Charlie's Creepy Stool

Just yesterday as I was searching the collection for seabean references I happened upon a description of the Creepy Stool that is housed in the West Highland Museum. This was very interesting as we photographed the stool on our last trip to the museum.

The writer possesses a small stool on which Prince Charlie sat the night Flora MacDonald took him across from Uist to Skye. The stool is simply a tree root on three legs and is like a [above: bread] toaster [deleted: slightly more curved]. It was known in the family from whom it was obtained [later addition: and to whose ancestors it belonged when used by the Prince] as Far chrann a Phrionnsa the [above: food] toaster of the Prince furm a Phrionnsa the form of the Prince and Stol a Phrionnsa the stool of the Prince.

CW228 is an article about The Prince Charlie Stool and gives an account of how Carmichael came into possession of it. He received it from Rachel MacDonald, Bororay, North Uist whose mother and mother’s mother passed on the stool. On a visit to the island Carmichael noted that the history of the stool was well known and that the history was ‘clear and distinct’. He was eager to meet the owner and see the stool and on meeting her he asked her for the stool! Initially she was not eager to part with it while she was alive but some years later she travelled to meet Carmichael at Lochmaddy in order to give him the stool. Alexander placed five shillings in her hand ‘to buy some small gift with it before she went back to her island home’ but Rachel refused to accept the money. She said it took away from the pleasure she had in gifting the ‘far-chrann’ to him.


A number of items in the Carmichael Collection at Fort William still have their tags with them, some written by Alexander and others by his daughter, Ella. Here is the label that is with the stool, can you make out what it says?

This is a really exciting time for the team to be combining the textual collection here at the University of Edinburgh with the object collection housed in the West Highland Museum. In the coming weeks we will be working on getting the photographs ready for the website!

References
CW386(b) Creepy Stool
CW228 The Prince Charlie Stool

A Jacobite Song: The Silver Whistle

Prince Charles Edward Stuart

Many would perhaps consider one of the most popular Jacobite songs out of more than just a few as An Fhìdeag Airgid (The Silver Whistle) composed in honour of the Young Pretender. The silver whistle in the context of the song refers to a silver reed used in the pipe chanter. Alexander Carmichael collected one of the earliest recordings of this songs from the recitation of Donald MacPhee, a blacksmith from Breivig in Barra, mentioned in an earlier blog. The version given here looks slightly corrupted perhaps because Carmichael had not understood the reciter or that the reciter himself had picked up the song incorrectly or perhaps merely misremembered some of the words:

Co shein[n]eas an fhideag airgid
Hi uill uill o
Mac mo righs eir ti[ghin]n a dh Alba
O ro hu o huill o.
Air luing a mharaiche ghreanan
Ho ro hu o hu ill o
Ribenan an t si[o]da Fhrangach
Ullagan oir eir g [sic] gach ceann diu
Mo ghaol ammister ainmeil
Cha b e mac sin M Fearachar
Cha b e ogha Mairi Simason
Ga b e thrialla gu tai[gh] talla

Carmichael notes that it was taken down on 21 May 1869 and he later wrote out the piece in a transcription book in a neater hand on 16 and 17 June 1869. Perhaps the most interesting part of this recording session is the song narrative that Carmichael had the pleasure of hearing. A further note says the MacPhee had heard from a North Uist bard and catechist called An Dall Mòr that the song had been composed specifically for the Prince. The reciter then goes on to give some historical details about the actual song. It is also of interest to note that this song or rather variations of this song was later recorded from quite a few tradition bearers from Barra:

One Peter Campbell from Barra
went to Loch nan Uagh for timber. Food
was scarce in Barra – no grain but
plenty of butter cheese & flesh. They
landed a pot in a nook to boil beef
when they saw a large vessel come
ashore in the Loch. He sent a boat
ashore. A gentleman landed
from the boat under whose arms
two men went & took him outdey[?]
They asked P[eter] Campbell to take
ashore arms swords & guns. He did
so and they hid them. He was asked
what pay he charged. He told them
that if they had grain food he pref[erred]. The
boat was loaded with flour & biscuits
till he told them that they would sink
his boat. He came home to Barra
and the pot is still in Lochnanua [Loch nan Uamh].
This was the landing of P[rince] Charlie.

References:
CW150/13, ff. 5r–5v.
An Fhideag Airgid: http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/22363/1 (Flora MacNeil)
http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/93660/1 (Captain Donald Joseph MacKinnon)
http://www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/fullrecord/30346/1 (Nan MacKinnon)
Image: Prince Charles Edward Stuart.

An Anecdote about Bonnie Prince Charlie

Berneray, Harris / Beàrnaraigh na Hearadh

Anecdotes and legendary accounts of Bonnie Prince Charlie were legion in the Western Isles and Alexander Carmichael was particularly fortunate to have collected quite a few of them. Although Carmichael is given rather scant acknowledgement by William Jolly, a school inspector and close friend, in his book Flora MacDonald in Uist: A Study of the Heroine in Her Native Surroundings (1886), it may be assumed with some degree of certainty that Carmichael would have supplied him with as much historical information as he had then to hand. In any case, this short anecdote tells of the Prince in the isle of Harris and his involvement with the Campbell of Srannda. He is said to have stayed, while on the lam, for six nights in Donald MacLeod’s house. Subsequently, or perhaps during the Prince’s visit, the host felt it expedient to make himself scarce and fled for safety to the nearby Cave of Ulladale. This would have been a wise move given that he did not wish himself to be associated with harbouring Public Enemy Number One at least as seen in the eyes of the Hanoverian Government. Nevertheless, MacLeod had clear Jacobite sympathies – he had been out – otherwise the Prince would not have been invited to have stayed in his house. For his trouble in offering such generosity despite the risks involved Berneray house was threatened by Captain Ferguson to be blown to kingdom come, a warning which came via the intermediary of Iain Laith mac ’ic Choinnich (a Campbell). It would seem that such a dire consequence was avoided as the house, it would seem, remained intact. The personalities mentioned were well-known in Jacobite circles: Dòmhnall mac Iain Òig, was Donald MacLeod (1671–1781), perhaps better known as Old Beneray or Old Trojan and Iain Mòr Liath mac ’ic Choinnich was John Campbell. The Captain Ferguson mentioned was a naval officer who originally hailed from Inverurie, Aberdeenshire and more details of his career can be found in John S. Gibson’s Ships of the ’45: The Rescue of the Young Pretender (1967):

Prince Charlie live[d] 6 nights in Don[ald]
Mac Iain oig[’s] ho[use]. Old Bearn[ar]y
fled to Ua[mh] Ulladail Capt[ain] F[e]rg[uson] set
his guns & casks of powder at the
house. Gen[e]r[al] Campbell came
to see Iain mor lia[th] mac
mhic Coinnich (Campbell)
(Strannd) then blind who told him
of their com[in]g & if he blew up Bearn[ar]y
house that he might levy Harris of
all the Camp[bells]. Gen[eral] took Iain lia[th] out
to see the long chog[aidh]. On their arri[val] F[e]rg[uson]
cursed Campbell insolentl[y] what
kept him.


Reference:
CW90/63, f. 24v.
Image:
Berneray, Harris / Beàrnaraigh na Hearadh.

Two Anecdotes About Bonnie Prince Charlie

From whom Alexander Carmichael collected these two short anecdotes about Bonnie Prince Charlie was not noted down by him at the time. They both refer to when the Prince was a fugitive on the lam in South Uist. It would seem likely, then, that Carmichael’s source was a Uist tradition bearer. Here, more than many other parts of the Highlands and Islands at that time, was a safe haven for the Prince and his comrades: the island was thoroughly Jacobite, mainly Roman Catholic, and fairly isolated. The greatest risk was taking a boat to the island because it was then that he would have been most exposed and liable to be undone. Nonetheless, this was not the first time that the Prince had to reply upon the loyalty and expertise of Hebridean mariners and so he managed to escape unscathed journeying to and fro from the Outer Hebrides. The first of these anecdotes reflects the loyalty and affection shown to the Prince by the South Uist people. As the man in question – Eachann mac Mhurchaidh ’icilleMhoire, who may have been a Morrison, belonging to Drimisdale – managed to steer the search party in the opposite direction from where the Prince was hiding. The second anecdote, involving Flora MacDonald, is rather amusing but reflects the concern showed by his Highland heroine to make sure that he looked the part when he was, presumably, dressed as Betty Burke.

The Prince drank the milk of her
black sheep from a girl milking sheep
Brai[gh] Bhornish. The P[rince] was com[in]g
from Bornish. Mary Nighean
mhic neill

A man met party of red sold[iers]
in search of Prince. They asked him
abo[u]t the P[rince]. He said had just parted
with him. Take us to him & we will give
a reward. I will. He took them in con[trary]
dir[ection] for they were near P[rince] not ¼ mile
& took them up Driomor & all fell
away but one when near farthest
part mount[ain] this other asked bheil
sinn fad uai[th] nis. Sin fad an
d fhag mis a mhic na bitse & he
struck him in the ear & felled him
& left him there! & took himself off
Eachan mac Mhurchai[dh]
ic Ille Mhoire. Dreumsdale.


Flora struck P[rince] with towel because
he did not wash milk boyns
right when soild[er]s pass[in]g. This
was sorest blow he ever got he said.


References:
CW1, fos. 5–6.
Linklater, Eric, The Prince in the Heather (London, 1965).
Image: Prince Charles Edward Stuart (1722–1788) by Antonio David.

The Prince's Pipes

Have you ever heard about the fate of Prince Charlie’s pipes? Well, Alexander Carmichael collected some information about them, probably from Roderick MacLellan (1831-1887) himself, who lived at Bagh Thiarabhagh, Barra, about a set of pipes thought to be owned by Prince Charles Edward Stuart. It was “made of light coloured wood like boxwood and mounted with ebony and dotted all over with ebony like pin points” and upon the mouthpiece was inscribed P.C.E.S. along with the year 1744. On the chanter were inscribed two further initials H.B. (Hugh Brown), the official piper to the young pretender. The story goes that the pipes came into the possession of this royal piper and that he later married and emigrated to Canada. Many years later the informant’s brother, a seafarer, met a grand-daughter of Hugh Brown and these set of pipes, along with other Jacobite relics, came into his possession. This man was lost at sea along with his pipes for he used to carry them at all times. It is not known whether he was an actual piper but even if he was not MacLellan’s brother valued them highly.

References:
CW 1o7/68 fos. 66v-67v