Scottish Highland Clearances (1: the problem)

[Dreamwoven]

John Prebble has written three books about this subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_P..._Sword_Trilogy. I have all three of these books and read them with interest. They cover the Battle of Culloden, where the clan system was defeated by the firepower of the Royal Artillery, and was the last attempt by the Scots to win power on the Field of Battle. Known by his enemies as "Butcher Cumberland" he successfully ruled Scotland with an iron hand: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince..._of_Cumberland. A Hanoverian by origin, he expressed his disdain for the Scots "Nothing but fire and sword can cure their cursed, vicious ways of thinking" (Prebble, Culloden, p. 287). The second book by Prebble is Glencoe, where the MacDonalds were slaughtered with the help of the Campbells and their settlement burned out. The third book is The Highland Clearanceswhich is the main subject of this post.

This is the story of the introduction of the new breed of sheep, the Cheviot: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheviot_sheep into Northern Scotland. Hardy and well-suited to the Scottish Highlands, it quickly became a popular source of income and wealth to the Scottish lairds. http://www.cheviotsheep.org.

The problem with this was that the crofters who lived all over the north of Scotland suddenly became redundant. Sheep needed only an overseer for each "herd", a sheepherder, so the large landowner found that there was no need for crofters. How the large estates became quit of their tenant crofters quite suddenly became a problem.

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2. The Solution
"The economics are quite simple. The Highlands of Scotland may sell, at present, perhaps from £200,000 to £300,000 worth lean cattle. The same ground will produce twice as much mutton, and there is wool into the bargain...Whereas the same ground under the Cheviot, or True Mountain breed, will produce at least £900,000 of fine wool." (Prebble, [I]The Highland Clearances[I/] p.28). This was a bonanza, a manyfold increase in the value of the land, making the owners rich almost beyond belief. The crofters could not compete with this, though they were tied to the land by virtue of personal attachment, going back many generations.

But the crofters did not own the land, just rented it from the laird. The best would be to remove the tenants and put the entire property to sheepherding under the Cheviot. The tenant crofters were a hindrance to maximising profitability. They tried to negotiate an increase in rents they could manage, but this was greatly exceeded by the value of the land under the Cheviot. So the tenant population would have to go. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highland_Clearances, for a more detailed analysis. It does not make pleasant reading. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highla...arances#Poetry, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highla...the_Clearances.

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highla...#Landlord_debt, and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highla...Overpopulation.

Many poor succumbed to disease, notably cholera, and starvation. Others migrated to the New World. So in the long run no-one benefitted.

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It is well worthwhile reading the entire Wikipedia post on the Highland Clearances, there is just too much for me to include here.

[Dreamwoven]

It is well worthwhile reading the entire Wikipedia post on the Highland Clearances, there is just too much for me to include here.

[Dreamwoven]

Prebble's book on the Highland Clearances (1972 p. 304) ends with the following comment:

"At Culloden and during the military occupation of the glens the British government first defeated a tribal uprising and then destroyed the society that had made it possible. The exploitation of the country during the next 100 years was within the same pattern of colonial development - new economies introduced for the greater wealth of the few and the unproductive population removed or reduced. In the beginning the men who imposed the change were of the same blood, tongue and family as the people. They used the advantages given them by the old society, to profit from the new but in the end they were gone with their clans.

The lowlander has inherited the hills and the tartan is a shroud."

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In the 5 years I spent in Aberdeen I noticed that the Highlands and Islands - Skye, the Grampians, the Hebrides, - were depopulated. And though I was familiar with the Prebble Trilogy I had nothing to compare my experience with. Years later when we moved to Southern Norrland I could compare the rural landscape with Sweden, which had not experienced the massive importation of cheviot sheep, and so had had a more traditional rural background.

I was struck by the way Swedish rural life was impacted by the small water-driven saw mills that dot the landscape, and that are still very visible today. The introduction of the Bessemer Process created demand for steel and iron, and shifted the process of industrialisation to the larger urban centres, also in Sweden. Of course, de-population is characteristic for Southern Norrland as the local urban areas still draw much of their workers from the rural areas. But the highly centralised land-ownership by the lairds meant that they determined the centralised development of rural industry, and it was this that made for a big difference between Sweden and Highland Scotland.

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"The land once belonged to the people, and their tribal society had been patriarchal. The chief was Ceann-cinnidh the founder of the tribe or the tea of the clan, and he and it in a mystic unity of blood. In time, and with the authority of law, the chief made the land his, but because they were closer to the past than he, the people
spoke of the earth as "our land". When they walked from it to the emigrant ships, it was not always the chief's rights in Law that they were obeying, but his ancient authority as Ceann-cinnidh. And when they defied him it was because they felt he had betrayed the trust of his clanna, his children.(Prebble The Highland Clearances" "p.129).

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Prebble gives a couple of examples of the "encouraging and deceptive prose" that was used. This is one of them (Prebble The Highland Clearances pp. 191-192):

"A substantial coppered fast sailing ship will be ready to receive passengers at Fort William on the 10th of June and sail for Pictou and Canada on the 20th.

All those who wish to emigrate to these parts in Summer will find this an excellent opportunity, as every attention will be paid to the comfort of Passengers, and they may depend on the most utmost punctuality as to the date of sailing.

For particulars, application may be made to Mr. John Grant, merchant in Fort William."

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The main purpose of this advertisement is to increase applications to travel to the New World. Attempts to provide more useful information were not accepted by the shipping company. Nor was the threat of starvation from delays in reaching the destination, nor the high rates of illness from overcrowded ships taken into account. The Highland and Islands Emigration Society complained and pressed for some control of what was published, but to no avail. See ch. 4 "The White-sailed Ships"

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In their eagerness to put as much land as possible under sheep, the evictions were stepped up and the crofts pulled down, sometimes when the inhabitants were still inside! See pp.277 "under the orders of Grant (the Factor) the inhabitants of 4 townships were cleared from their homes, even those who had refused to leave. "The inmates were ordered out, the thatch was pulled off, picks were stuck into the walls, the levers removed the foundations, axes cut the couple trees, and then roof, rafters and walls fell in with a crash...men, women and children stood at a distance completely dismayed. From house to house, hut to hut and barn to barn the Factor and his menials proceeded".

[Dreamwoven]

The last chapter (6: where are the Highlanders?) became a pertinent question when the clan chiefs were looking for men to take the King's Shilling - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King%27s_shilling in the 1850s when British troops were preparing to fight in the Crimea. The lairds were surprised at how little interest there was. John Maclachlan of Rahoy:

""On an April morning I no longer hear
birdsong or the lowing of cattle on the moor.
I hear the unpleasant noise of sheep
and the English language, dogs barking
and frightening the deer."

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Prebble p.302)
"When the recruiters left the highlands, without the men they had hoped for, Donald Ross jeered at the astonished landlords. Let them bring out their cooks and their housemaids with pokers and broomsticks, and their flunkies and coachmen with switches and pitchforks!" But the young men of Sutherland, remembering their ancestors and those few of their kin who were dying of cholera and cold before Sebastopol, did not wish it to be thought that they were cowards. They called a public meeting and drew up an address to the newspapers.
"We have no country to fight for, as our glens and straths are laid desolate, and we have no wives nor children to defend as we are forbidden to have them. We are not allowed to marry without the consent of the factor, the ground officer being always ready to report every case of marriage, and the result would be banishment from the country. Our land has been taken from us and gives to sheep farmers, and we are denied any portion of them, and when we apply for such, or even the site for a house, we are told that we should leave the country. For these wrongs and oppressions, as well as for others which we have long and patiently endured, we are resolved that there should be nonvolunteers or recruits from Sutherlandshire. Yet we assert that we are as willing as our forefathers to peril life and limb in defence of our Queen and our country were our wrongs and long endured oppressions redressed, wrongs that will be remembered in Sutherlandshire by every true Highlander as long as grass grows and water runs."

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In just 50 years between the end of the Napoleonic Wars where the clansmen had fought so well and the war against Russia in the Crimea, the lairds succeeded in being rid of their problematic tenants, who stood in the way of the large profits to be made from the Cheviot sheep. They were dispersed over the world, against their own will and desperately clinging to the doorposts of their homes. Their fingers had to be prised off the doorposts before the evictions could be done.

Now when the glens had been so thoroughly emptied the lairds went out with bags of gold to recruit new soldiers, but failed utterly to raise, literally, more than one man. "Where are the highlanders?" they asked in London, a thousand miles south of Sutherland shire. The quote in the preceding post was the embittered response they got.

So what happened to the lairds´ dream of riches? They made a lot of money out of the Cheviot sheep, but spent it all on the high life in homes in Edinburgh and in London. And it did not last. Just 50 years later Australian wool began pouring into Britain. It was all for nought. The people had gone, leaving the valleys and hills bare of people. No sheep, no clansmen for war, no wealth. It was a well-deserved fate for the greed of the lairds...But it also left future generations to bear silent witness to the results.

[Dreamwoven]

In just 50 years between the end of the Napoleonic Wars where the clansmen had fought so well and the war against Russia in the Crimea, the lairds succeeded in being rid of their problematic tenants, who stood in the way of the large profits to be made from the Cheviot sheep. They were dispersed over the world, against their own will and desperately clinging to the doorposts of their homes. Their fingers had to be prised off the doorposts before the evictions could be done.

Now when the glens had been so thoroughly emptied the lairds went out with bags of gold to recruit new soldiers, but failed utterly to raise, literally, more than one man. "Where are the highlanders?" they asked in London, a thousand miles south of Sutherland shire. The quote in the preceding post was the embittered response they got.

So what happened to the lairds´ dream of riches? They made a lot of money out of the Cheviot sheep, but spent it all on the high life in homes in Edinburgh and in London. And it did not last. Just 50 years later Australian wool began pouring into Britain. It was all for nought. The people had gone, leaving the valleys and hills bare of people. No sheep, no clansmen for war, no wealth. It was a well-deserved fate for the greed of the lairds...But it also left future generations to bear silent witness to the results.

[Dreamwoven]

PompeyBum remind me in a message about crofts. We in fact live in one, so that was a useful reminder to me to write about it, however limited. its a small house, surrounded by pine forest.