Rait Castle (and inadequate leglislation)

Rait Castle, a mile south of Nairn, is the best surviving example of a Scottish hall castle and yet in the last twenty years or more nothing has been done to protect this unique 800 year old structure. I took a walk up there yesterday. The owners have done a certain amount of shrub clearance, (I am told that more is planned) and with the foliage now at its thinnest you can get an idea of how the buildings within the protective barmkin wall might have looked when the castle was abandoned in the 15th century. But it is damage to the building itself that really concerns me: trees grow out of the wallheads, their roots boring into the handiwork of those who probably also built Barevan Kirk and some of Kinloss Abbey.

Some ten years ago I put up a site, provocatively titled Save Rait Castle. It is now a bit out of date but I hope you can see there why this castle is both historically important and architecturally impressive. There is also a good ghost story.

Why has nothing been done? It's a long story, centring round a protracted dispute over ownership which allows bureaucracy to look the other way pleading, "We can't do anything until we know the legal owner". Personally I think the law must be changed so that landowners are obliged to take responsibility for historically important buildings on their land and the state is obliged to intervene to get things done, imposing harsh penalties for non-cooperation.

Finally, and a little whimsically, Gervaise de Rait was Edward I of England's man in Nairnshire. When Edward was strutting his stuff as the self-appointed 'Overlord of Scotland' in 1303, he spent ten days at Lochindorb Castle. During this period his army famously took Urquhart Castle, but also Nairn Castle. Rait lies on the road from Lochindorb to Nairn and it would be strange indeed if he didn't dine, or sleep, or both with his adherent at Rait!

Jerome S. Anderson (The First)

This was never meant to be a family history site but I was delighted, back in November 2007, to have united descendants of Jerome S Anderson who left the Isle of Skye for the New World in 1706. The descendants in the original post were living in Norway and France. I wrote then, "Who knows? There may be a whole lot more of you out there waiting to be linked up", and little suspected that this would unearth descendants in Waterford Connecticut, New Mexico, North Carolina and Schuylkill Pennsylvania!

Here now is a picture of the great man. Many thanks Suzanne Tedeschi.

Mullach Clach a'Bhlair

This post has nothing to do with clans and castles - I forsook the office and took to the hills today. This is what I saw.

Glen Feshie:
A little of the ancient Caledonian Pine Forest (and three generations of cocker spaniel):
Cadha na Coin Duibh:
Approaching the summit of Mullach Clach a'Bhlair:

Barack Obama and Robert Burns

It's always irritating to be beaten to a good idea! With the newspapers today packed with the words of these two plain speaking, egalitarian-minded men (today is the 250th anniversary of Burns' birth), it seemed a good idea to link the two. Unfortunately Emma Cowing in the Scotsman got there first.

I have written already of how Abraham Lincoln used to carry a volume of Burns around with him. Indeed I wrote then that Burns' passion for social justice fuelled the US leader's crusade to emancipate African-Americans.

Has President Obama read any Burns? I suspect not, but I think he would enjoy it...

The Tree of Liberty (circa 1789)

Wi' plenty o' sic trees I trow,

The warld would live in peace, man;

The sword wad help to mak a plough ,

The din o' war wad cease, man.

Like brethren in a common cause,

We'd on each other smile, man;

And equal rights and equal laws,

Wad gladden every isle man.

I would like to trawl through President Obama’s Inaugural Address and other speeches looking for parallels but the haggis is smelling good and I am being called on to mash the neeps!

It looks like a good evening. Och Aye. And we’ll tak a right guid willy waught, for auld lang syne.

Happy Burns Night!

Britannia's Slaves

Most of us in Scotland watched yesterday's inauguration of the 44th President with a degree of excitement. The BBC commentators made the point several times that whilst President Obama's roots are in Kenya, his wife Michelle's ancestors were slaves.

The talk of slavery set me thinking for some reason about that great English anthem, 'Rule Britannia', (sung with great gusto each year at the Last Night of the Proms in London):

When Britain first, at Heaven's command

Arose from out the azure main;

This was the charter of the land,

And guardian angels sang this strain:

"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:

"Britons never will be slaves."

Leaving aside the question of The Almighty's role in creating this island, it is interesting that these words, (by Lowland Scot James Thomson) were first heard in London in 1745. It was in the following year, after the Battle of Culloden, that thousands of clansmen (each one a British citizen) were sold into slavery in America. More would follow.

Mind you, this had already been going on for a hundred years or more:

On 28 July 1651, John Cotton, a Puritan Minister in Boston, wrote to Oliver Cromwell, "The Scots whom God delivered into your hands at Dunbarre and whereof sundry were sent hither, we have been desirous (as we could) to make their yoke easy. Such as were sick of the scurvey or other diseases have not wanted Physick and chyrugery. They have not been sold for slaves to perpetual servitude. But for 6 or 7 or 8 yeares as we do our own."

Note: The reference is to the Battle of Dunbar, September 1650.