One Penny Per Hour

Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Crofters and Cottars in the Highlands and Islands 1883 Part E

Alex Gunn continues:

Pay  - two or three years later

'When any work was to do on the estate, we had to attend at once, no matter how pressing our own work might be, and we were paid the handsome sum of 1 shilling per day, of 12 hours, being at the rate of one penny per hour, and after working for it, it was sometimes two and sometimes three years before we got a settlement, and there would be no money got at that time. The head of the family would get a boll of meal if he had as much in the laird’s hands as would pay the rent.'

Doing their own work. Leave at once.

Building Roads

'All the males on the estate, on reaching the age of 17, had to pay 3s 6d each for road money. This money was kept off the counting table. Should any of the young men seek more remunerative employment elsewhere, the father was threatened with eviction.'

Proprietor's Protection Society

'When a family was evicted from the estate, they had great difficulty getting a house on the neighbouring estate, as the landlords had a sort of a trades protection society amongst themselves, and the unfortunate man had to stand a process of cross-questioning as to why he had left, and what the laird had against him, and was in some cases kept for weeks in suspense before he got a definite answer.'

Further comments by Alex Gunn:

‘The district [Auchencraig] being depopulated, the fishing was discontinued, and those poor people were obliged to work for their human laird at the rate of 1s per day for full grown men, women and boys from 4d to 6d per day, and out of this pittance to support themselves and families, and pay their rents, for their crofts scarcely yielded anything.’

Ousdale steep land plus Ousdale bridge and old road

‘Badbea comes next in course, the inhabitants of which were employed in reclaiming a wild piece of ground on a hill-side at Ousdale for Mr Horne, where he availed himself of the Government Drainage Act. They were made to toil and travel two miles each way for 1s a day, and Mr Horne was very fortunate in the choice of a man to set over them, as he spared neither bone nor sinew. The heads of families were obliged to take all their family to the work that could work, and if any young man was found spirited enough to go and work where he would be better remunerated for his labour, his parents were marked, and they did not escape punishment. 

But the work at Ousdale was finished, and Mr Horne could find nothing more for them to do, and as a matter of course six families were single out to be set adrift by next Whitsunday, and to find no shelter on the paternal estate of Langwell. This appeared the harder when it is considered that some of them had been in the place for 50 or 60 years, and one family occupied the house possessed by their forebears for four generations, and others reared families of 10 and 11 children under the same roof.’

‘They were promised payment for all the foreign timber in their houses, but one day a couple of men appeared on the scene, leaped on the top of the house, and with shovels and graipe peeled the roofs of the house, leaving nothing but the bare roofs and the bare walls. When the poor people demanded payment as promised, they were told they could take the timber if they chose, but no payment would be made, and there was no redress. These men were the scum of the estate, always ready to perform any dirty work the laird wanted done. This was the year 1845. Before this happened the village of Badbea was surrounded by a five-feet stone wall, a sure indication of the coming storm.’

The additional comments are from Roydhouse unpublished 1975

Alex Gunn continues..

Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Crofters and Cottars in the Highlands and Islands 1883 Part D

Best Pasture Taken

The best half of the hill pasture was taken from the Badbea people, and there was no reduction of rent; but if our cattle happened to pass an imaginary line, dividing the sheep ground from the crofters, they were pounced upon at once by the shepherd, and driven either to Ousdale or Langwell, where a couple of shillings were charged for each beast before they were given up, and I am very much of the opinion that the money never entered the coffers of the landlord.

Remains of a kale yard at Badbea

The last of a kale crop in a kale yard

Sheep in the Kale Yards

The Laird’s sheep came down to our very doors, leaped into our Kale yards, and nibbled up all our cabbages and we dare not drive them out if the shepherd was in sight. As for the shepherd he would pass by, and see his sheep devour the best cabbages, and would not interfere. The gamekeepers and the shepherds would wade through our patches of corn up to the knees rather than go round about 100 yards, when they could get past without doing any damage. We never were allowed to keep a sheep, or a dog, or a gun. The gamekeepers even shot the cats at our very doors, lest they might kill a rabbit. The places of these 97 families were filled with sheep to the number of about 5000, employing 12 shepherds. 

My Comments:

The time Alex Gunn is referring to must have been before the long stone dyke from Auchencraig to Berriedale was built.

To be continued..

Alex Gunn Begins His Statement

Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Condition of Crofters and Cottars in the Highlands and Islands 1883 Part C

NORTHERN ENSIGN, THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1883

THE CROFTER COMMISSION

STATEMENTS PREPARED BY DELEGATES

A number of statements intended to be read by delegates before the Crofter Commission, but which there was no time to hear, were handed to us, and some of them are given below.

ESTATES OF LANGWELL AND DUNBEATH, CAITHNESS

STATEMENT BY MR ALEX GUNN, LANGSIDE, GLASGOW

I appear before Her Majesty's Royal Commission to give evidence in reference to the management of the estate of Langwell situated in the Parish of Latheron, and the west end of the county of Caithness, and better known as Berriedale. It stretches from the Ord of Caithness, eastwood along the sea coast about ten miles, and extends landward four or five miles. It is intersected by two rivers, the Berriedale and the Langwell.

These straths were once inhabited by a happy, industrious, and loyal people, but early in the beginning of the present century the mania of eviction seized the landlords, and those fertile straths were stripped of all their inhabitants, and were occupied by sheep in place of human beings. A few of those driven off were allowed to squat on bare hillsides along the sea coast, where they built themselves houses and cultivated small patches of ground, and where they eked out a miserable existence, but the greater number were driven off the estate altogether, to find shelter elsewhere.

Evicted family Outer Hebrides 1895

About 1830 there was another batch evicted from Auchencraig, the Cairn, and other places, and latterly in 1845 the half of the people of Badbea were evicted, so that from first to last there were ninety-seven families evicted, all in good circumstances and not one of them owing a single farthing of rent. An idea may be formed of the comfortable circumstances of these people when it is stated that the 13 families in Auchencraig and the 8 families in Ousdale sent 250 head of cattle to the sheilings in the summer season. 

A costume engraving of Rothesay and Caithness Fencibles, 

depicting Sir John Sinclair who found the battalion in 1794 

and who designed the uniform.

When Sir John Sinclair, who was proprietor before Mr Horne, raised a regiment of Volunteers or Fencibles, as they were then called, 60 men from Berriedale joined the regiment, and they were considered the pick of the regiment. My father who stood nearly six feet was one of them. My father and grandfather served their Queen and country, and the martial spirit is not extinct in the family yet, as one of my sons carries the colours in the Scottish Rifles, and is no disparagement to the family, as he stands 5 feet 9 inches, and weighs 16 stones. 

My father was evicted from Badbea, and also an uncle of mine, who had been bedridden for some years. He removed to the barn at the term, but he was only there a few weeks when two men appeared with graips and spades and 'tirred' the roof of the barn, leaving the sick man with nothing to cover him but the blue vault of heaven. He lay there for five days before he could be moved to Helmsdale - a distance of 8 miles - being the nearest place where he could get shelter.

To be Continued