Dun Cows for a Kiss

AN OLD MAN’S NARRATIVE OF THE ULBSTER ESTATE EVICTIONS Part A

Northern Ensign 21 February 1884

Sir,-

"In one of his recent letters to the Ensign, Mr Logan said that neither Sir Tollemache Sinclair or any member of his family ever evicted any human being from the township of Rumsdale since the creation of the world. Now I will give Mr Logan the history of the township of Rumsdale, Dalganachan, and the Glutt, beginning with the period of 60 years before Mr Logan was born." 

The small ‘townships’ of Dalganachan, Rumsdale and the Glutt are all shown on the John Thomson's Atlas of Scotland 1832

Dun Cows for a Kiss

"When Ulbster married the noble and amiable Lady Janet Gordon, the daughter of the Earl of Sutherland, the young pair came home to the Castle of Thurso East, and Alexander Gunn, tenant of Dalganachan, went to see the laird of the castle. Gunn was a noble figure of a man in his Highland kilt. He was called in. He had no English but Ulbster and his lady could speak the Gaelic. Ulbster said to Gunn, “What do you think of my wife?” Gunn replied, “If she gives me a kiss, I will give her a pair of the best calves and cows that I have in Dalganachan.” The lady rose as quick as lightening and kissed Gunn; and the following week he came down with a pair of dun cows and calves, and presented them to her ladyship, who said to him, 

                  “As long as you live you will not be removed, nor your off-spring.”

A group of Highland cattle, black, red and dun coloured

Glens of Rumsdale

"Cromaild, or the glens of Rumsdale, at that time were a forest of natural wood, and William Gunn, tenant of Rumsdale, was a forester. The tenants of Harpsdale had an agreement, and claimed in their leases to get wood for their Highland couples and small wood for their houses, from the forest, and the forester, William Gunn supplied them."

Glutt Water, Dalganachan

View downstream from above a rocky outcrop towards Dalganachan where the Glutt Water is joined by the Rumsdale Water and changes name to River Thurso.

20 Sovereigns

"William More Macdonald, the head tenant of Rumsdale at that time, never went to see his cattle without 20 sovereigns in the purse of his kilt and a sword in his belt, and he never took a breakfast or a dinner without putting two odd spoons on the table for any person to come in." 

A Suffocated Bull

"The next head tenant was Roderick More Mac-Ulliam-Mac-Dohinil, and he was as strong as four men at that time. When his dun bull was suffocated in the snow in Lochleer, he went in his kilt and took the bull out of the water, twisted his four legs at the knee joint, separated then from the body without any instrument, and took half the bull home on his back to Rumsdale, a distance of four miles."

To be Continued:

My Comments:

This Letter to the Editor was published in the Northern Ensign on 21 February 1881 and signed by “One who was evicted and one who knows”. Although Alexander Gunn has not signed the letter, it has his hallmark all over it and I reckon it very probably was written by him. 

The letter is of particular interest to me, as my great great grandparents, Christina Sutherland and John McLeod, mentioned in earlier blogs, spent 41 years at Rumsdale after the evictions.

The lineage in the first paragraph has been a bit complicated to figure out and I stand to be corrected on the data I have used. Names change over time and, who succeeds who when it comes to peerage and titles, can be complex.

Lady Janet Gordon

So who was ‘the noble and amiable Lady Janet Gordon’? This is what I think!

Janet Gordon was a daughter of William Gordon, Lord Strathnaver, and Catherine Morrison, Lady Strathnaver. She was born about 1725 and died in 1795. Had Lady Janet's father, William, Lord Strathnaver, outlived his father, he would have become the 17th Duke of Sutherland.

Janet was also known as Lady Janet Sutherland and is referred to as such by her granddaughter Catherine Sinclair in her book Shetland and the Shetlanders:

‘My grandmother, Lady Janet Sutherland whose portrait is hung in Dunrobin, appears there in the character of a little smiling old fashioned infant, rather formal, with a cherry in her hand, looking very unlike the venerable character she afterwards became.’

Janet married Sir George Sinclair of Ulbster and was then also referred to as Lady Janet Sinclair. George died in 1776 leaving a son and three daughters. The son, born in Thurso castle in 1754, became the well-known Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, politician, lawyer and agricultural reformer, who made the first eviction in the north of Scotland for sheep.

Lady Janet was held to be both knowledgeable and astute.

In the Memoirs of the Life and Works of Sir John Sinclair, he makes some interesting comments about his mother. He quotes in full her last letter written to him. Here are two small extracts:

 Lady Janet Sinclair to John Sinclair, Esq. dated 9 June 1783

‘I entreat you to observe economy and to be aware of impositions. Reside in Caithness as much as possible and do not trust too much on the management of others in conducting your affairs. You will find few to trust. Self interest with some, popularity with others. Keep short accounts with those you employ in every capacity. To be in debt is a most disagreeable situation. To contract debt is easy but how different to repay, it lessens one's importance, chagrins the temper and ruins a family.......

I don’t approve of setting large tacks to tacksmen. They often oppress the poor people under them.

Janet Sinclair.

There has long been a castle in Thurso. In the mid seventeenth century George the Earl of Caithness enlarged what was there in the way of a castle. But in 1872 Sir Tollemache Sinclair had that castle substantially rebuilt. Most of the seventeenth century castle was either demolished or incorporated into the new structure. The workmanship was poor and in 1952 much of that castle was demolished. The Thurso castle that is visible today has no trace of the original castle.

The gift to Lady Janet of a pair of dun cows and calves was a very fine gesture. I don’t know the history of Highland cows in Caithness but it’s likely that the majority of cows bred and traded at that time were either black or the familiar red. A dun is a brownish/grey colour. A dun line was likely highly prized and would have had the value of a stud line today. Lady Janet responded nobly with a promise of security of tenure. Pity her son John wasn’t witness to that promise.

The story about the suffocated bull is the stuff of legends. There are numerous stories of strong Highland men from days gone, but the tradition of being extremely strong is still alive and well in the popular Highland Games where very strong men compete with each other.