Mrs Dugald Gilchrist | The Children's Education | A Holiday on the Continent | The Garden | Miss Lyon
Gilchrist Family of Ospisdale
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The Gilchrist Family, Opisdale, near Dornoch, Sutherland.
This is the story of’ a family which lived in Sutherland from about the middle of the Eighteenth Century, until comparatively recently. This family was neither famous nor particularly wealthy, but members of it contributed to the development and prosperity of the County over the years, and for that reason, if for no other, deserve to be remembered. Because they lived in the same house, accumulating letters, bills, farm accounts and other family memorabilia, over a period of many years, they unwittingly compiled a unique and valuable slice of local history which the last surviving member of that family wisely decided must go eventually to the Scottish Record Office. Many boxes of papers were despatched in that lady’s lifetime, those left at the time of’ her death, were but a small fraction of the whole, so obviously this story must be incomplete, and probably incorrect in some details, but nevertheless, I hope it may give a few glimpses of a long-vanished way of life and be of some interest to the people of Dornoch and the surrounding country.
The young Miss Lyon. The first Dugald Gilchrist, or at least the first of whom there is any record, came from Kilmichael in Argyllshire, and, after starting his working life as a tutor, came to Sutherland in 1737 to become Factor to the Earl of Sutherland, a post he retained until he retired in 1757, when he left Dunrobin and went to live in Lothbeg until his death in 1797. He was said to be a man of great shrewdness and the highest personal integrity, and, never marrying himself, helped to support his brothers and sisters financially. In 1783, he purchased the estate of Ospisdale near Dornoch from Robert Gray, and since he did not find it convenient to live in it himself, he let it to a kinsman, William Munro of Achany, who was there for some 13 years. Under the terms of his will however, the estate went to his great nephew, a grandson of a half-brother, another Dugald, who was 24 years old at the time, and who had some difficulty in getting them to move out of the house so that he could reside in it himself. When eventually they did move out, they went to live at Uppat about 20 miles further north. The mother of this younger Dugald was Margaret Ross, the last of the Ross’s of Tollie and Achanloich (a branch of the Ross family at Balnagown), but this distinction did not bring with it any financial advantage, and he always had to work hard to make his lands profitable, and even at the end of his life could hardly have been described as a rich man. It was probably old Dugald’s influence that procured for his great-nephew a commission in the Sutherland Volunteers (the Fencibles), and later, when this regiment had been reduced, he transferred to the Ross-shire Militia. In 1800, while stationed in Aberdeen, he met and married Catherine Rose, a niece of William Munro of Achany, a 16 year old, who was ten years his junior, and said to be quite a beauty. A few months after his marriage, he was posted to Shetland to command the garrison at Fort Charlotte, remaining there for two years until peace was declared in 1802. By this time he had achieved the rank of Major, and he now retired from the army and was able to give his whole attention to his estate. He installed a man called George Herkes as grieve, who remained at Ospisdale for many years. Whenever his master was away from home, Herkes wrote regularly giving full reports of the work in hand – ploughing, wood-cutting and so on- showing complete understanding of the farm routine and giving details as to the state of men and animals alike. Herkes’ letter and farm accounts are marvels of neatness and clarity, with delightful flourishes around his signature, and there are little added grumbles about the weather with snippets of local gossip, such as "Mr. Leslie in Dornoch turned off his .wife upon suspishon (sic) of her not being honest to him, but by the advice of the Minister, Mr. Bethune of Dornoch, he was prevailed upon to bring her back again to his house and children". The final page of each letter was ruled in columns, and showed dates since the previous letter, and what work was accomplished each morning and afternoon (Sundays of course were always blank), and also what the weather had been like, so Dugald would have known exactly what had gone on the farm in his absence. One letter written in 1802, states, "The bull is coming finely on since the fresh weather came on. I hope he will be good beef in short time. Your fine little sweet child Margaret is very well and comes out to see me ploughing – I shall never forget to mention about your dear child Captain. I have a particular regard for Margaret – she is a fine sweet healthful child and good natured", this was Dugald and Catherine’s eldest daughter, who would only have been a toddler at the time. These letters and reports written by Herkes certainly disprove the nonsense which is sometimes talked about primitive Highlanders who could only speak the Gaelic. He could well have come from Shetland originally, where there are still many with the similar name of Harcus. Major Gilchrist had a fund of energy unusual in a Highland Laird, and became increasingly involved in County business in addition to farming. At Ospisdale his nearest neighbour was George Dempster, M.P. for Perth Burghs, who had purchased the Estate of Skibo in 1794 and a sheep farm at Pulrossie some time later. The main object of Dempster’s life was to persuade Highland proprietors to adopt a proper system of encouraging their tenants towards a more modern approach to life. He was deeply concerned, as were many others, at the tide of emigration which was sweeping over Scotland, but he saw that nothing could be done to improve the lot of the country people without an improvement in the road system, for at that time the western parts of Inverness-shire, Ross-shire, Sutherland and Caithness were still utterly inaccessible to carriages and almost to horsemen too. A good many years were to pass before the Government in London took up the problem of emigration from the Highlands, but eventually, urged on by Scottish M.P’s and the owners of large estates, a Parliamentary Committee of Roads and Bridges was set up in 1801. The Commissioners employed the genius of Telford in making a general survey of the Highlands, and his reports and recommendations enabled them to direct successfully the greatest public works yet undertaken in the north. Nevertheless, many difficulties were encountered in laying the foundations of a road system in the Highlands. There were no large contractors such as we know today, and contracts were taken up by proprietors and substantial farmers who knew nothing of road making themselves, but made sub-contracts with mason’s and others, who had not always sufficient knowledge themselves to avoid problems in the collecting of materials and payment of their men. Major Gilchrist was one of’ these proprietors. With a partner named Christie, who had worked for Telford in Aberdeenshire, he took a contract to build a new road from Tain to Bonar. This he carried out successfully. Then, without Christie, who had not been a very satisfactory partner, he contracted for an extension of the new road along the Sutherland coast, which had just been completed as far as Golspie. This road was to run by Drummuie down to Littleferry, and on the other side of Strath Fleet from the ferry to Evelix. The Major’s bridge over the Evelix River still stands – it has been preserved as a relic of the road which first carried our ancestors in their new gigs and smart chaises along the coast. From Evelix, the road ran past Skibo and Ospisdale, and through Spinningdale to Creich. As first planned, this road was to reach the shores of the Dornoch Firth just below Creich House (now a ruin) where there was a favourite crossing for cattle on their way to markets in the south, but Telford, after a careful survey, decided to bridge the Firth at Bonar. Large gangs of men were employed on the road – one wonders if they were local men, or if, as was more likely, they had come from a distance, attracted by the regular work and pay, which averaged 1/6d to 2/- a day. Tools had to be provided, and thus local smiths were kept busy. The men also had to be housed and fed, oatmeal being the main part of their diet, and the administrative responsibilities must have been heavy, and involved Major Gilchrist in a certain amount of travelling. Some old hotel bills exist from about this time – one from the Inn at Bonar, and another from the Black Bull Inn at Banff. Overnight accommodation was usually 2/-, while breakfast and dinner together amounted to 7/-, with 6d charged for a dog. The bills were so printed to include every kind of alcoholic refreshment as well as meals, food for servants, fodder for horses, and end rather nicely "to more punch and more wine!" Since everything appeared to be obtainable the Major’s bills were very modest. In 1809 Major Gilchrist took a lease of the sheep farm at Rhynie from the Sutherland Estate. This land carried about 800 ewes, and the sale of sheep, mutton and the wool-clip formed a large portion of his farming business. He had also become one of the Commissioners of Supply for the County, and so indeed was a busy man. By this time, George Dempster has transferred Skibo to a niece, since he had no heir of his own. This lady had married a Colonel William Soper, who added the name of Dempster to his own, and they took up residence at Skibo. It may have been that, finding himself the owner of a fine Highland Estate, the situation rather went to Colonel Soper Dempster’s head, or perhaps he had a natural tendency towards litigation, which made him an uneasy neighbour. As long as George Dempster himself had held Skibo there had been no disputes about boundaries, but once Colonel Soper Dempster was settled in, he laid claims to lands that would have completely altered the boundaries of Skibo, Ospisdale, Creich and Airdens. The argument developed into a long drawn out lawsuit, involving the depositions of witnesses declaring where their grandfathers, and even their great grandfathers had grazed their cattle, and there was even a further law suit concerning the removal of stones for road building from Newton Point, but Colonel Soper Dempster lost both cases and died shortly afterwards. He was succeeded by his son George Soper Dempster, who was obviously cast in a different mould from his father, and thereafter relations between the two households were always most amicable. Telford’s graceful bridge over the Kyle was opened in 1812, the Creich road as far as Bonar by then being completed. It delighted the people of Ross-shire who could now drive from Tain to Dornoch without having to cross the Firth at the Meikle Ferry. For the heavy travelling carriages of those days crossing on the Ferry was a hazardous business, and might easily entail wading ashore with all the discomfort of wet feet for the passengers. In 1813 Major Gilchrist was made collector of Cess and Assessments, a post he held until 1834. He succeeded Captain Kenneth Mackay, a descendant of the Reay family, who lived at old. Embo House and farmed extensively. Old Dugald Gilchrist had also held this post from 1779 until his death in 1797, and during his time and that of his successors the salary had remained at £50 per annum. The completion of the road from Drummuie to Bonar, and the crossing of the Kyle, emphasized the desolation of the interior of Sutherland, still a wilderness of bog and heather without a single road, but with innumerable streams that, after a few hours of rain, could convert into torrents, cutting off large tracts of land from any connection with the coast. After a prolonged survey it was settled that a road from Bonar to Tongue, a distance of over 50 miles, would open up the County, despite the forseen difficulties in making a road where no track had even existed before. Contracts for the projected road varied enormously in price according to the experience of the contractors, but finally Major Gilchrist was awarded the contract at a price of £16,831. Work on the road could only be carried out during the summer months. Barracks had to be built to shelter the workmen and great quantities of oatmeal purchased to feed them. One purchase alone was for 270 bolls (20 tons), bought from James Craig, Victual Merchant, in Thurso in 1814. Work on the road was begun in that year and not finished until 1819, and by this time repairs were already a problem. This was the Major’s last road building effort, and from now on he had become more interested in farming and improving his house and garden at Ospisdale. By the 1820’s the Major’s family was more or less grown up and most of them were with him at home. His elder son, another Dugald, had gone to Edinburgh to study law and to read History, but he did not seem to have become very successful. His father feared that his son preferred the social life of the capital to his studies, but the real reason may have been that the young man was not strong and was subject to fainting fits which were alarming to witness. He died young, due to one of these attacks, on the morning of what was to have been his wedding day. The second son, Daniel, born in 1803 stayed at home to assist his father and grew to be a very capable farmer. He seems to have taken over where George Herkes left off, writing long and detailed letters to his father whenever the latter was away from home. Many of these were sent to a London address in the Haymarket, and presumably this house was both a pied-a-terre in town, and an office. There is a letter in the form of an advice note for two boxes, each containing six legs of beef and one also containing "a sheep, cut in two, without the head, which you will send to Mr. Gilchrist at 19 The Haymarket". In the same shipment there is a box containing nine sheep, another two (boxes) of pork, and fifteen live wedders, so the Major was into the cattle business in quite a big way. The letter goes on "kindly return all ropes, boxes and cloths – cloths marked with a ‘G’ in red". The meat was sent south by steamboat from Invergordon and was presumably salted. Sheep were extremely important, and eventually the Gilchrists owned vast tracts of land at Shinness and Blairich as well as locally, and also at Shandwick and other places in Ross-shire. The first record of anything resembling an agricultural show was a Sheep Show which took place at Golspie on 23rd August 1827 when the first prize for a class of six tups was as high as £7, and a prize of ten sovereigns was awarded to a pen of fifteen yearling Cheviot ewes – big money at that time. A nephew, Dugald Leckie, stayed in Liverpool and handled the wool side of the business. His letters to his Uncle are masterpieces of calligraphy and politeness. All goods were despatched from Sutherland by sea, usually from Invergordon, and in 1838 a steamer carrying a cargo of wool went ashore off the east coast, near Dunbar. The’ agents wrote to say that at least some of the wool was saved, but that the whole quantity was insured for £2,200, which must have meant a lot of wool in those days. A number of men were employed as shepherds on the various farms and sheepruns. These were signed up for work from one Whitsuntide to the next, and the rate of pay was usually 15/- a month with bed and board, or 21/- if the men lived out. The latter also got a boll of oatmeal a month, plus keep for two cows and about 70 sheep, also a horse if they had one, or the use of an estate horse if they did not. In some cases a small plot of land was allowed them for growing potatoes. In return they had to agree that they would undertake any work that was allocated to them, and that they would remain "faithful, obliging, attentive and honest". A number of these agreements still e exist, written in a good copper plate hand by someone else, and signed with either a shaky signature, or with simply a cross. Shepherds and herdsmen lived and died in the same service, and the bond between master and employed was still one of mutual sympathy. A letter from one George Orr written in April 1822 requests a position as grieve, saying that he has "a family that is very fit for making hay." He got the job, but "as you are advanced in years, you are not fit for a Highland charge – although this is a small one – I will therefore consider you as the shepherd", and Orr goes on to imply that his sons will do most of the work! His remuneration was as usual – sheep, two cows, a horse "fit to lead in the hay, and oatmeal with an extra boll for your children’s trouble at the hay". The farm workers have familiar names – Mackay, Brown, Polson, Wilson one wonders if their descendants are still living in this neighbourhood to-day. Horses were indispensable of course, and Major Gilchrist was in fact the first land-owner in the north to use horses in place of oxen. The horses at Ospisdale ranged from heavy draught animals to ponies for the children and we even know the names of some of them – Polly, Major, Glasgow, Hamilton and Bess. James Ross, the blacksmith at Lairg, did a lot of work for the Estate, and submitted lengthy bills annually, with amounts for shoeing, mending pots and pans, mending carts, "laying a sock or coulter" (sharpening a ploughshare or blade) and many smaller items. Shoes for the large horses cost 1/- each, while those for the ponies were 9d each. The total bill for fifteen months (1822-3) was £6.18s.9d, the following year marginally less, even though there were at least three items charged each month. Tradesmen like Ross and others were kept waiting a long time for their money – bills were only paid once a year at best. With the road building contracts behind him and the farm prospering, Major Gilchrist turned his attention to the improvement of his house, and was his own architect. This would have been in the first half of the 1820’s. The plans included clearing away the old domestic quarters at the front of the house, and building a new wing which was joined to the back of the old house overlooking the garden. On the ground floor was a dining room and kitchen, servants hall etc. and above was a new drawing room with three bedrooms beyond. Unfortunately, when this wing was nearly finished, it was realised that there was no way of reaching the bedrooms except through the drawing room, so a long passage had to be built onto the drawing room wall, with a single window at the end and a flat roof above. It was at this time that the thatch was removed and the whole building slated. The materials for all this work were obtained locally – cobbles from the firth at Newton Point, hewn stone and pavings from a Brora merchant, William Robertson. There is a list of some of the masons who worked on the house, with small sums of money written against their names – usually £2 (with oatmeal in addition), presumably one month’s wages. One of the men was Alex Hood – there is a firm of monumental masons in Dingwall today with the same name – could there be any connection? Some years later another wing was added which joined the servants hall at right angles – this provided a laundry, dairy and "bottle cellars", though these cellars were not actually underground. The dairy had a stone shelf all round it holding great bowls of milk and cream, and one of the cellars held a 30 gallon cask of whisky which was never allowed to be less than half-full for the next hundred years. All visitors, coachmen and messengers who came to Ospisdale were offered refreshment, and most would choose to take a dram, though the fishwife who walked from Embo every week, with her creel on her back, would be invited to sit in the servants hall, and given a cup of tea and a "piece". Miss Lyon also used to tell of the smaller cask for brandy (the drink of gentlemen in those days) which from time to time was left empty overnight on the sill of an open downstairs window, and before morning would be miraculously filled, and no questions asked, though it is difficult to believe that such a correct and public figure as Major Gilchrist, whose father John had been in the Customs and Excise service in Dingwall many years before, would have stooped to drinking contraband liquor! Claret was purchased in huge barrels direct from the Continent, and, like most other goods, came by sea, either to Newton Point or Invergordon, whence the Ospisdale ox-carts were sent to haul it home. It was bottled there in bottles which had the initials ‘D.G.’ impressed in the glass, and which were just thrown away when the house was finally sold. They would have been collector’s pieces today. Whilst on the subject of strong drink, another of Miss Lyon’s stories concerned the ‘postie’ of those days. There is a pile of stones near the Whiteface cross-roads, all that is left of the little local post office. A postman walked from there down to Dornoch each day to collect the mail. Ospisdale and Skibo were the last houses on his round, and letters for both the big houses were carried separately in leather pouches, marked with brass name-plates. Apparently, for years he never missed a working day, winter or summer, except at New Year, when local hospitality became too much for him, and he was liable to collapse into the ditch at the roadside! Snow must have presented a problem in some winters though there was a snow plough at Skibo, drawn by eight horses, which would have helped to a certain extent. But to return to the house and it’s owner ... the house was now completed, as much as it was to be for the next sixty years or so, and attention was turned to furnishing it in a befitting manner. A letter from Tain dated April 1814 announced that the ‘Hope’ (probably a coastal vessel) was on her way from Inverness, and would be landing a kitchen stove for Ospisdale at Dornoch shortly, and the freight due would be 13/-d, alas, there are no further details. The occupants of the house would have to wait another eleven years before there was any suggestion of plumbing, but in June 1825 there was an estimate for the installation of a ‘patent water closet with cesspool’ which would cost £5, free on board at Leith, and with 5% discount for cash. If this estimate was accepted, this surely must have been one of the first lavatories to be installed in the Highlands. In November 1825 a shipload of furniture arrived, also from Leith on board the ‘Janet’ and was off-loaded at Helmsdale. The Major was advised by an agent there to send his own horses to collect it. It would mean two days work for them, but "there would be less risk of it being injured". Sadly, there seems to be no bill for this consignment, but Miss Lyon used to tell how her beautiful Hepplewhite-style dining chairs, which were made locally about this time for Ospisdale, originally cost 10/-d each. In 1822 a consignment of lamps, with shades and wicks, arrived from a London firm, John Appleton of Ludgate Street. The account is on beautifully decorated paper, and advertises that he can supply lamps for ‘Doors, Streets, Balls, Routs and Carriages’, and that he can also install ‘Speaking Pipes’. A further large consignment from another London firm consisted of carpets, rugs and doormats amounting to well over £60. This included three large carpets (Best Brussels at 5/6d per square yard) and a quantity of stair carpeting (Superfine Venetian at 3/-d per yard). By this time the house must have been both comfortable and handsome, and a source of great satisfaction to the family. Major Gilchrist also owned a house in Tain, which had originally been acquired to house his children during their school days at the Academy there. In the 1830’s a lot of work was done to this house. Donald Murray of Tain, who described himself as a cabinet maker, must have been a man of many parts. He re-thatched part of the roof, made a drain in front of the house, put in a grate (5/6d) and fitted new locks. He also made palliasses, upholstered furniture, repaired the gig and supplied "mettle macheenary for a mangle". The strangest item on his bill was "to payment for medicine for the old miller – 3/6d" Murray also appeared to have collected the rent for the house on Major Gilchrist’s behalf, and perhaps just as well he did, as his bill runs from 1830 to 1840 without any mention of payment on account. The Gilchrist daughters, Margaret (the beautiful Miss Gilchrist), Catherine, Alexa and Georgina had grown up and acquired the usual accomplishments of the day – music, sketching, needlework – and in addition some of the less usual ones in that they not only spoke French and Italian reasonably well, but had some knowledge of the classics also – reputedly rising at 5 a.m. to study Latin and Greek! They travelled on occasion with their father to Edinburgh and London, and there still exists a slip of paper headed Theatre Royal, Covent Garden and showing that six places had been reserved for the Dress Circle for Friday 27 May 1825 for Major Gilchrist and his party. It would have been nice to know what play they were to see, but no other details were given. On this occasion they travelled to London by sea with the London and Edinburgh Steam Packet Co., on board "The Tourist" and the cost of the cabins was 4½ gns each. This seems reasonably inexpensive, since only a few years previously (1818) a ticket for one inside place on the Caledonian Coach running from Edinburgh to Inverness cost £4.15.0d, while the fare between Edinburgh and London by coach was £9.0.0d. Perhaps as a result of a particularly good wool-clip, Major Gilchrist took Margaret and Catherine on an extensive tour of the Continent in 1835. They were away for ten weeks and Margaret kept a journal describing their travels, but this is described in another Chapter. Margaret Gilchrist never married. Miss Lyon had a large portrait of her, and she was indeed lovely to look at. There was also a much smaller picture of her in which she is wearing a riding habit, with a smart black ‘topper’ and a veil. One supposes she returned to Ospisdale when her education was completed to keep house far her father, and later she travelled to some extent on the Continent, eventually dying in Paris in 1858. When Catherine married George Rose of Pitcalnie (the last hereditary Chief of Clan Ross) in 1837, the couple spent an elaborate honeymoon in Germany, and Margaret, her favourite sister, accompanied them! The mail coach ticket for the journey from Hamburg to Berlin still exists – one ticket for three seats for ‘Mr. Ross, his Lady and Miss Gilchrist’ and states that the coach will leave on Thursday 22 June at 8 o’clock precisely. The Royal Prussian Mail Coach office certainly catered for foreigners as, surprisingly, it is printed in English, and the cash columns have spaces for dollars (thalers?) Groschen and Pence, and 4/9d is written across all three columns in ink – what can that mean? The length of the journey is also written on the ticket as being 38 miles, which must certainly be an error. What eventually happened to Georgina is not known. She was alleged to be delicate despite all that dancing, and she probably died young. There was a fifth daughter, Mary-Ann, about whom we know almost nothing beyond the fact that she became a Mrs. Purvis, although Miss Lyon had a beautiful miniature of her, with a lock of her hair, intricately plaited under the glass at the back of the oval frame. Daniel, now the owner of the house and estate, married Jane Reoch, the daughter of an Edinburgh ship owner in 1842, and in due course became the father of two sons, Dugald and John, and three daughters, Margaret, Catherine and Georgina, their names being almost exactly the same as those in the previous generation, which rather adds to the complication of sorting out the family history. Farming and his family were Daniel Gilchrist’s whole life. His estate covered many acres and he was an early member of the Scottish Agricultural Society. Over the years he accumulated a number of silver cups and other trophies won by his livestock in the show ring, and in 1855 he exhibited cattle at the Paris Exhibition. These beasts were walked from Sutherland to Leith in charge of a Gaelic-speaking herd, who apparently had no problems of communication once he was on French soil. The animals did well, and to celebrate this, Daniel purchased a very pretty French papier-mache chair, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, as a present for his wife. He also gave orders that the cattle must return to Scotland by the same route as they had come, claiming that they were far too good to be converted into beef to feed the French! Shortly before his marriage, Daniel had purchased a number of articles of clothing from Messrs. Macfarlane and MacDonald of Buchanan Street, Glasgow, including a saxony coat, dark green for £2.15.0d, a ‘patent waterproof hat’ for 18/-d and two cotton nightcaps at 1/-d each. Ten years later a firm of Edinburgh outfitters supplied what sounds to be a similar coat (but with sporting buttons) for £2.18.0d...those were the days, when inflation was almost unknown. It is sad that no bills for Jane’s dresses were found – possibly they were made at home, or by a local seamstress, but a Tain draper, William Murray, supplied quantities of material, ribbons and thread, and 600 sewing needles were bought in (in one consignment) from a London haberdasher – 1/1d a hundred – how could they have needed so many? There is a scribbled reminder on the back of a visiting card "Ball dress for Georgina" and a bill for a Leghorn Straw Bonnet purchased in London for £2. Messrs. Grieve and Oliver (‘Hatters to the Queen’) supplied a gentleman’s ‘Fine Satin Hat’ for one guinea, with hats for the boys at 10/6d each and at about this time, finest Jamaican Coffee cost 1/7d per pound, and tea (of unspecified quality) was 4/-d per pound, which is roughly what it cost as late as the 1930’s. Though whisky was generally considered the panacea for all ills (as perhaps it still is) and a cask containing 10½ gallons from John Haig cost £3.15.6d in 1825, the services of Dr. Ross of Golspie were sometimes required. Since all his visits had to be made in his gig, his charge of 10/-d a visit doesn’t seem unreasonable, with medicines extra at 1/-d or 1/6d. In 1845, little Dugald Gilchrist, then aged two, must have been very ill for a time, as Dr. Ross visited him on six occasions within eleven days. Some years later, in 1854, the good Doctor wrote to Daniel asking as a favour that ‘yr coachman speak to the boy John Gordon whom I saw at Ospisdale the other day, and say to him that I will give him 35/-d in the half year, with his clothes and washing, if he comes to me as a boy and perhaps you will be kind enough to let me know the result as soon as convenient, so that if he declines, I may look out for another. If he does engage, if you give him the shilling, I shall honestly repay you! This is the wage I have been in the habit of giving the first half year, and afterwards £2.’ This seems a fairly generous wage, even allowing that the boy would have been expected to work all hours. Indoor servants, especially the women would have been paid much less. The shilling he was to be given if he accepted the doctor’s offer was, one supposes, to seal the contract – in other words, the civilian equivalent of the King’s (or Queen’s) shilling given to a man when he enlisted in the army. A question comes to mind as I write about Dr. Ross. How would he have been summoned in the first place? A posted letter would have taken too long, so doubtless a stable lad would have been despatched over to Golspie with a message – all somewhat time consuming – but of course every household of any size had a medicine cupboard and housewives were adept in dispensing pills and draughts for minor ailments, and the Doctor was summoned only as a last resort. Jane Reoch Gilchrist was a girl of 23 when she married Daniel, and though used to sophisticated city life in Edinburgh, seems never to have missed it and soon grew to love her new home. She became a superlative housekeeper, famous especially for her mutton-hams, and other meats preserved for winter use, and for baking and her jams. She had actually seen Sir Walter Scott, and her youth had touched the old age of people to whom the memories and tales of the ’45 were still fresh. She had a beautiful voice and played the piano proficiently, and was therefore frequently called on to entertain dinner guests. When their children were old enough, they were sent to school in the south, and had to travel, first in the gig to Little Ferry and thence by sea to Burghead in a horrible little steamboat which felt as though it was going to turn turtle in the bad weather. The girls went to Cheltenham Ladies College, and of course stayed there throughout the year, spending Christmas holidays in the home of the famous Miss Bales, Cheltenham’s redoubtable headmistress. The two boys attended Inverness Academy. Shortly before Daniel’s death, he was presented with a large silver salver inscribed ‘To Daniel Gilchrist Esq., of Ospisdale as a tribute of gratitude from the parishioners of Creich April 1857’ which must surely be proof of the affection and respect in which he was held in the District, and beyond. He died in 1857, and was survived’ by his Wife for almost half a century. She continued to oversee the running of the house and farm for many years, and was assisted by her two sons, Dugald and John, (though neither of these seemed as dedicated to farming life as their father had been), and by a Colonel Mackintosh, who was her Factor. Neither of the sons married, and both predeceased their mother, who was a devoted member of the Church, attending Dornoch Cathedral (there is a memorial tablet to her on the wall there) and Creich Church on alternate Sundays. At that time the church stood in the burial ground north of Bonar Bridge. Towards the end of her life Mrs. Gilchrist presented the church with a fine set of Communion silver, still in use today, and to mark Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee she paid for a special dinner for the inmates of Migdale Hospital, at that time a Poor Law Institution. The boys seemed to have led rather aimless lives without independent careers; for some reason, their mother was deeply opposed to service life, so there was no encouragement to enter the army or navy, and with no leanings towards the Church or the Law, what was there for the sons of gentlemen to do in those days, after they had shot everything that moved on their estates? The eldest daughter, Margaret, like her Aunt of the same name, did not marry either, and it was she who discovered a treasure trove of family letters and accounts stored away in a barn at Ospisdale, and it is from those papers that these notes about the Gilchrist family have been gleaned. Catherine married Hugh Rose of Tarlogie about 1880, and had a family of four. Unfortunately, this marriage ended in divorce – more shocking in those days than it is now-and the younger generation of that branch of the family rather lost touch with their relations in Sutherland. Georgina Jane, (known to her family as Naini) married a naval officer, Alex Lyon, in 1883. The Lyons came from Cheshire, but owned a sheep farm in New Zealand, and so it was in New Zealand that Alex and Naini started their married life, and where their only child Kathleen was born two years later. She was the last known survivor of the Gilchrist family of Ospisdale, and was such an interesting character that she deserves, and will get, a chapter all to herself.
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