Sketch annotated “Part of old House of Logiealmond, Saturday July 24 1852” Image courtesy of Local & Family History, A K Bell Library

Issue Number

38 Spring 2015

CONTENTS Page

Chairman’s notes and Archive news 2

The northern Highlands’ trade and transactions with Perth in the late sixteenth/early seventeenth centuries 4

First World War postcards 11

A growing road network 12

Perth — a comprehensive guide for locals and visitors 15

Magic Box 112 — a look at Logiealmond 16

Railway summaries of collections 20

St Peter’s at Dargie 22

Highland Perthshire through the Archive 23

4

The northern Highlands’

trade and transactions with Perth

in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries

“Why”, asks Dr Thomas Brochard, an Honorary Research Fellow at

Aberdeen University, “would someone interested in the northern Highlands

come to Perth to have a look at the Council Archive?” His answer? “Well, there

is more to the Fair City than meets the eye. It is sometimes worth going off the

beaten archival track to explore a particular topic and in the process underline

the national, and even international, value of this great local archive.” His

detailed and eye-opening article focuses on trade, primarily the cattle trade,

between the northern Highlands (Ross, Caithness, Sutherland, and the Western

Isles) and Perth in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, while briefly

examining other commercial, financial, socio-economic, and cultural

transactions.

This statue of a Highland Drover is situated outside Dingwall Mart, and was unveiled in April 2011.

Photograph courtesy of Bruce Mackintosh, Dingwall & Highland Marts Limited

5

When looking at the cattle trade in the early-modern period, one necessarily

follows in the exploratory footsteps of Perthshire luminary Archibald Haldane.

His book The Drove Roads of Scotland set the scene way back in 1952 and still

does to some extent. A recent Edinburgh PhD thesis by Alexander Koufopoulos

has done much to update and expand our knowledge of the topic, especially the

organization of the trade’s finance and credit. However, much remains to be done

on the local and regional trade patterns.

A good series of registers of deeds in the Council Archive (B59/8) presents a rich

picture of daily and commercial transactions happening in the royal burgh of

Perth and its vicinity from 1566 onwards. Consultation of these volumes quickly

reveals the overall organization of the trade in ‘barkit leddir’ (tanned leather) and

hides in the burgh at the time. These hides and leather were mainly sold by local

burgesses to other Perth merchants and to Dundee burgesses. Very

interestingly, the sale of these manufactured products did not involve Edinburgh,

Leith, or Glasgow merchants.

The same series points to an earlier development of the cattle trade between the

northern Highlands and the markets in the south than had been previously

known. Gillechallum Macleod of Raasay was already selling cows on the hoof,

albeit a mere couple of heads, to William Wenton, burgess of Perth, in 1572. But

this was only a paper transaction, leaving Macleod the option of the actual

delivery of the cows or the alternative payment of 12 marks (£8) Scots. Obviously,

it could well be that Macleod actually sold other beasts before or after this very

contract. Neil Macleod of Assynt and the ‘Lard mcrannald’ also most likely sold

cattle to Perth merchants in the late 1560s. It is however worth bearing in mind

that in some instances such sales mask actual debt settlements, whereby the sale

of cattle alleviated arrears of payment.

Although the registers of deeds do not specify the nature of the contracts, they

were presumably related to sales of goods, even if these were very modest (£10

Scots or less). It is rather telling that Macleod and Macranald were the recipients

of the money, meaning that they were either the vendors or moneylenders. In

Macranald’s case, the debtor was the son of Andrew Robertson, a Perth skinner.

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Given that the Perth merchants could secure loans locally, it seems more likely

that they were trading goods with these northern Highlanders rather than

borrowing from them.

The volume of transactions recorded in these early registers demonstrates,

moreover, that the local cattle trade had reached a certain regularity by the late

16th century, if not earlier. The registers further depict the early popularity of

Perth as a market, drawing vendors of goods from a very extensive geographical

area. This wide catchment area saw Perth merchants trading with the Raasay,

Glengarry, and Kintail estates, as well as Badenoch, Argyll, Keppoch, and

Lochaber, among other places. It is also striking to note the rapid expansion of

the Perth cattle trade in terms of volume within the last decades of the 16th

century. Earlier sales to Perth merchants were normally between about a couple

to about twenty heads in the late 1560s. The registers clearly record a

progression to high double- and triple-digit sales by 1600.

An interesting example of this relatively large number of cattle traded occurs in

the year 1600. Two separate droves, one of at least 154 heads and the other of

139 cattle, were making their way from Lochalsh and Kintail to the Yule market

being held at Alyth on 2 November of that year. On the eve of the market, two

Matheson tenants of Kintail had 154 of their beasts intromitted (interfered) with

at Drumturn at the foot of Glen Shee, about eight miles north-west of Alyth. In

view of the fact that the two Mathesons were actually Dugald and John, sons of

Lochalsh chief Murchadh Buidhe, their cattle almost certainly originated from

Lochalsh. This incident adds to our knowledge of Dugald’s activities as a drover.

It underscores that, on this particular occasion, the family itself opted to play a

role in this initial phase of the droving process to the south rather than recruit

professional drovers. These became established with the subsequent

development of the trade. Also in 1600, Donald MacAngus of Glengarry sold at

least £100 worth of cows to Thomas Duff, merchant burgess of Perth.

The sums owed by three Perth burgesses – James Hood in Balhousie; James

Maxton; and William Rhind, skinner – to Donald MacAngus of Glengarry in

December 1600 and January 1601 for the purchase of cattle are almost certainly

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connected to that same Alyth market. Incidentally, these records show that

Glengarry used a resident of Atholl as his intermediary for these three separate

sales. Based on the price received by the tenant in Kintail for 139 cows (254

marks 10s), it is possible, accepting an inherent margin of error, to estimate the

sales and size of the droves involved. The 154-strong Lochalsh drove would sell

for around £188, whilst debts to Glengarry of £100, £54, and £30 40d imply that

Map reproduced by kind permission of Birlinn Publishers, Edinburgh

8

the herds totalled at least 82, 44, and 25 beasts, respectively. More importantly,

this suggests that, by 1600, both the Kintail and Glengarry estates were able to

sell at least 300 and 150 heads of cattle in a single year, earning around £358 and

£184. Given the fact that these details are only taken from a single register, the

presumption is that at the time both estates were involved in very large cattle

sales generating substantial revenues for them. Taking into account the fact that

some of these cattle purchases was done on credit – hence their recording when

the payments were not forthcoming – and supposing that 1600 might have been

an exceptional year, this still leaves room for other sales in Perthshire and

elsewhere.

As Haldane points out, cattle droving was ‘a precarious trade attended by heavy

loss’ with extortions practised en route by the countryside inhabitants living

along these drove ‘roads’. These exactions likewise appear in these deeds. In the

most pessimistic scenario, the above figures then amount to the (near-) total

sales for these two estates in that year.

Very interestingly, these registers of deeds further document the role of women

in the trade. Moir Macleod, the daughter of Alasdair Crotach, the Macleod chief

of Harris, and widow of Ranald Macdonald of Keppoch, was in Perth in

December 1569. Her position as a widow allowed her such commercial freedom.

To adapt the Thatcherite saying: “the lady was not for churning”. Instead Moir

delivered seventeen ‘quik ky’ (cows on the hoof) which she handed over

personally to William Kid, a local butcher, for £84 6s 8d.1

After 1601-1602, the registers do not record any reference to the cattle trade with

the northern Highlands or the other Highland areas apart from a couple of sales

noted for Lochaber and Glengarry.2 Either such commercial transactions were no

longer entered in these volumes and were instead written in other types of

documents or the trade had moved to other locations with their own archival

______________

1 Moir was probably the wife of the Keppoch chief executed in 1547 rather than his son, Ranald, then alive, as she features, nameless, in clan genealogies in association with the beheaded leader rather than with the son. 2 The registers in the series were consulted up until 1679.

9

deposits and means of consigning business to paper, or even a combination of the

two. One thing is certain: Kintail men still sold cattle at the Alyth and Fowlis

Wester fairs in the 1620s.

So far, these documents have established the geographical extent of the Perth

cattle trade and on occasions helped map out its droving routes. They have also

given clues about its organization, including the initial use of family members

and tenants and later employment of intermediaries. It is tempting to see in

these instances of the second half of the 16th century the remnants of the cattle

trade pattern in the Highlands in the late Middle Ages with the sale of a few

heads and with the participation of family members.

In addition to the cattle trade, Highlanders conducted other business

transactions with Perth. ‘[M]acronnald’ and Lochaber inhabitants found a ready

clientèle in Perth burgesses for their wool and yarns. In 1577, John Macdonald of

Ardnamurchan stood indebted to the above-mentioned William Kid, perhaps for

undelivered cattle. In July 1569, Helen Gray and Gilbert Gollan, in Inverness,

still owed Oliver Norie, son of a Perth burgess, £3 for ‘certane powder’ and the

‘burd (i.e. material suitable for the border or edging)’ of a crimson red belt.

Inverness residents additionally purchased cauldrons, pepper, cinnamon,

vermilion, ‘melzeis’ (small metal rings to be fixed to a garment), shears, and

unspecified merchandise. Inhabitants of the River Ness town further sent wool

and yarn to be dyed in Perth. In April 1582, when John Umphray, a sword-sliper

(sword-sharpener) from Inverness, needed blades to carry out his craft, he

turned to John Miller, a Perth merchant, for his £42 purchase. Certain

merchants in the Highlands engaged in a more regular pattern of trade and made

frequent commercial exchanges with their partners in Perth. In 1577 and in 1578,

Richard Colt alias Wobster in Inverness borrowed 42 marks from David

Anderson, a maltman burgess of Perth, but at the same time sold him one boll of

meal and two bolls3 of bear (barley) respectively. In another deal in that year,

______________

3 Nowadays, one boll = 6 imperial bushels; one bushel = 2,219.36 cubic inches.

10

Colt bought a boll of meal in his commerce with Perth locals. A family connection

actually eased Colt’s business deals with Perth merchants. On several occasions,

a John Colt alias Wobster, skinner burgess of Perth, stood as cautioner for

Richard’s contracts.

With its references to Gdańsk, Flanders, France and French items, ‘osmond’ iron

(superior quality of iron imported from the Baltic), a Dutch ship and a Dutchman

(meaning German or Dutch), a number of Englishmen and of Scots in England,

and to Stralsund (in Pomerania), this series of writs is invaluable in

demonstrating the extent of the connections of the royal burgh and people of

Perth far beyond the Tay and the Lawers Massif.

In conclusion, Dr Brochard highlights the richness of the archival collections in

Perth, where just a single series of documents provides a wealth of information

on a topic strictly speaking not specifically grounded in Perth or Perthshire

history. He states that the Archive’s “potential is vast and rewarding for

enthusiastic readers” and recommends the practice of reading old Scots, which

“will immerse you in the cultural wealth of Perth heritage that speaks to a local,

national, and international audience”.

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