Harkness – MacGillivray Stories

My mother may have unconsciously wanted to establish permanence in our childhood lives by keeping various physical objects and relics within the confines of our different homes.  However, these may also be have given my mother’s life value as it was proof she lived in a well-to-do middle class home. As observed, well-off people usually surround themselves with things of worth– cars, furniture, houses, paintings, and so on. 

But even the richest people cannot take their valuable objects and money with them after death. So my mother’s material and worldly things were not valuable anymore in that sense. That’s probably why as she grew older, she tried to bestow some of her possessions on her children, albeit not always equally. So these things have remained with us even as we spread across the globe to Scotland, Norway and the U.S.

Relics from the Burning Boat

Most of these objects and pieces of furniture were acquired originally by my father. It was said that my father had ‘acquired’ the burning boat’s furniture and some of the ‘relics’ of our upbringing. One of those was a seaman’s chest from a burning boat he rescued in the Holy Loch from the 1940s. The story is somewhat unclear here. It was rumoured in our family circle was that my father himself set fire to his own boat. After, he then ‘rescued’ some of the furniture before it got burnt up. This was during the Second World War before I was born, so I consider it hearsay; why he would set fire to his own boat is also unclear.

Perhaps his superiors had decided that he should embark upon some hazardous mission far from his home in Dunoon, which wasn’t to his liking? Whatever, the boat did catch fire, and my father did burn his hand, as can be seen in the photo. Whether this was a traitorous act of war sabotage or an accident no one will ever know. On other occasions, my father would ‘do things’ for personal gain that bordered on criminal activity, but he was hardly a ‘criminal’ as such ⁸⁵. 

In addition, he had also bought some interesting pieces of furniture when he was working in Burma in the post-war period. Factual details are a little vague here but my mother’s Scrapbook has a testimonial certificate from the time he worked in Burma for several months. I might add this later, as it is amongst ‘My Files’.

Contraband’s Exports to Pittsburgh

My eldest brother Sandy proved to be the most acquisitive of the family relics when I visited him at his home in Pittsburgh, U.S., in February 2009. He has lived there for several decades then. I took some photographs of the various objects and pieces of furniture that my mother must have given to him at one time or another, and which he transported to Pittsburgh. He told me then that these ‘antique’ pieces of furniture are now of quite some value. Obviously they are worth something, but their value must be limited – not exactly the sort of thing that is sold at Sotheby’s!

A perhaps more valuable and interesting piece of furniture that my brother has in his house in Pittsburgh is an elephant tusk dinner gong and striker. Of course, when I was a child I didn’t give it a second thought why we had a completely useless yet decorative and exotic piece of furniture in our house. Perhaps the fact that it was ‘useless’ added to its value. For sure, I also didn’t wonder whether the elephants liked their tusks adorning British ‘colonial’ homes or not. But as of 2022, trade in elephant tusks is now considered a crime in many countries ⁸⁶.

They say photos don’t always capture the intrinsic craftsmanship or worth of an object or piece of furniture, but I included them nonetheless.

The Other Brothers’ Relics

On the other hand, I differ considerably from my brother Sandy. He is obviously interested in the value of material things and tradition. When I was younger, these pieces of family furniture and other objects decorating our homes were of little interest to me – it is only in retrospect I can see what function they played. What I mostly kept were some paintings which I hang in my flat in Oslo, Norway.

Stuart, I seem to remember, had a broken down model of a sailing ship in his cottage in Leadhills, Scotland. He also got the oak cabinet with lead paned glass doors. I can recall that one of the panes is broken, while one of the doors was held together by a string on its hinge! The old sailing ship was my father’s – perhaps he had built it. It was two feet high and three feet from prow to stern. He also had my father’s tool chest.

As far as I can remember, Alistair had no such ‘family remembrances’ in his house.  He often described them as ‘junk’ – the furniture, paintings, ornaments, etc. To him, they were of little saleable value contrary to the value placed by mother on them

Gavin, the youngest brother, has also adorned his house with various paintings bequeathed to him.

You can read my previous post about our other family relics on the post: Sentimental Value

⁸⁵ My father’s ‘criminal’ activities will be described in ‘Recollections 2’. This mainly concerns ‘raiding building sites’. Family ‘arson activities’ will be described in ‘Recollections 2’ – the follow up to this book. This mainly concerns my brother Stuart.  

⁸⁶  https://www.animallaw.info/intro/elephants-and-ivory-trade  Read 13 April 2022.