Harkness – MacGillivray Stories

Meeting Katie MacKinnon was arranged by her granddaughter, Kathleen Miller, on Sunday, July 22^nd. Alan and I arrived at 3 PM. I and had been sitting talking to Katie MacKinnon when Kathleen arrived about 4 p.m. with her two daughters, Bria (‘beautiful’) and Catriona (Kathleen).

Katie MacKinnon’s mother is Flora Campbell, daughter of Roderick Campbell; Flora’s sister, Morag was my mother’s mother; in other words, she is my mother’s cousin; however, Flora was nine years older than Morag; Flora Campbell married John MacKinnon. He was the manager of Laig farm (under Petersen) and Kildonnan farm (under Runciman) prior to the Second World War.

My mother, Rhoda MacGillivray, her sisters Flora and Violet, and her brothers Donald and Alick visited their aunts and uncles on Eigg during the summer holidays. Katie MacKinnon remembered this very well. I was making some notes when I mentioned that I had forgotten how to spell MacGillivray. She helped me by spelling it out! So she still had her wits about her despite the fact that she is getting on in years.

Four generations of MacKinnon women

The MacGillivray sisters plan to visit Eigg

The picture to the left shows the MacGillivray siblings, Flora, Donald, Violet, and my mother Rhoda. The picture to the right shows Violet and Flora in front of a ‘MacGillivray’ bus at Acharacle. My grandfather, Hector MacGillivary, was born in Acharacle. So, this company is perhaps ‘in the family’. 

My mother had planned to visit Eigg with her two sisters, Violet and Flora (Morag Campbell’s daughters) in 2003. They had booked accommodation from Mrs Kirk. They planned on visiting Katie McKinnon. Katie said that she was mainly friends with Flora of the MacGillivray sisters; the fact that Flora was bridesmaid at her wedding suggests that they were close friends. This adds a sad touch to the fact that these old friends never met up again after all these years.

My mother hadn’t visited Eigg since around the time of WWII for one reason or another; so this would represent a trip into her childhood past; she often talked about not wanting to take the trip to Eigg because of the terrible boat crossing; this seems ironic considering the modern ferry service which doesn’t take that long.

The three sisters had booked accommodation and were on their way when Flora took ill at Fort William and died later; so the trip never materialised. This was perhaps one reason I wanted to visit Katie McKinnon, and also because she is one of the few Gaelic-speaking people left on the island, and in one sense represents a way of life that has been fast disappearing. I hoped also to ask her about some of the stories my mother had told me up through the years, such as the story of her mother’s brother, Hugh, who died after falling from the cliffs.

Originally, I’d thought most of these stories were tales and legends, until the ‘Hugh story’ was corroborated by the information provided on his death certificate. I have still to corroborate the other ‘child death story’ of Mary, Hugh’s sister, who is said to have died from eating jam made from ‘Belladonna’ berries; although this story seems fantastic, the fact that Mary’s death certificate states: “unknown cause of death” means that the story could be true. In addition, so-called ‘causes’ were often given, such as ‘died from a bad cold’; so the fact that the cause of death was ‘unknown’, seems to corroborate the story. 

Although Katie McKinnon is in her eighties, she remembers these visits more than 60 years ago. I asked her if she remembered my grandmother, Morag MacGillivray, to which she answered yes, and I asked her if she thought she was a nice woman. I thought I’d ask this question directly because my mother rarely speaks about her mother, and when she does it’s not always ‘fond memories’. This is perhaps natural for parent/child relationships, but not always described in print.

On asking the question, Kate’s face took on a look of concentration. What followed surprised me because Katie sits in her chair fairly quietly (her movement is impeded by a medical problem). “She certainly could give you a verbal lashing, and cut you down to size, so you were that small (she illustrated this with her left hand, showing the distance of about an inch between her thumb and forefinger). But she was a kind woman at heart,” she concluded.

In other words, Katie gave me a description of my grandmother that was perhaps the only real impression I got of her, and perhaps the only ‘real’ description that will be passed down to posterity. That is to say, Morag was an assertive woman who dominated her husband and children, characteristics that my mother inherited – so this makes a lot of sense! But the insightful Katie adds that “she was a kind woman at heart.” The same description would also fit my mother. In this context, regarding Katie, one might refer to the adage, ‘It is the old who are wise.’

I then went on to ask her what all the kids did in the summertime (the children on the island and the children visiting the island). Did they participate in the work? “Well it was haymaking. They had haymaking then – now it’s only my son Donald and his wife Morag who do the haymaking. But the children were often more trouble than help. They were wild happy times – all the children running free barefoot over the island without parental interference.”

Katie’s account informs us in lots of ways. She points out that it is now only her son Donald and his wife Morag who do the haymaking. In other words, what she probably means is that they did the haymaking manually, while automated haymaking on the mainland had been introduced at least half a century before. You might say that her son, Donald and his wife, were a kind of historical anachronism.

The other point she makes is that the children ran free barefoot over the island without parental interference. Regarding my mother, this would be difficult when living in a Glasgow tenement building. “Running free” certainly built up the strength of children, but also involved dangers, such as the story of Hugh who fell off the cliffs to his death, mentioned elsewhere here. 

Katie McKinnon remarked that the pre-Second  World Wars summers were marked by good weather. One can visualise the children running barefoot along the Singing Sands or Laig Beach on warm summer days. This must have represented a stark contrast for my mother. When living in a tenement building in the ‘slums’ of Glasgow, the smell that filled your nostrils was not the fresh sea air of Eigg, but the putrid stank of male-cats that dwelled in the moist cellars of the tenement building. This rancid smell is something that I can remember from the early 1950s, when I was a young boy and visited my grandmother in Glasgow.   

John MacKinnon – the reliable and honest farm manager

Katie McKinnon shares my mother’s view regarding her father: “My father (John MacKinnon) was used as a manager because he was reliable and honest which wasn’t always popular.”

Photos of Kildonnan church and graveyard: Eigg trip 2007

I took some photos at Kildonnan church and graveyard in 2007, when I visited Eigg with my son Alan. I’m not sure what the green cap is that he is wearing – I think it is the Loch Ness monster. This is perhaps appropriate because my creative English school ‘friends’ used to call me the ‘Harkness monster’. Whatever, the photos show that this cultural site is quite overgrown and uncared for. As you can see – Saint Donnan is buried amongst the flowers and weeds along with my ancestors!