160 years ago, in 1850, the dream of connecting communities separated by sea with telegraph cable became a reality.
The first of these connections in the Western isles was laid in 1872 between Loch Ewe, on the mainland of Scotland to Branahuie Bay, Stornoway, on the Isle of Lewis. This 32.5 Nautical mile (Nm) line, like it's followers, contained just a single conductor. This allowed the land-linked isles of Lewis and Harris to communicate with the the British mainland.
It took a dozen years before the next coupling was established in 1884 linking the island of South Uist the 16.5 Nautical miles to its southerly neighbour, Barra. This allowed communications from Barra all the way to North Uist via Benbecula (although the nature of the other relatively minor links required are sadly not recorded). Evidence to the Napier Commission in 1883 explained the importance of this link.
A couple of years later in 1886 the islands finally became fully connected with the establishment of the 11.5 Nm Port E(i)sgein, Harris to North Uist link.
Thus, a mere 36 years after the advent of this new technology, some of the remotest communities in the British Isles established electrical communications both within the isles themselves, to the British Isles and thence across the Globe.
Source: http://atlantic-cable.com/Cables/CableTimeLine/index1850.htm
Thursday, 11 February 2010
Infinite Horizons
Last night's 'Horizon' was on a big concept, a very big concept, possibly the biggest concept of them all, for it was on Infinity. It certainly got me thinking, but not in ways that the makers intended.
Once upon a time, television took the popularisation of science seriously. Programmes were made that focused upon educating, rather than merely entertaining, those watching. People such as mathematician Jacob Bronowski brought us( in 1973 and on 16mm film) 'The Ascent of Man' and astrophysicist Carl Sagan brought the wonders of the Universe to our living rooms in the 1980 series 'Cosmos'.
It wasn't just that these were series that sets them apart, for even today we have mini-series 'covering' similar subjects, it was the presenters themselves. These two, who each died in their early sixties, were erudite scholars whose slow-paced delivery gave us time - time to think, to dwell upon, to absorb and to admire. They were unusual in having the ability to communicate huge, complex ideas and make them intelligible to us lesser mortals.
They, and a very few others, were not only ambassadors for science but also, in Sagan's case, passionate debunkers of pseudo-science. When 'Cosmos' was broadcast I was working in a bookshop. For every copy of the accompanying book that we sold, we sold several more copies from Erich von Daniken's armada of 'bad science' demonstrating how necessary debunkers such as Sagan were.
In the ensuing decades, that armada has become a flood of half-backed, anti-science purporting to 'explain' and give meaning to life in a Godless Universe. The need for the likes of Bronowski and Sagan is even greater now than it was 30 or 40 years ago.
'Horizon' should be building upon it's once great and honourable past but, alas, even it has allowed 'entertaining' to take precedence over educating.
Ronald Graham, the man after whom 'Graham's Number' is named, explained that his number is the largest known number to actually possess a name. It is (as one of the young children in the programme being asked about Infinity might say) a very, very, very big number but, thanks to Ronald Graham, it is known to exist and has uses in the esoteric universe of the Pure Mathematician.
Graham was allowed to entertain us by showing that only thing that is certain about Graham's Number is that its final digit is a 7.
He was not allowed to educate us in the (Secondary school) arithmetic that leads to this knowledge.
I would like to see Ronald Graham present a programme on his number because that would be educational as well as entertaining.
As it was, the programme climaxed (an apt term in this 'sexed-up' era) with a calculation of how far one would have to travel to find one's nearest doppelganger, living on a 'parallel Earth' in the infinity of universes that may well be out there.
I just hope that their popular science programmes are superior to ours...
Once upon a time, television took the popularisation of science seriously. Programmes were made that focused upon educating, rather than merely entertaining, those watching. People such as mathematician Jacob Bronowski brought us( in 1973 and on 16mm film) 'The Ascent of Man' and astrophysicist Carl Sagan brought the wonders of the Universe to our living rooms in the 1980 series 'Cosmos'.
It wasn't just that these were series that sets them apart, for even today we have mini-series 'covering' similar subjects, it was the presenters themselves. These two, who each died in their early sixties, were erudite scholars whose slow-paced delivery gave us time - time to think, to dwell upon, to absorb and to admire. They were unusual in having the ability to communicate huge, complex ideas and make them intelligible to us lesser mortals.
They, and a very few others, were not only ambassadors for science but also, in Sagan's case, passionate debunkers of pseudo-science. When 'Cosmos' was broadcast I was working in a bookshop. For every copy of the accompanying book that we sold, we sold several more copies from Erich von Daniken's armada of 'bad science' demonstrating how necessary debunkers such as Sagan were.
In the ensuing decades, that armada has become a flood of half-backed, anti-science purporting to 'explain' and give meaning to life in a Godless Universe. The need for the likes of Bronowski and Sagan is even greater now than it was 30 or 40 years ago.
'Horizon' should be building upon it's once great and honourable past but, alas, even it has allowed 'entertaining' to take precedence over educating.
Ronald Graham, the man after whom 'Graham's Number' is named, explained that his number is the largest known number to actually possess a name. It is (as one of the young children in the programme being asked about Infinity might say) a very, very, very big number but, thanks to Ronald Graham, it is known to exist and has uses in the esoteric universe of the Pure Mathematician.
Graham was allowed to entertain us by showing that only thing that is certain about Graham's Number is that its final digit is a 7.
He was not allowed to educate us in the (Secondary school) arithmetic that leads to this knowledge.
I would like to see Ronald Graham present a programme on his number because that would be educational as well as entertaining.
As it was, the programme climaxed (an apt term in this 'sexed-up' era) with a calculation of how far one would have to travel to find one's nearest doppelganger, living on a 'parallel Earth' in the infinity of universes that may well be out there.
I just hope that their popular science programmes are superior to ours...
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
An Unintended Consequence of Victorian Apprenticeships
One interesting and unusual aspect of Victorian life was how young men were trained in particular skilled occupations.
The son of a blacksmith, for example, (sometimes even if following in his father's footsteps) would be taken under the wing of another craftsman for his apprenticeship. Literally 'under the wing' because the lad would not only work with his mentor but actually become part of the household.
(Anyone who has been 'taught' to drive by a parent will be able to empathise with the benefit of being apprenticed outside the family!)
Often these apprenticeships would take the form of a reciprocal arrangement whereby the families exchanged sons and, sometimes, this would result in an even closer tie between the two families if there happened to be a daughter 'available' and a marriage ensued.
Daughters, if they did not meet a match as a by-product of these apprenticeships, would almost certainly go into domestic service. This was the predominant form of female employment until WWI spurred the process, albeit hesitatingly, of allowing women into the wider workplace.
Domestic Servants were often the daughters of friends or relatives in what appears to have been a similar system to that in place for the male apprentices.
They, too, might make a match with a member of the hosting household, more usually a fellow employee, and thus it was that Victorian society (which was far more geographically mobile than is often assumed) aided the dispersion and social mobility of (skilled working-class/aspiring lower-middle class) families, a fact attested to by comparison of the locations of surnames over time.
The son of a blacksmith, for example, (sometimes even if following in his father's footsteps) would be taken under the wing of another craftsman for his apprenticeship. Literally 'under the wing' because the lad would not only work with his mentor but actually become part of the household.
(Anyone who has been 'taught' to drive by a parent will be able to empathise with the benefit of being apprenticed outside the family!)
Often these apprenticeships would take the form of a reciprocal arrangement whereby the families exchanged sons and, sometimes, this would result in an even closer tie between the two families if there happened to be a daughter 'available' and a marriage ensued.
Daughters, if they did not meet a match as a by-product of these apprenticeships, would almost certainly go into domestic service. This was the predominant form of female employment until WWI spurred the process, albeit hesitatingly, of allowing women into the wider workplace.
Domestic Servants were often the daughters of friends or relatives in what appears to have been a similar system to that in place for the male apprentices.
They, too, might make a match with a member of the hosting household, more usually a fellow employee, and thus it was that Victorian society (which was far more geographically mobile than is often assumed) aided the dispersion and social mobility of (skilled working-class/aspiring lower-middle class) families, a fact attested to by comparison of the locations of surnames over time.
Tuesday, 9 February 2010
Two Characters In Search Of A History
I am choosing to start this particular story with a marriage.
It is the 30th of April 1918 and we are in St Thomas' Church, Rutland Place Edinburgh and the wedding is taking place 'after Banns according to the forms(?) of the Church of England'.
Adele, the 36 year-old daughter of Elias Le Couvey, a Fundholder, and his wife, Francoise Bourget, is currently residing at 16 Dryburgh Gardens, Glasgow West.
John, the 58 year-old son of Roderick Kerr, a Building Contractor, and his wife, Christina MacLennan, is normally to be found at The Manse, Harris, Inverness-shire but is presently at Rouen.
We now jump back in time and in 1861 find 6 year-old John, the eldest of two children, living in Little Borve, Harris, where his father works as a Joiner. It is easy to imagine him playing with his 3 year-old sister Rachel in this idyllic spot, sitting in fertile machair land bounded inland by the craggy outcrops of time-served gneiss and on the other side by the sea-swept shell-sand beaches of the Atlantic.
Come 1871, 16 year-old John is still living with his family, whose numbers have been swelled only by the addition of the elderley Catherine Macrae and the two 40-something Macrae 'girls'. Their address is not given on the Ancestry.co.uk transcription but it is likely to have remained Little Borve.
1881 finds 26 year-old John boarding at 33 Russell Street, Glasgow where he is a Student of Arts at the University. His future wife is still a couple of years away from being born. Back in Little Borve, his widowed mother, who was a Midwife, is living with her daughter Rachel Morrison and Alexander Morrison, a General Merchant. Little Roderick Morrison is 1 month old and we can presume that his Grandmother's occupation aided his progress into this World.
We reach 1891 and 8 year-old Adele, the middle of 5 children, is living at La Rue Faiveusaie(?) in the parish of St Saviour on the channel island of Guernsey where her father works as an Agricultural Labourer. She had been born in Forest, Guernsey.
John, meanwhile, has moved to 479(?) St Vincent Street, Glasgow and is now a Student of Theology - but clearly not of Arithmetic as he has shaved 4 years off his age, reducing it to 32.
It is now 1901 and 18 year-old Adele, is living at Le Bordage in the parish of St Peter's in the Wood, Guernsey (which sounds much nicer as St Pierre Du Bois, but the enumerator clearly wasn't going to allow more French onto his form than was absolutely necessary !). She is employed as a servant in the household of John G Lenfestey, a 57 year-old Grower and is the sole servant to this family of 3 adults and 7 children.
John is working as an Assistant Minister in Dalavich, Argyll and gives his age as 36 which is a but a mere decade below the truth. Of course, it is just possible that I have been tracking the wrong person, but the number of John Kerr's born in Harris who follow a path towards becoming the Minister living at The Manse, Scarista is unlikely to make this so.
Now, at this point, I confess that I am unable to locate my source of John's work in France during WWI but, from memory, he was tending to the troops. Bearing in mind that by 1915 he was 60 Earth-years-old (and thus 50 or less by his own accounting system) I do not know how typical this was. It might well, however, reflect the huge numbers, proportionately, of men from the Western Isles serving on the Western Front (and other 'theatres' of war).
The remains of this story are best left to be read in the place that led me to investigate this unusual coupling, namely in the pages of Finlay J Macdonald's 'Crowdie & Cream' where the Minister appears, albeit posthumously, as 'Ayatollah Kerr' and Adele as the kindly, if at times slightly gullible, face of friendliness.
Notes:
The 'Ayatollah' was slightly more accurate with his Arithmetic when it came to his wedding because the 63 year-old reduced his actual age by a mere 5 years. He was actually 27 years her senior!
John's paternal grandparents were John Kerr and Marrion MacLeod, a Weaveress, of Scarista. Their eldest son , John, was also Carpenter/Joiner who moved to Birkenhead, Cheshire.
You are spared one of my customary personal links to the 'Ayatollah' because, although there definitely is one, the precise nature of our ancestral paths meeting is lost in time...
...but not in space, for it is certainly somewhere on Harris!
It is the 30th of April 1918 and we are in St Thomas' Church, Rutland Place Edinburgh and the wedding is taking place 'after Banns according to the forms(?) of the Church of England'.
Adele, the 36 year-old daughter of Elias Le Couvey, a Fundholder, and his wife, Francoise Bourget, is currently residing at 16 Dryburgh Gardens, Glasgow West.
John, the 58 year-old son of Roderick Kerr, a Building Contractor, and his wife, Christina MacLennan, is normally to be found at The Manse, Harris, Inverness-shire but is presently at Rouen.
We now jump back in time and in 1861 find 6 year-old John, the eldest of two children, living in Little Borve, Harris, where his father works as a Joiner. It is easy to imagine him playing with his 3 year-old sister Rachel in this idyllic spot, sitting in fertile machair land bounded inland by the craggy outcrops of time-served gneiss and on the other side by the sea-swept shell-sand beaches of the Atlantic.
Come 1871, 16 year-old John is still living with his family, whose numbers have been swelled only by the addition of the elderley Catherine Macrae and the two 40-something Macrae 'girls'. Their address is not given on the Ancestry.co.uk transcription but it is likely to have remained Little Borve.
1881 finds 26 year-old John boarding at 33 Russell Street, Glasgow where he is a Student of Arts at the University. His future wife is still a couple of years away from being born. Back in Little Borve, his widowed mother, who was a Midwife, is living with her daughter Rachel Morrison and Alexander Morrison, a General Merchant. Little Roderick Morrison is 1 month old and we can presume that his Grandmother's occupation aided his progress into this World.
We reach 1891 and 8 year-old Adele, the middle of 5 children, is living at La Rue Faiveusaie(?) in the parish of St Saviour on the channel island of Guernsey where her father works as an Agricultural Labourer. She had been born in Forest, Guernsey.
John, meanwhile, has moved to 479(?) St Vincent Street, Glasgow and is now a Student of Theology - but clearly not of Arithmetic as he has shaved 4 years off his age, reducing it to 32.
It is now 1901 and 18 year-old Adele, is living at Le Bordage in the parish of St Peter's in the Wood, Guernsey (which sounds much nicer as St Pierre Du Bois, but the enumerator clearly wasn't going to allow more French onto his form than was absolutely necessary !). She is employed as a servant in the household of John G Lenfestey, a 57 year-old Grower and is the sole servant to this family of 3 adults and 7 children.
John is working as an Assistant Minister in Dalavich, Argyll and gives his age as 36 which is a but a mere decade below the truth. Of course, it is just possible that I have been tracking the wrong person, but the number of John Kerr's born in Harris who follow a path towards becoming the Minister living at The Manse, Scarista is unlikely to make this so.
Now, at this point, I confess that I am unable to locate my source of John's work in France during WWI but, from memory, he was tending to the troops. Bearing in mind that by 1915 he was 60 Earth-years-old (and thus 50 or less by his own accounting system) I do not know how typical this was. It might well, however, reflect the huge numbers, proportionately, of men from the Western Isles serving on the Western Front (and other 'theatres' of war).
The remains of this story are best left to be read in the place that led me to investigate this unusual coupling, namely in the pages of Finlay J Macdonald's 'Crowdie & Cream' where the Minister appears, albeit posthumously, as 'Ayatollah Kerr' and Adele as the kindly, if at times slightly gullible, face of friendliness.
Notes:
The 'Ayatollah' was slightly more accurate with his Arithmetic when it came to his wedding because the 63 year-old reduced his actual age by a mere 5 years. He was actually 27 years her senior!
John's paternal grandparents were John Kerr and Marrion MacLeod, a Weaveress, of Scarista. Their eldest son , John, was also Carpenter/Joiner who moved to Birkenhead, Cheshire.
You are spared one of my customary personal links to the 'Ayatollah' because, although there definitely is one, the precise nature of our ancestral paths meeting is lost in time...
...but not in space, for it is certainly somewhere on Harris!
Monday, 8 February 2010
A Victorian Gamekeeping 'Dynasty'
My great, great grandfather, George Ashby, was born circa 1813 in Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire. Even today, it is a sleepy, 'unspoilt', one-pub village, accessible solely by single-track roads yet lying only a few miles from the busy town of Welwyn and the A1(M). One thing that has changed is that the humble, ancient cottage that George was born in (which I identified by walking in the footsteps of the Census enumerator) would probably cost a cool three, four or five-hundred-thousand pounds today...
By 1841 George had moved to Kent and was married to Jane Wood with whom he produced no less than eight children between the years 1836 and 1860. Their four sons were Joseph, William, Charles, and Alfred Edwin.
The 1841 Census shows that there were several Gamekeeping Ashby’s still living in this part of Hertfordshire and, given that this was a profession that was handed-down the generations, I am quite certain that they were related to George, either as brothers or as cousins.
Having moved to Kent, where his wife was born, George spent the next 50+ years living and working at several locations but all within a small geographical area and on one, or at most two, estates.
1841 Park Barns near The Hermitage, Larkfield, Aylesford, Kent.
There were two other Gamekeepers and a Bailiff, amongst others, in residence and, as Jane was elsewhere, perhaps they were engaged upon a hunt at the time?
1851 Hermitage Woods, Aylesford, Kent.
George, Jane and their five children are recorded living here. Although the precise location remains unknown it appears to be part of the same Preston Hall Estate of Edward Ladd Betts where George was working a decade earlier.
Edward Betts was a railway engineer who's first project was the Dutton Viaduct which he undertook with George Stephenson. Preston Hall became a hospital and is at the centre of the Royal British Legion Village
1861 Tyland, Boxley, Kent.
The family has grown by one but perhaps the most significant addition is that George’s eldest son Joseph, aged 24, is now also a Gamekeeper. They are living in a semi-detached house with the farmer (probably a tenant of the estate) as their neighbour. You imagine my surprise when, upon visiting Tyland Barn (HQ of the Kent Wildlife Trust) earlier this year, I was shown the very house that my great grandmother (then aged 3) was living in! Tyland was part of the Cobtree Estate owned by the Tyrwhitt-Drake family.
1871 Cobtree, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
Only George, Jane and my great grandmother Kate are listed at this address which is a mile or so South of Tyland and now home to The Museum Of Kent Life. This open-air museum is a collection of Kent buildings that have been rescued from destruction and rebuilt. It owes its existence to the generosity of the last of the Tyrwhitt-Drake family who bequethed the whole of his estate to the people of Maidstone.
Son Joseph, now aged 33, is a Gamekeeper in Blyth, Nottinghamshire.
Charles, aged 23, is a Gamekeeper lodging in Wateringbury, Kent. The Head of the household he lodged with was also a Gamekeeper. Sadly, William had died in 1867 at the age of 22 so I have no written evidence that he was ever a Gamekeeper but the chances are that he was!
1881 Cobtree, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
The widower George has with him his Gamekeeping son Joseph (and his wife) together with George’s 21 year-old son Alfred Edwin who now is also a gamekeeper. Charles, George’s second son, is still a Gamekeeper but now living at Larkhouse Cottage, Hempstead, Essex.
1891 Cobtree Cottage, Nr Tyland, Kent.
George is still a Gamekeeper at the ripe old age of 79 and with him is his sister-in-law Esther and a boarder, Arthur G Jeffrey, who is also a Gamekeeper but some 60 years younger than George.
Joseph, aged 50, is a Gamekeeper living in Moreton Green, Moreton Cum Alcumlow, Cheshire.
1901 Mill House, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
George is listed as a Gamekeeper Retired but the word ‘Retired’ is crossed-out and the word ‘GameK’ has been added so maybe the old man was still practising the art?
Joseph is now a retired Gamekeeper living in Congleton, Cheshire. I can find no record of him having any children and, as Charles became a publican in Long Melford, Suffolk, and, as Alfred Edwin died in 1883, I think that this was probably the end of this particular Gamekeeping line.
1904 The Old Mill House, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
At the age of 92, George, after a minimum of half-a-century of Gamekeeping, and having spawned at least three Gamekeeping sons, is laid to rest.
By 1841 George had moved to Kent and was married to Jane Wood with whom he produced no less than eight children between the years 1836 and 1860. Their four sons were Joseph, William, Charles, and Alfred Edwin.
The 1841 Census shows that there were several Gamekeeping Ashby’s still living in this part of Hertfordshire and, given that this was a profession that was handed-down the generations, I am quite certain that they were related to George, either as brothers or as cousins.
Having moved to Kent, where his wife was born, George spent the next 50+ years living and working at several locations but all within a small geographical area and on one, or at most two, estates.
1841 Park Barns near The Hermitage, Larkfield, Aylesford, Kent.
There were two other Gamekeepers and a Bailiff, amongst others, in residence and, as Jane was elsewhere, perhaps they were engaged upon a hunt at the time?
1851 Hermitage Woods, Aylesford, Kent.
George, Jane and their five children are recorded living here. Although the precise location remains unknown it appears to be part of the same Preston Hall Estate of Edward Ladd Betts where George was working a decade earlier.
Edward Betts was a railway engineer who's first project was the Dutton Viaduct which he undertook with George Stephenson. Preston Hall became a hospital and is at the centre of the Royal British Legion Village
1861 Tyland, Boxley, Kent.
The family has grown by one but perhaps the most significant addition is that George’s eldest son Joseph, aged 24, is now also a Gamekeeper. They are living in a semi-detached house with the farmer (probably a tenant of the estate) as their neighbour. You imagine my surprise when, upon visiting Tyland Barn (HQ of the Kent Wildlife Trust) earlier this year, I was shown the very house that my great grandmother (then aged 3) was living in! Tyland was part of the Cobtree Estate owned by the Tyrwhitt-Drake family.
1871 Cobtree, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
Only George, Jane and my great grandmother Kate are listed at this address which is a mile or so South of Tyland and now home to The Museum Of Kent Life. This open-air museum is a collection of Kent buildings that have been rescued from destruction and rebuilt. It owes its existence to the generosity of the last of the Tyrwhitt-Drake family who bequethed the whole of his estate to the people of Maidstone.
Son Joseph, now aged 33, is a Gamekeeper in Blyth, Nottinghamshire.
Charles, aged 23, is a Gamekeeper lodging in Wateringbury, Kent. The Head of the household he lodged with was also a Gamekeeper. Sadly, William had died in 1867 at the age of 22 so I have no written evidence that he was ever a Gamekeeper but the chances are that he was!
1881 Cobtree, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
The widower George has with him his Gamekeeping son Joseph (and his wife) together with George’s 21 year-old son Alfred Edwin who now is also a gamekeeper. Charles, George’s second son, is still a Gamekeeper but now living at Larkhouse Cottage, Hempstead, Essex.
1891 Cobtree Cottage, Nr Tyland, Kent.
George is still a Gamekeeper at the ripe old age of 79 and with him is his sister-in-law Esther and a boarder, Arthur G Jeffrey, who is also a Gamekeeper but some 60 years younger than George.
Joseph, aged 50, is a Gamekeeper living in Moreton Green, Moreton Cum Alcumlow, Cheshire.
1901 Mill House, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
George is listed as a Gamekeeper Retired but the word ‘Retired’ is crossed-out and the word ‘GameK’ has been added so maybe the old man was still practising the art?
Joseph is now a retired Gamekeeper living in Congleton, Cheshire. I can find no record of him having any children and, as Charles became a publican in Long Melford, Suffolk, and, as Alfred Edwin died in 1883, I think that this was probably the end of this particular Gamekeeping line.
1904 The Old Mill House, Sandling, Boxley, Kent.
At the age of 92, George, after a minimum of half-a-century of Gamekeeping, and having spawned at least three Gamekeeping sons, is laid to rest.
Serving King & Country...
The 7,267 ton merchant ship Tahsinia was completed in 1941 by William Doxford & Son Ltd of Sunderland. She joined the fleet of the Anchor Line (Henderson Bros) Ltd in Glasgow and was put under the charge of 51 year-old Captain Charles Edward Steuart.
On the 28th September 1943 she left Colombo,Sri Lanka (having sailed from Calcutta) en route to the UK via Aden with over 7,000 tons of cargo, including tea, manganese ore and pig iron. She had no escort.
Fregattenkapitan Ottoheinrich Junker, the 38 year-old captain of the Monson Boat U-532 was patrolling the waters North-East of the Maldive Islands when, on the 1st October, he first torpedoed the Tahsinia and then sunk her with gunfire. She was the third of his 8 victims and he was duly rewarded with the Iron Cross, 1st Class.
Captain Steuart, his 39 crewmen and 8 gunners all survived. On 6th October, 23 of them made landfall on Mahdu Atoll in the Maldives from where they were taken to Colombo by an Indian dhow. The remaining 25, including Captain Steuart, were picked up by the British merchant ship Nevasa some 10 miles West of Alleppey Lighthouse. They had been in their lifeboats for a whole week. The Nevasa took them to Bombay, arriving there on the 11th October 1943.
On the 7th December 1945, 54 year-old Charles Edward Stuart died in the Western Infirmary, Glasgow. The causes listed on his Death Certificate are Subacute nephritis, Uraemia and Cardiac failure. That the true cause was the damage wrought by those 7 days in an open boat in the Indian Ocean is testified by his listing on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission site which records his final resting place in the Glasgow Crematorium.
However, that is not quite the end of the story because 3rd Office Steuart had also been injured in WWI as a result of which he met a hospital nurse Louisa Ogg Hall who, although 11 years his senior, he married on 16th February 1918 in Aberdeen.
Years earlier, a family holidaying in Aberdeenshire had a gravely ill son and the call went out 'for the best nurse in the Land'. Whether Louisa was indeed the best in the Land, or merely the best available locally, is not known, but it was she who was despatched to look-after the sickly child.
It was, apparently, touch-and-go whether he would survive but, due in no small part to the care of his nurse, he recovered.
His grateful parents rewarded Louisa with a brooch which now resides in Canada.
The little boy's name was Albert, but he is better-known to us as George VI.
Notes:
Captain Steuart was always known in our family as 'Uncle Charlie' but is was in fact Louisa who was my Father's 1st Cousin on his mother's side. Upon Louisa's death in 1951, my aunt in Canada inherited the brooch which is in the form of a monogram bearing the parents initials, G & M
U-boat info: http://www.uboat.net/boats/u532.htm
Tahsinia info: http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/3095.html
& http://www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?14164
CWGC Record: http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=2840920
On the 28th September 1943 she left Colombo,Sri Lanka (having sailed from Calcutta) en route to the UK via Aden with over 7,000 tons of cargo, including tea, manganese ore and pig iron. She had no escort.
Fregattenkapitan Ottoheinrich Junker, the 38 year-old captain of the Monson Boat U-532 was patrolling the waters North-East of the Maldive Islands when, on the 1st October, he first torpedoed the Tahsinia and then sunk her with gunfire. She was the third of his 8 victims and he was duly rewarded with the Iron Cross, 1st Class.
Captain Steuart, his 39 crewmen and 8 gunners all survived. On 6th October, 23 of them made landfall on Mahdu Atoll in the Maldives from where they were taken to Colombo by an Indian dhow. The remaining 25, including Captain Steuart, were picked up by the British merchant ship Nevasa some 10 miles West of Alleppey Lighthouse. They had been in their lifeboats for a whole week. The Nevasa took them to Bombay, arriving there on the 11th October 1943.
On the 7th December 1945, 54 year-old Charles Edward Stuart died in the Western Infirmary, Glasgow. The causes listed on his Death Certificate are Subacute nephritis, Uraemia and Cardiac failure. That the true cause was the damage wrought by those 7 days in an open boat in the Indian Ocean is testified by his listing on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission site which records his final resting place in the Glasgow Crematorium.
However, that is not quite the end of the story because 3rd Office Steuart had also been injured in WWI as a result of which he met a hospital nurse Louisa Ogg Hall who, although 11 years his senior, he married on 16th February 1918 in Aberdeen.
Years earlier, a family holidaying in Aberdeenshire had a gravely ill son and the call went out 'for the best nurse in the Land'. Whether Louisa was indeed the best in the Land, or merely the best available locally, is not known, but it was she who was despatched to look-after the sickly child.
It was, apparently, touch-and-go whether he would survive but, due in no small part to the care of his nurse, he recovered.
His grateful parents rewarded Louisa with a brooch which now resides in Canada.
The little boy's name was Albert, but he is better-known to us as George VI.
Notes:
Captain Steuart was always known in our family as 'Uncle Charlie' but is was in fact Louisa who was my Father's 1st Cousin on his mother's side. Upon Louisa's death in 1951, my aunt in Canada inherited the brooch which is in the form of a monogram bearing the parents initials, G & M
U-boat info: http://www.uboat.net/boats/u532.htm
Tahsinia info: http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/3095.html
& http://www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?14164
CWGC Record: http://www.cwgc.org/search/casualty_details.aspx?casualty=2840920
Sunday, 7 February 2010
A Stroll From Strond To Rodel Across The Decades...
The locations are listed from Strond to Rodel as if one was walking the coastal road to Borrisdale, continuing on the path to Port Esgein and then climbing over the hill to Rodel:
1841 – Strond 332, Rodel 81, Total 413
1851 - Strond 40, Port Esgein 150, Port Esgein Farm of Strond 89, Rodel 38, Total 317
1861 – Strond 179, Borrisdale 14, Rodel 32, Total 225
1871 – Strond 206, Borrisdale 8, Rodel 48, Total 262
1881 – Strond 241, Rodel 36, Total 277
1891 – Strond 213, Rodel 48, Total 261
1901 – Strond 169, Rodel 48, Total 217
The first thing to note, in this age before postcodes, is that locations can reflect the whim of the individual census enumerator, an English-speaker in Gaeldom, as well as the changes of land usage in these turbulent times. I am not sufficiently versed in the waves of 'clearances' that beset South Harris before and during these counts to comment upon their specific impact but these coastal communities were not blessed with the fertile machair of the West coast so the 'Farm of Strond' and the later Rodel Farm might easily conjure inappropriate images of the land under cultivation...
Secondly, the ancient settlement at Carminish, almost an island in its own right but connected by a short, narrow strip at the Western end of Strond, is not listed as a separate entity yet is quite likely the original settlement now known as Strond. It is a relatively easily defended community (the remains of a Dun or Broch are to be found there) but with easy access to the nearby cultivatable hillsides. Today there are only a few houses there but they do include a reconstructed Blackhouse that was constructed by cannibalising the remains of at least one other but the end result was worth the sacrifice. If Carminish was still inhabited then its people are certainly to be found in the entries for Strond itself.
Thirdly, whilst the population of Rodel appears to be fairly constant post 1841, I believe that earlier figure might be inflated by the inclusion of the population of Port Esgein, but then again it could have been the result of 'clearance' or the 'Hungry Forties'.
Finally, as it would take a herculean analysis of the Censuses, maps, the Dunmore estate and of the land itself to fully answer these questions and bring back to life the story of this strip of land, I have chosen a moment in time to look at one very specific community.
Here is my analysis of the 1851 population of Port Esgein, Farm of Strond.
In 'Islanders & The Orb', Janet Hunter says that Bill Lawson gives the 'Paisley Sisters' location as being in Strond but in fact they are to be found specifically here:
1851 – Farm of Strond, Port Esgein, Harris
89 people in 17 households
1) John Gillis, 43, Fisherman, Wife & 6 children
2) Allan Gillis, 40, Ag Lab, Mother & Nephew
3) Kenneth Gillis, 42, Ag Lab, Wife & 2 children
4) Angus Kerr, 61, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 adult children & 3 children
5) Margaret Kerr, 60, Shoemaker's Widow, Son & 5 other adults
Donald Kerr, 32, Shoemaker
John Kerr, 26, Shoemaker
John Mcaulay, 30, Visitor, Miller
Finlay Mcleod, 30, Visitor, Gamekeeper
6) John McDermid Snr, 66, Ag Lab, Wife, 4 adult children & 1 child
John McDermid, 30, Sailor/Tailor
7) John Macdonald, 59, Ag Lab, Wife, 2 adult children & 2 children
8) Ann McQueen, 60, 1 child
9) Ann Martin, 90
10) Murdoch Martin, 35, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 children
11) John McDermid Jnr, 55, Ag Lab, Wife, 2 adult offspring, 2 children
12) Christina Mcleod, 80, Ag Lab's Widow, 3 adults, I child
Marion Mcleod, 47, Weaveress The 'Paisley Sisters'
Christina Mcleod, 40, Weaveress The 'Paisley Sisters'
13) Angus Mcleod, 63, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 children
14) Alexander Mcleod, 47, Mason, Wife, 4 children & 2 adults
15) Alexander Mcleod, 28, Fisherman, Wife & 2 children
16) Christian Macsween, 90, Farmer's(?) Widow
17) William Ross, 58, Ag Lab, 4 adult children
It is unfortunate that many households with adult offspring do not specify the occupations of those adults but, given that in some case these are recorded, it is probably safe to assume that they were engaged on the land and in the home in ways deemed not worthy of remark!
There are 10 households for whom agricultural labour is the main type of work and the lack of the term 'Small Tenant' together with the specifying of this part of Port Esgein as 'Farm of Strond' leads me to conjecture that this land was in fact that directly supporting Rodel.
Several of these families are shown in the 1841 census as living at Rodel which begs the question as to which farm they worked and/or lived on. In subsequent years 'Rodel Farm' appears, but 'Farm of Strond' is never again seen. In addition, several of these families are later found living and working at Rodel Farm and Rodel House.
Off the land, we have a couple of Fishermen, a Mason, two Shoemakers, two visitors in the shape of a Miller and a Gamekeeper and, perhaps of greatest historical interest regarding the product with which Harris is most famously associated, two Weaveresses, the 'Paisley Sisters'.
There presence here, following their 'adoption' for training by Lady Dunmore, leads me to ask whether it is amongst the ruins of the Blackhouses of Port Esgein that a plaque to these two should be erected and whether that in Strond itself accurately depicts their home at the birth of Harris Tweed in 1864.
In locating the sisters on the Farm of Strond living on land under Mrs Campbell the tenant of the tack of Strond & Killegray. This fact certainly lends credence to Harris Tweed having been born at the earlier of the range of dates that are conjectured upon in 'Islanders and the Orb'.
As to precisely locating the site of Farm of Strond, the entry in the RCAHMS for 'Borosdale' includes the following:
Two tumbled walls connected to heaps of large boulders, submerged at high-tide - associated with nearby deserted township and built to prevent cattle from straying. NG 040 834
A township comprising five roofed, thirteen unroofed buildings and six enclosures is depicted on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Inverness-shire, Island of Harris 1881, sheet xxvii)NG 037 835
This, I am now convinced, is the site of the 1851 Farm of Strond, with the associated cattle walls sited in Loch Rodel.
In 1881, there were 18 buildings, at least 13 of which had become uninhabited but 5 were still inhabitable. The 1881 census for Rodel lists 6 households led by farm workers so the map may well show us where they were living, in the remains of Farm of Strond at 'Borosdale'...
(Archaeological Notes NG08SW 10 centred 037 835)
Ref: http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search_item/index.php?service=RCAHMS&id=74710
On a personal note, Angus Kerr the Agricultural Labourer, was my '3rd great granduncle' and Margaret Kerr was the widow of Angus Kerr who's sons followed in his footsteps as Shoemakers but whose precise relationship to me I have yet to discover.
Notes:
I have interrogated the Ancestry.co.uk database because, although there are known issues over transcriptions regarding spellings, the ScotlandsPeople database does not provide the same level of finesse in refining searches. The downside of this is that the images are unavailable unless one is prepared to access them at ScotlandsPeople, for £1 per page...
I have used English spellings purely because these are (with variations!) what are to be found in the written sources and I apologise profusely to all Gaelic-speaking people for any offence this may cause.
1841 – Strond 332, Rodel 81, Total 413
1851 - Strond 40, Port Esgein 150, Port Esgein Farm of Strond 89, Rodel 38, Total 317
1861 – Strond 179, Borrisdale 14, Rodel 32, Total 225
1871 – Strond 206, Borrisdale 8, Rodel 48, Total 262
1881 – Strond 241, Rodel 36, Total 277
1891 – Strond 213, Rodel 48, Total 261
1901 – Strond 169, Rodel 48, Total 217
The first thing to note, in this age before postcodes, is that locations can reflect the whim of the individual census enumerator, an English-speaker in Gaeldom, as well as the changes of land usage in these turbulent times. I am not sufficiently versed in the waves of 'clearances' that beset South Harris before and during these counts to comment upon their specific impact but these coastal communities were not blessed with the fertile machair of the West coast so the 'Farm of Strond' and the later Rodel Farm might easily conjure inappropriate images of the land under cultivation...
Secondly, the ancient settlement at Carminish, almost an island in its own right but connected by a short, narrow strip at the Western end of Strond, is not listed as a separate entity yet is quite likely the original settlement now known as Strond. It is a relatively easily defended community (the remains of a Dun or Broch are to be found there) but with easy access to the nearby cultivatable hillsides. Today there are only a few houses there but they do include a reconstructed Blackhouse that was constructed by cannibalising the remains of at least one other but the end result was worth the sacrifice. If Carminish was still inhabited then its people are certainly to be found in the entries for Strond itself.
Thirdly, whilst the population of Rodel appears to be fairly constant post 1841, I believe that earlier figure might be inflated by the inclusion of the population of Port Esgein, but then again it could have been the result of 'clearance' or the 'Hungry Forties'.
Finally, as it would take a herculean analysis of the Censuses, maps, the Dunmore estate and of the land itself to fully answer these questions and bring back to life the story of this strip of land, I have chosen a moment in time to look at one very specific community.
Here is my analysis of the 1851 population of Port Esgein, Farm of Strond.
In 'Islanders & The Orb', Janet Hunter says that Bill Lawson gives the 'Paisley Sisters' location as being in Strond but in fact they are to be found specifically here:
1851 – Farm of Strond, Port Esgein, Harris
89 people in 17 households
1) John Gillis, 43, Fisherman, Wife & 6 children
2) Allan Gillis, 40, Ag Lab, Mother & Nephew
3) Kenneth Gillis, 42, Ag Lab, Wife & 2 children
4) Angus Kerr, 61, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 adult children & 3 children
5) Margaret Kerr, 60, Shoemaker's Widow, Son & 5 other adults
Donald Kerr, 32, Shoemaker
John Kerr, 26, Shoemaker
John Mcaulay, 30, Visitor, Miller
Finlay Mcleod, 30, Visitor, Gamekeeper
6) John McDermid Snr, 66, Ag Lab, Wife, 4 adult children & 1 child
John McDermid, 30, Sailor/Tailor
7) John Macdonald, 59, Ag Lab, Wife, 2 adult children & 2 children
8) Ann McQueen, 60, 1 child
9) Ann Martin, 90
10) Murdoch Martin, 35, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 children
11) John McDermid Jnr, 55, Ag Lab, Wife, 2 adult offspring, 2 children
12) Christina Mcleod, 80, Ag Lab's Widow, 3 adults, I child
Marion Mcleod, 47, Weaveress The 'Paisley Sisters'
Christina Mcleod, 40, Weaveress The 'Paisley Sisters'
13) Angus Mcleod, 63, Ag Lab, Wife & 3 children
14) Alexander Mcleod, 47, Mason, Wife, 4 children & 2 adults
15) Alexander Mcleod, 28, Fisherman, Wife & 2 children
16) Christian Macsween, 90, Farmer's(?) Widow
17) William Ross, 58, Ag Lab, 4 adult children
It is unfortunate that many households with adult offspring do not specify the occupations of those adults but, given that in some case these are recorded, it is probably safe to assume that they were engaged on the land and in the home in ways deemed not worthy of remark!
There are 10 households for whom agricultural labour is the main type of work and the lack of the term 'Small Tenant' together with the specifying of this part of Port Esgein as 'Farm of Strond' leads me to conjecture that this land was in fact that directly supporting Rodel.
Several of these families are shown in the 1841 census as living at Rodel which begs the question as to which farm they worked and/or lived on. In subsequent years 'Rodel Farm' appears, but 'Farm of Strond' is never again seen. In addition, several of these families are later found living and working at Rodel Farm and Rodel House.
Off the land, we have a couple of Fishermen, a Mason, two Shoemakers, two visitors in the shape of a Miller and a Gamekeeper and, perhaps of greatest historical interest regarding the product with which Harris is most famously associated, two Weaveresses, the 'Paisley Sisters'.
There presence here, following their 'adoption' for training by Lady Dunmore, leads me to ask whether it is amongst the ruins of the Blackhouses of Port Esgein that a plaque to these two should be erected and whether that in Strond itself accurately depicts their home at the birth of Harris Tweed in 1864.
In locating the sisters on the Farm of Strond living on land under Mrs Campbell the tenant of the tack of Strond & Killegray. This fact certainly lends credence to Harris Tweed having been born at the earlier of the range of dates that are conjectured upon in 'Islanders and the Orb'.
As to precisely locating the site of Farm of Strond, the entry in the RCAHMS for 'Borosdale' includes the following:
Two tumbled walls connected to heaps of large boulders, submerged at high-tide - associated with nearby deserted township and built to prevent cattle from straying. NG 040 834
A township comprising five roofed, thirteen unroofed buildings and six enclosures is depicted on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Inverness-shire, Island of Harris 1881, sheet xxvii)NG 037 835
This, I am now convinced, is the site of the 1851 Farm of Strond, with the associated cattle walls sited in Loch Rodel.
In 1881, there were 18 buildings, at least 13 of which had become uninhabited but 5 were still inhabitable. The 1881 census for Rodel lists 6 households led by farm workers so the map may well show us where they were living, in the remains of Farm of Strond at 'Borosdale'...
(Archaeological Notes NG08SW 10 centred 037 835)
Ref: http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/search_item/index.php?service=RCAHMS&id=74710
On a personal note, Angus Kerr the Agricultural Labourer, was my '3rd great granduncle' and Margaret Kerr was the widow of Angus Kerr who's sons followed in his footsteps as Shoemakers but whose precise relationship to me I have yet to discover.
Notes:
I have interrogated the Ancestry.co.uk database because, although there are known issues over transcriptions regarding spellings, the ScotlandsPeople database does not provide the same level of finesse in refining searches. The downside of this is that the images are unavailable unless one is prepared to access them at ScotlandsPeople, for £1 per page...
I have used English spellings purely because these are (with variations!) what are to be found in the written sources and I apologise profusely to all Gaelic-speaking people for any offence this may cause.
Saturday, 6 February 2010
The End of the CREST
Although the Maritime History museum archives list Crew Agreements for her up to 1903, I was reluctant to spend more money on obtaining more records of the Crest in addition to those of 1896-1899 that I had already purchased copies of.
Therefore my stumbling upon a second record in the Canmore database came as a pleasant surprise...
It is Saturday18th April 1903 and 47 year-old Ship Master Alexander John Kerr is taking his 41 year-old ketch, the Crest, along the East coast of the Isle of Lewis when disaster strikes.
The headland of A' Chabag juts into the Minch at the South of the mouth of Loch Odhairn. The township of Orinsay, where Alexander John's mother Mary Macdonald was born, lies a mere 4 landmiles away in Loch Sealg.
The record gives no information as to how many souls were on board, nor of her ports of origin and (unattained) destination, but she is described as being 'in ballast' suggesting that she was carrying no cargo.
Until I purchase the Crew Agreement of Crest 44427 for 1903, I am unable to add any facts, save that Alexander John's first wife, Margaret (Macarthur), had died in on 6th December 1902 and he did not marry Mary (Morrison) until the 3rd March 1904. The recently widowed father of three was a highly respected and experienced Captain so I must conjecture that some calamity befell the vessel that he had owned & sailed for the past seven years.
What thoughts were going through his mind of his young motherless family in Plantation Street, Stornoway as he left his stranded ship for the very last time?
I hope that all his companions also survived the horror of being shipwrecked.
Ref: http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/220756/details/crest+a+chabag+loch+sealg+lewis+north+minch/
Therefore my stumbling upon a second record in the Canmore database came as a pleasant surprise...
It is Saturday18th April 1903 and 47 year-old Ship Master Alexander John Kerr is taking his 41 year-old ketch, the Crest, along the East coast of the Isle of Lewis when disaster strikes.
The headland of A' Chabag juts into the Minch at the South of the mouth of Loch Odhairn. The township of Orinsay, where Alexander John's mother Mary Macdonald was born, lies a mere 4 landmiles away in Loch Sealg.
The record gives no information as to how many souls were on board, nor of her ports of origin and (unattained) destination, but she is described as being 'in ballast' suggesting that she was carrying no cargo.
Until I purchase the Crew Agreement of Crest 44427 for 1903, I am unable to add any facts, save that Alexander John's first wife, Margaret (Macarthur), had died in on 6th December 1902 and he did not marry Mary (Morrison) until the 3rd March 1904. The recently widowed father of three was a highly respected and experienced Captain so I must conjecture that some calamity befell the vessel that he had owned & sailed for the past seven years.
What thoughts were going through his mind of his young motherless family in Plantation Street, Stornoway as he left his stranded ship for the very last time?
I hope that all his companions also survived the horror of being shipwrecked.
Ref: http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/220756/details/crest+a+chabag+loch+sealg+lewis+north+minch/
Friday, 5 February 2010
CREST - Official Number 44427 - 47 Net Tonnage - Length 56ft 6in - Beam 13ft
The 'Crest' and I go back a long way and I have already written of how I first happened upon her in the register of deaths and of my luck in locating her records all the way across the mighty Atlantic in Newfoundland.
However, I have delayed dissecting that information until now. The spur, the impetus to do so, has been granted me by the serendipitous discovery of an account of her final resting place...
The 'Crest' had her keel laid in 1862 in Ramsey on the Isle of Man. She was a wooden ketch, that is to say that she had two masts, and she entered the story of my family when she already had 36 years service under her hull. She had been laid-up in Tobermory following the death of her owner, Alexander Macdonald, and it was from there that Alexander John Kerr rescued her to replace his previous ship 'Jessie'. I have been unable to discover anything about 'Jessie', nor of the 'Crest's successor 'Lady Louisa Kerr', but on the 6th of August 1896 her Master, John Macdonald, wrote a letter apologising to the Burgh of Tobermory for not having notified them of her movements (or, rather, lack of) during the first half of the year.
I cannot be sure of the date that Alexander John took possession of her but on the 26th October 1896 he (from the SS 'Alice' of Stornoway) , together with his 74 year-old father, Malcolm Kerr (from the 'Jessie' of Stornoway), and 40 year-old John McLeod (from the SS 'Clydesdale' of Glasgow, an 1862 Mail Steamer in MacBrayne's fleet), set sail from Tobermory and landed in Larne the next day.
There she was loaded (Alas, I know not what with, for nowhere does Alexander record his cargoes!) and on the 14th November set sail for Gairloch, arriving on the 24th. A lighter 'Crest' left there on 30th November and made Tarbert on 1st December where her remaining cargo was unloaded. They spent a week in Tarbert, no doubt using the time to visit various relatives on Harris including those in Malcolm's home township of Direcleit, and then took her the short journey to her new home port of Stornoway on the 8th December where John McLeod was 'Paid-off'. He and his fellow 'Able Seaman' Malcolm have a 'Report upon Character' entry 'For Ability' and 'For Conduct' that Alexander John had to complete. I am delighted to inform you that he gave his father and John McLeod the same (presumably impeccable?) grades!
1897 begins with the well-laden 'Crest' (only 20 inches above the sea at her midships!) departing on the 20th January for Belfast which she eventually reaches on the 15th February. On board are the same three men who last sailed her, but Malcolm is now promoted to 'Mate' which I suspect was more in recognition of his having been a Ship Master in his own right rather than a reflection of the need to establish a formal naval hierarchy in such circumstances?
At this point, I must introduce my conjecture that Alexander John (no doubt encouraged by Malcolm) demonstrates his dislike of the formality of form-filling for the next voyage sees the trio departing Larne on the 25th February as if sailing from Belfast to Larne somehow didn't count as something worth recording...
They arrive in Gairloch on the 4th April and the freeboard, which had been 2ft 4in on departure, was down to a mere 1ft 4in upon their arrival. The length of time, together with this alarming evidence of extreme loading, suggests that there had been a wee bit more to this voyage than the record suggests!
Another leap takes place and on the 22nd April they depart Tarbert and take a week to reach Stornoway, presumably due to adverse weather.
In fairness to my relatives record-keeping, there were circumstances in which voyages did not require documenting, these being termed 'Agreement-Eng. (1) or Eng. (6), but I am still attempting to discover the precise nature of these.
The second half of 1897 sees the Crest undertaking eight separate voyages:
Stornoway July 12 Troon July 22 Empty
Troon July 30 Stornoway Aug 11 Laden
Stornoway Aug 24 Ullapool Aug 25 Part Laden
Ullapool Sep 13 Stornoway Sep 20 Laden
Stornoway Oct 11 Carrick Fergus Nov 1 Empty
Carrick Fergus Nov 10 Lochmaddy Nov 26 Laden
Lochmaddy Dec 3 Tarbert Harris Dec 4 Nearly Laden
Tarbert Dec 7 Stornoway Dec 7 Empty
I am reasonably sure about the three 'Empty' voyages as her draught & freeboard are identical on each occasion, albeit that they appear to have reduced the ballast carried, possibly as a result of having chosen to spend a couple of months getting her ship-shape?
The crew of four comprised Master Alexander, Bosun Malcolm, 48 year-old Able-Seaman Malcolm Munro and 16 year-old Murdo Macleod who's status was simply 'Boy'. These two were discharged, with apparently excellent Reports, on the 8th of December.
1898 sees Alexander at 24 New Street, Stornoway and the Crest is laid-up from 1st January until the 13th March. On the 14th she leaves for Larne, riding even higher in the water suggesting that father and son had made yet more modifications, no doubt to increase both her speed and her carrying capacity. This time the crew of four includes Able-Seaman John MacPherson and the Boy Donald Macleod, for whom this is his maiden voyage.
They reached Larne on the 24th March and, fully laden, departed on the 5th April for Gairloch which they reached on the 9thApril. A nearly-full Crest left Gairloch on the 18th April and reached Aultbea the same day. On the 24th they were similarly full and headed for Stornoway which they made on the 27th April. The two new crew members are discharged, each marked as 'VG' but clearly no-longer required. The 6th May saw them depart for Larne, customarily Empty but with Able-Seaman Malcolm Munro returning, and they reached there on the 15th. By the 29th May they were full and Stornoway bound, attaining home on the 10th June. Malcolm Munro had been employed on another vessel but his return suggests that he was deemed preferable to John Macpherson?
I shall leave the remaining voyages of 1898 for a later entry, encompassing as they do the final journey of Malcolm Kerr, a remarkable man who was born the son of the landless cottar 'John an Taileur' in a sea-swept house in the Bays of Harris and became a Stornoway Ship Master...
However, I have delayed dissecting that information until now. The spur, the impetus to do so, has been granted me by the serendipitous discovery of an account of her final resting place...
The 'Crest' had her keel laid in 1862 in Ramsey on the Isle of Man. She was a wooden ketch, that is to say that she had two masts, and she entered the story of my family when she already had 36 years service under her hull. She had been laid-up in Tobermory following the death of her owner, Alexander Macdonald, and it was from there that Alexander John Kerr rescued her to replace his previous ship 'Jessie'. I have been unable to discover anything about 'Jessie', nor of the 'Crest's successor 'Lady Louisa Kerr', but on the 6th of August 1896 her Master, John Macdonald, wrote a letter apologising to the Burgh of Tobermory for not having notified them of her movements (or, rather, lack of) during the first half of the year.
I cannot be sure of the date that Alexander John took possession of her but on the 26th October 1896 he (from the SS 'Alice' of Stornoway) , together with his 74 year-old father, Malcolm Kerr (from the 'Jessie' of Stornoway), and 40 year-old John McLeod (from the SS 'Clydesdale' of Glasgow, an 1862 Mail Steamer in MacBrayne's fleet), set sail from Tobermory and landed in Larne the next day.
There she was loaded (Alas, I know not what with, for nowhere does Alexander record his cargoes!) and on the 14th November set sail for Gairloch, arriving on the 24th. A lighter 'Crest' left there on 30th November and made Tarbert on 1st December where her remaining cargo was unloaded. They spent a week in Tarbert, no doubt using the time to visit various relatives on Harris including those in Malcolm's home township of Direcleit, and then took her the short journey to her new home port of Stornoway on the 8th December where John McLeod was 'Paid-off'. He and his fellow 'Able Seaman' Malcolm have a 'Report upon Character' entry 'For Ability' and 'For Conduct' that Alexander John had to complete. I am delighted to inform you that he gave his father and John McLeod the same (presumably impeccable?) grades!
1897 begins with the well-laden 'Crest' (only 20 inches above the sea at her midships!) departing on the 20th January for Belfast which she eventually reaches on the 15th February. On board are the same three men who last sailed her, but Malcolm is now promoted to 'Mate' which I suspect was more in recognition of his having been a Ship Master in his own right rather than a reflection of the need to establish a formal naval hierarchy in such circumstances?
At this point, I must introduce my conjecture that Alexander John (no doubt encouraged by Malcolm) demonstrates his dislike of the formality of form-filling for the next voyage sees the trio departing Larne on the 25th February as if sailing from Belfast to Larne somehow didn't count as something worth recording...
They arrive in Gairloch on the 4th April and the freeboard, which had been 2ft 4in on departure, was down to a mere 1ft 4in upon their arrival. The length of time, together with this alarming evidence of extreme loading, suggests that there had been a wee bit more to this voyage than the record suggests!
Another leap takes place and on the 22nd April they depart Tarbert and take a week to reach Stornoway, presumably due to adverse weather.
In fairness to my relatives record-keeping, there were circumstances in which voyages did not require documenting, these being termed 'Agreement-Eng. (1) or Eng. (6), but I am still attempting to discover the precise nature of these.
The second half of 1897 sees the Crest undertaking eight separate voyages:
Stornoway July 12 Troon July 22 Empty
Troon July 30 Stornoway Aug 11 Laden
Stornoway Aug 24 Ullapool Aug 25 Part Laden
Ullapool Sep 13 Stornoway Sep 20 Laden
Stornoway Oct 11 Carrick Fergus Nov 1 Empty
Carrick Fergus Nov 10 Lochmaddy Nov 26 Laden
Lochmaddy Dec 3 Tarbert Harris Dec 4 Nearly Laden
Tarbert Dec 7 Stornoway Dec 7 Empty
I am reasonably sure about the three 'Empty' voyages as her draught & freeboard are identical on each occasion, albeit that they appear to have reduced the ballast carried, possibly as a result of having chosen to spend a couple of months getting her ship-shape?
The crew of four comprised Master Alexander, Bosun Malcolm, 48 year-old Able-Seaman Malcolm Munro and 16 year-old Murdo Macleod who's status was simply 'Boy'. These two were discharged, with apparently excellent Reports, on the 8th of December.
1898 sees Alexander at 24 New Street, Stornoway and the Crest is laid-up from 1st January until the 13th March. On the 14th she leaves for Larne, riding even higher in the water suggesting that father and son had made yet more modifications, no doubt to increase both her speed and her carrying capacity. This time the crew of four includes Able-Seaman John MacPherson and the Boy Donald Macleod, for whom this is his maiden voyage.
They reached Larne on the 24th March and, fully laden, departed on the 5th April for Gairloch which they reached on the 9thApril. A nearly-full Crest left Gairloch on the 18th April and reached Aultbea the same day. On the 24th they were similarly full and headed for Stornoway which they made on the 27th April. The two new crew members are discharged, each marked as 'VG' but clearly no-longer required. The 6th May saw them depart for Larne, customarily Empty but with Able-Seaman Malcolm Munro returning, and they reached there on the 15th. By the 29th May they were full and Stornoway bound, attaining home on the 10th June. Malcolm Munro had been employed on another vessel but his return suggests that he was deemed preferable to John Macpherson?
I shall leave the remaining voyages of 1898 for a later entry, encompassing as they do the final journey of Malcolm Kerr, a remarkable man who was born the son of the landless cottar 'John an Taileur' in a sea-swept house in the Bays of Harris and became a Stornoway Ship Master...
Thursday, 4 February 2010
Cured Herrings for Carloway?
I happenstanced upon a couple of entries on the ScotlandsPlaces.gov.uk site which hosts the Canmore searchable database of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS)...
It is Monday13th January 1890 and the vessel SPANKER of Stornoway is on her way to Carloway, on the West coast of Lewis, from her home port. Her owner, M (possibly, Murdo, with whom AJK worked ashore in later life?) Maclean, saw his ketch leave with three crewmen aboard under the Captaincy of Alexander John Kerr. She was laden with cured herring, those salted silver darlings of the sea lying packed in hand-hewn barrels in those most-happy of days for the Lewis fisheries.
34 year-old Kerr, an experienced seaman who's first voyage had taken him to Archangel some 20 years earlier, had undertaken many such coastal trips as had his 68 year-old father, Malcolm, who may have been with him on this occasion. (Although we know that the 31 year-old Spanker was registered as SY 832 we do not know her Official Number and hence cannot search the Newfoundland archives for further information.)
What we do know is that at some point on this Winter's day in the Sound of Harris, those dangerous shallow-strewn waters between Berneray & Harris, they ran into a Southerly storm (recorded as Force 10 on the Beaufort Scale).
This 58' 6" long sailing ship with a beam of 16' 6", fully-laden so that there were maybe only a couple of feet of free-board between her midships and the boiling sea below, became stranded on the rocks somewhere in Obbe Bay. What thoughts did these men have?
Alexander John's mind, fully-focussed upon his responsibilities, must be allowed to have wandered back to his home in 13 Church Street where his wife Margaret (MacArthur), 6 year-old son Donald and little baby Catherine Isabel (who tragically died of Tetanus, aged 5) who probably did not notice the wind moving round and gathering in intensity. He may also have reflected upon the fact that he was yards away from the shore where his grandfather had been born.
Whether they were attempting to make safe harbour in An-t-Ob, or hoping to ride-out the storm in this treacherous stretch of sea cannot be known, but Maclean's cured herrings never reached Carloway, nor did whatever else those barrels may, or may not, have contained...
120 years later, if you take the ferry from Berneray to 'Leverburgh', you will follow, in part, the fateful course of the last journey of the 'Spanker'.
Should you do so, take time to peruse the Admiralty Chart on board, the Blue-Sea of the Sound spattered Jackson-Pollock fashion by the Sand-Yellow blotches of the myriad islands and shallows lying in wait and, as you make the two near-ninety degree turns that are the only safe passage, spare a thought for those four men on that stormy day all those years ago who's fate, save for that of the skipper, I do not know...
Ref: http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/214131/details/spanker+an+t+ob+harris+atlantic/
A 'spanker' is a gaff-rigged sail used on square-rigged ships to add speed and that is probably the reason for the name of this ship in those days when the race to catch, cure & despatch the herring was at its height.
It is Monday13th January 1890 and the vessel SPANKER of Stornoway is on her way to Carloway, on the West coast of Lewis, from her home port. Her owner, M (possibly, Murdo, with whom AJK worked ashore in later life?) Maclean, saw his ketch leave with three crewmen aboard under the Captaincy of Alexander John Kerr. She was laden with cured herring, those salted silver darlings of the sea lying packed in hand-hewn barrels in those most-happy of days for the Lewis fisheries.
34 year-old Kerr, an experienced seaman who's first voyage had taken him to Archangel some 20 years earlier, had undertaken many such coastal trips as had his 68 year-old father, Malcolm, who may have been with him on this occasion. (Although we know that the 31 year-old Spanker was registered as SY 832 we do not know her Official Number and hence cannot search the Newfoundland archives for further information.)
What we do know is that at some point on this Winter's day in the Sound of Harris, those dangerous shallow-strewn waters between Berneray & Harris, they ran into a Southerly storm (recorded as Force 10 on the Beaufort Scale).
This 58' 6" long sailing ship with a beam of 16' 6", fully-laden so that there were maybe only a couple of feet of free-board between her midships and the boiling sea below, became stranded on the rocks somewhere in Obbe Bay. What thoughts did these men have?
Alexander John's mind, fully-focussed upon his responsibilities, must be allowed to have wandered back to his home in 13 Church Street where his wife Margaret (MacArthur), 6 year-old son Donald and little baby Catherine Isabel (who tragically died of Tetanus, aged 5) who probably did not notice the wind moving round and gathering in intensity. He may also have reflected upon the fact that he was yards away from the shore where his grandfather had been born.
Whether they were attempting to make safe harbour in An-t-Ob, or hoping to ride-out the storm in this treacherous stretch of sea cannot be known, but Maclean's cured herrings never reached Carloway, nor did whatever else those barrels may, or may not, have contained...
120 years later, if you take the ferry from Berneray to 'Leverburgh', you will follow, in part, the fateful course of the last journey of the 'Spanker'.
Should you do so, take time to peruse the Admiralty Chart on board, the Blue-Sea of the Sound spattered Jackson-Pollock fashion by the Sand-Yellow blotches of the myriad islands and shallows lying in wait and, as you make the two near-ninety degree turns that are the only safe passage, spare a thought for those four men on that stormy day all those years ago who's fate, save for that of the skipper, I do not know...
Ref: http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/214131/details/spanker+an+t+ob+harris+atlantic/
A 'spanker' is a gaff-rigged sail used on square-rigged ships to add speed and that is probably the reason for the name of this ship in those days when the race to catch, cure & despatch the herring was at its height.
Sunday, 10 May 2009
Obituary of Alexander John Kerr
DEATH OF STORNOWAY SHIPMASTER
The Late Mr Alexander J Kerr
On Tuesday of last week there passed away a
respected and familiar local figure in the
person of Mr Alexander J Kerr, Shipmaster,
Keith Street. Although he had been in failing
health for several weeks, he was out a few
days before his death, and the end came with
unexpected suddenness.
Sixty Seven years of age, he was one of the
few remaining links connecting us with the
time when in his youth the town of Stornoway
was of considerable importance as a shipping
port, and when a fine fleet of sailing ships
registered here, and belonging to enterprising
local owners, carried on an extensive trader with
Archangel and the Baltic ports; ln those ships
Mr Kerr had his first seagoing experience
having, at the age of 14, joined the "Alliance"
on a voyage to Archangel under Captain
Macpherson. He continued in the same service
under Captain John Smith, in the "Africa", and
in the brig "Supply", with Captain Murdo
Morrison - names of ships and men well known
to all old Stornowegians.
After several years' sailing in foreign parts on
the "Gleniffer" of Glasgow he joined his
father, the late Mr Malcolm Kerr, in the
coasting trade off the West Coast of Scotland
which he continued to work on this own
account after his father's death. There was no
one better known than Mr Kerr in the
different places of call between the Mersey
and Cape Wrath, and no craft more readily
recognised than the "Jessie," the "Crest", and
the "Lady Louisa Kerr"; which he owned and
sailed in succession. But as with the larger
windjammers that had to yield the ocean trade
to the modern steamer, so also with the small
coasting vessels. The competition of steam
has rendered them unprofitable, and the
picturesque sailing coaster has been almost
completely squeezed out of existence.
For some years Mr Kerr had worked on shore
in the employ of Mr Murdo Maclean, shipping
agent, where he was available as pilot for
steamers proceeding south to Clyde, Mersey
and Irish ports. His unique knowledge of the
West Coast peculiarly fitted him for this
service, and among mariners he had the
reputation of being one of the most skillful
and careful of pilots.
Of a very quiet disposition, he was a respected
citizen of his native town, and the esteem in
which he was held was marked by the very
large number who turned. out in wet and
disagreeable weather to his funeral on
Thursday when he was interred in Sandwick
Stornoway Gazette, October 1922
Where's Malcolm?
At times, it appears that one's ancestors have done their hardest to elude the family historian's grasp; birth year's apparently increasing as the years unfold, spellings as arbitrary as those found in a school exam, the list ins infinite.
Sometimes, however, in the very last act they perform on this Earth, an ancestor can unwittingly unlock a whole new landscape that unfolds before us as beautifully as any hand-crafted chart...
I was searching for my Isle of Harris (Scotland) ancestor Malcolm Kerr (born c1823) using the powerful, albeit pricey, www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk with mixed success: no record of his birth in the Old Parish Registers which wasn't a total surprise given that the records from the Gaelic-speaking islands are few and far between, rather more success with his second Marriage and with his childrens' subsequent records, but no sign of him in the 1851 & 1871 censuses and as for his Death?
Well, this was where Malcolm did me a huge favour (almost as big a favour as the one he done in siring my great Grandmother!) for he died in the middle of December 1898, at the age of 76, not peacefully in his home in Stornoway but at sea, as befits an elderly sea-dog in his dotage, perhaps?
The singular significance of this circumstance was not the location, in the sound of Kerrera, near Oban, nor the cause, Heart Disease, but the existence on the record of of a five-letter name and a five-digit number: CREST 44427.
The Crest, as I later discovered in the Maritime Museum in Greenwich where I was vainly searching for Malcolm's Masters Certificate (Ships Captain who were wholly engaged in Coastal Trade were exempt from certification) was a 47 Net Tonnage Ketch. In translation, she was a small two-masted ship probably about 25 metres from stem to stern (80 feet in 'old money'!) built in Ramsay on the Isle of Man in 1863????
Although this was a major breakthrough in that it told me something of Malcolm's seafaring days, it begged even more questions: Who owned the Crest?, who was her Master? (Malcolm was listed as a 'Hand' on the Death Certificate), what trade was she plying? And, most of all, what the heck was a 76 year-old man doing off the West Coast of Scotland in the middle of Winter!
Eventually, after having visited every website in the Country that might possibly give me a clue: was he engaged in Herring fishing, was he involved in Trade, was he smuggling...or, perhaps, a combination of all these!, I stumbled upon the Maritime History Archive in...Newfoundland.
Now, much as I had by now become obsessed in my quest to discover all that I could about Malcolm, a trip to Newfoundland was definitely out of the question. It came as a great relief, therefore, to learn that the Archive is searchable online SO LONG AS YOU KNOW THE OFFICIAL NUMBER – but for Malcolm's untimely death, this vital detail could never have been know to me.
I vividly recall typing 'CREST' followed by '44427', checking each for errors, and then gingerly lightly tapping the return key...
...Oh my God, not only did the Archive possess documents, they had some covering the all-important period between 1898/99 that was crucial to my research.
Next, I decided to cover all my bases, and placed a request, via email, for scans covering the years 1896-1899. I don't know why I added the previous couple of years, but was very glad that I did...
With amazing haste, a reply was received and, a couple of weeks later (and about £70 lighter) my PC shook as the weight of the papers hit the email 'hallway'...
The emotional impact was even greater when the details revealed that the owner of the 'Crest', and her Master, were non-other than Alexander John Kerr, Malcolm's son and my great, Great Uncle! This remarkable man, the ancestor whom I had grown to respect and love in equal measure, had died as Bosun assisting his own son in his profession.
It was only later, after I had located my cousin who is Alexander John's granddaughter, that I was able to read his own obituary from the Stornoway Gazette and learn that the Crest was but one of several vessels that Alexander John had owned and sailed until he retired from that and became a Pilot, assisting others in the treacherous seas along Scotland's Western shores.
It was also my cousin who, when I made my first visit to the isles, showed me this photograph of Malcolm Kerr, born 1823, Direcleit, Isle of Harris, Scotland, died 15th December 1898, Sound of Kerrera, Near Oban, Scotland, but where is he buried???
To be continued...
Tuesday, 28 April 2009
In homage to J G Ballard...
The Bonds That Tie Us...
Even if it had been realised what was happening and why, there was absolutely nothing that could have been done to prevent it...
The Sun glistened on the ripple-topped Solent, refracting rays into a myriad sparkling diamonds of pure light. Across the Globe, billions watched as the gun fired and the first yachts rounded the start-buoy signalling the opening of the Olympic sailing. To the participants, the spectators perched along every speck of coast both on the mainland and the Isle of Wight and those staring at many millions of television screens and computer monitors, everything seemed perfect.
Dr MacLeod pressed the mute button on the remote, turned to the semi-comatose form of Iain still slumbering beside her, and slipped out from under the duvet, turning only to gently replace it around the man's warm and welcoming form, and stepped into the bathroom.
Performing her ablutions to the accompaniment of an assortment of aquatic orchestrations, she emerged several minutes later refreshed, revitalised, and with perhaps just a tad too much expensive eau de parfum anointing her. She dressed quickly, quietly but with great care for today she was to deliver her paper on 'Quantum Effects and Evolution' at the 10th Anniversary Celebrations of the Society of Humanist Independent Philosophers. The SHIP had been formed when, under increasing attack from the religionists, the multi-nationals and the Establishment in general, it had been realised by a few courageous and outspoken thinkers that they needed to create a rallying point for themselves and the shrinking number of the World's population who's crap-detection facilities remained following the onslaught of Global Independent Television and it's allies. GIT, whose founder, the late Sir Mark Muddleson, had inserted his tentacles into the educational enclaves of every Country was known, not entirely jokingly, as 'Big Brother'. By a process of celebritisation and de-criticalisation, he had rendered electronic entertainment into a non-stop diet of trashy, instant-gratificational mush. At first this had seemed innocuous enough in the developing market of globalisation but when it was understood how GITs mantra of 'No Play Lasts Longer Than Foreplay' as a defining maxim for the time between adverts had been shown to have permanent degenerative effects upon the cerebral cortex the few realised that if they didn't act now, there might well not be anyone left to act later.
Chirsty double-checked that she had put all that she needed into her Harris Tweed shoulder bag, picked up her keys, looked one last time at the now-snoring bloke in her bed, and slipped out into the corridor of her apartment, gently closing the door with a slight 'click' behind her...
On board 'Sea Serpent III', skipper Steve was beaming as his boat's bowsprit broke the laser beamed finish line first. To win an Olympic Gold, particularly in the waters upon which his mother had given birth to him 24 years ago, was the highlight of his life so far. He had been a natural sailor, winning every class with apparent ease as he eased his way up to this, the highest class of sailing recognised by the Olympic Committee. However, behind that smile, he was worried. The race itself had been easy, almost too easy, but the SS III hadn't handled as he'd expected. She seemed almost to sit too low in the water until she was planing, skimming the surface as if on a cushion of air, and that wasn't how she'd been when he first took her helm several months ago.
The GIT camera crew approached him as he stepped ashore and bombarded with questions, most of which seemed to focus upon his sponsors and how their products had single-handedly handed him the victory, Steve smiled that famous winning 'ToofProof' smile, pushed back his golden 'Fame & Glory, shampoo that tells a story' locks and said, “Something's wrong.”...
In Control Room 4, the producer hit the 'Emergency Interlude Key', shouted, “Eik” and sacked the interviewer and camerawoman on the spot. In a billion homes and workplaces, the dying syllable of Steve's devastating dual-worded statement was drowned under a tide of mega-paced music and images of beautiful young things entwined in ecstasy. This advertisement for over-processed, pre-packaged, microwavable dog food had won awards and the accompanying law suits from people who's dogs had mauled them were mysteriously absent from all GITs news output...
Back on Portland Bill, Steve and the other competitors were exchanging experiences in the camaraderie that defines ocean racers who will happily scupper their own chance of success in order to rescue a stricken rival. None of the assembled mariners could precisely define the problem but all of them agreed that today their vessels had behaved differently. Clearly something had changed. They consulted the meteorologists, the ferry companies and even the Royal Navy but there was no explanation of this freak phenomenon except that, unbeknown to them, it was anything but a freak.
Chirsty's speech, eschewing all the paraphernalia of a modern 'presentation' was an object-lesson in oration. Her audience was held spellbound as she wove the magic of her words around her as skilfully as an actor on the World's stage. The august assembly of, arguably, the finest 200 minds left thinking in the World, gave her a long, rapturous ovation.
In the lounge after this formal start to the celebrations, various pockets of 'brains' sat in small groups, discoursing, discussing, cussing and laughing, it was almost a reminder of how academia used to be. The giant plasma-screen above the bar was silent but a ribbon of text juddered along the bottom of the screen and it was almost impossible not to give it a glance from time-to-time, despite the GIT logo glaring down like a disapproving monster. “Sailor Steve's Gold 'n' Glow'...sticky water...planing like a hovercraft...Solent, silent...”
When Chirsty returned home, Iain was gone. This was no great surprise but the huge bouquet of flowers and the one-word message, “Sorry”, was. She hadn't thought of Iain as anything but fulfilling a physical need and they had both agreed that that need had run its course, hence her shock at the note. He had nothing to be sorry about. Strange, she would never understand this Romantic streak that seemed to run through some men as if they were a piece of sweet, seaside rock.
As she prepared for bed, reflecting that it was just as well that she didn't have to go through any motions after all the emotions of the day, she flicked the screen on. An advertisement, she had no idea what it was for because it was the usual mix of music and sex that all adverts comprised, ended and was replaced by the Sun descending over a mirror-calm sea. There was some chromatic aberration in the picture, unusual but then technology hadn't quite mastered every aspect of capturing nature in its pixellated virtuality...
As she watched, and listened to the laughably-dismissed talk of 'sticky seas', Chirsty's demeanour darkened. She focussed intently upon the angle between the Sun and the surface of the sea, she stared carefully at the aberrations on the surface of her screen, and she wept...
Her tears, running down her cheeks, illuminated by the glow of the screen, were affirming her fears, as the hydrogen bonds holding the aquatic world together weakened, dissolved and disintegrated allowing the oceans to evaporate, human bodies to cease functioning, and even the rays of the plasma screen fell foul of the quantum event that signalled the end of water-based ,organic lifeforms in the Universe...
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