On 10th July 1598, David Weir, “ane juggler”, “playit supple tricks” on a tightrope suspended from the top of the steeple of St Giles’s Cathedral to Edinburgh’s mercat cross. King James VI gave him £20.
In November 1922, while Clementina Churchill was campaigning in Dundee for her husband, someone released “electric snuff” at a open forum meeting causing a mass sneezing fit. Churchill lost the election.
After patronizing the crowd and accusing them of taking advantage of Mr Churchill’s illness, they *really* turned on her. Woman in crowd: “Play the game, hen. Play the game. Dinna use that sentimental argument about yer man being ill.”
Clementina Churchill left the meeting hall to Irish Republican songs and cheering for De Valera.
Was he 180 years old when he died in 1645? Was he just *really* into Christmas?
Most likely, the Diùrachs were playing a trick with the traveler, Martin Martin when he visited in 1705. Gaels celebrated “Big Christmas” (An Nollaig Mhòr) and New Year, “Little Christmas” (An Nollaig Bheag). Gillour was probably 90 or so.
Gillouir’s niece Mary has a headstone near his and was thought to have died at age 128 in 1856. In reality she died in December 22nd 1855, and was *only* 118.
https://marccalhoun.blogspot.com/2013/03/Mary MacCraine’s [sic] entry in register of deaths in 1855.
In 1888, two men from Calcutta (now Kolkata) set off for Demerara in British Guiana (now Guyana) but ended up in a freezing Leith sailors’ mission. If ever you think you’ve had the journey from Hell, these guys probably have you beat.
Unfortunately, we don’t know the names of the two men involved here, but unsurprisingly we do know the names of all the (white) people who helped them.
In May 1888, two Bengali men– “a trader and his servant”– boarded a ship in Calcutta bound for Liverpool, where the were to take a transatlantic steamer to Demerara. The trader had family in the West Indies and was emigrating out there to join them.
Postcard of Calcutta DocksLiverpool Docks
The passage from Calcutta by sail took them three months. By the time they docked in Liverpool, they’d missed the steamer. They had no English and lost their travel papers and nobody would find a Bangla speaker to help. The harbourmaster put them on a train to London…(it’s not clear why).
In London, nobody knew what to do but saw their baggage had an address on it followed by “DM”. Some bright spark decided that DM meant Denmark! and “helped” the pair buy tickets for the “Boat Express”–a train to Harwich and a paddle steamer to Esbjerg (via Rotterdam)
Advertisement for the Boat Express run by The Great Eastern RailwayHarwich to Continent paddle-steamer
The pair arrived in Esbjerg near penniless, were arrested by Danish police, and taken to Copenhagen. Here a “Mrs. Severin” who’d spent time in India and had limited Bangla tried to help. As “subjects of the Empire” she appealed on their behalf to the British Consulate.
Copenhagen as it looked in the 1880s
They refused to help but would return them to Calcutta (and charge them for it). For 3 months, the pair made money by selling the goods brought with them from India and Severin put them on the SS Thorsa bound for Leith. It was now late November…
Advertisement for routes operated by James Currie and Co., owner of the SS ThorsaComing into Leith Docks
The Thorsa arrived (via Kristiansand, Norway) on 26th November 1888, about *6 months* after the pair left Calcutta. They had a letter from Severin to a retired Raj colonel, called Buist. They got rooms at the Sailors Home, Buist was sent for.
Postcard of the Leith Sailors’ Home
As luck would have it, Buist knew Bangla and was able to find a man from Calcutta in Leith. Between them they worked out a plan to get the pair to Demerara. Their luggage was clearly relabeled “DEMERARA” in English and Bangla…
10 days later the two men and the manager of the Sailors Home took the train to Glasgow and met the SS Cipero bound for Demerara. The Cipero, a slow cargo freighter, took 20 days to reach Trinidad before finally arriving in Demerara on January 2nd, 1889.
Postcard of the harbour at Demerara, British Guiana. Image credit: http://www.cumberlandscarrow.com/demerara.htm
For a sense of how comfortable this journey might’ve been, here is a list of everything the Cipero hauled to the West Indies on that trip.
In reality though, it was likely more comfortable for them than for most Indians headed for British Guiana. After the abolition of slavery, plantation owners looked to the Empire for labour to exploit. In 1889 ~90,000 East Indians lived and worked in British Guiana.
Illustration of the conditions during the voyage taken by East Indians to the West Indies to work in the cultivation of sugar
That’s all I could find about the pair while tracing their journey (and most of it was about the people that helped them…). If anyone knows anything else (or where to look) let me know!
References
Dundee Courier. November 28th 1888. pg. 3 Leith Burghs Pilot. -December 1st 1888 pg. 5 -December 8th 1888. pg. 8 Aberdeen Press and Journal. December 7th 1888. pg. 4 Dundee Evening Telegraph. November 28th 1888. pg. 3 Edinburgh Evening News. December 6th 1888. pg. 3 Lloyd’s List. November 27th 1888
Whilst the workmen engaged in repairing the dykes round Calwood, near Coshieville, were so employed last week, one of them accidentally came on an earthen jar in the old dyke, filled with money. This is supposed to be one of those treasures which Donuch Mhor am Phiabhur–“Muckle Duncan the Piper”–a harmless character who used to travel through the Highlands, was known to have deposited in many places. Duncan was in the habit of receiving alms from high and low, and then hiding them, and forgetting where he had put them.
In 1903 Clementina McDonald was arrested for walking down Edinburgh’s High Street dressed in a Black Watch uniform. She was let out with a warning and told to “stick to petticoats”.
