Pipe wind cap from Calum (Salum) MacLean’s shop in Salum. Round metal cap for placing over the end of a smoker’s pipe in order to prevent the wind from disturbing the tabacco. These were used by sailors, crofters when in the hay barns, or by those not wanting holes burned into their clothes.
Hardback book ‘Sailors on the Rocks’ about famous Royal Navy shipwrecks, by Peter C Smith, 2015. Chapter 14 (pg 217) is about HMS Sturdy, which was wrecked on rocks off Sandaig in 1940.
CD of 10 Tiree tales from the Dewar Manuscripts (1866) in Gaelic and English, which are held in Inveraray Archives. Story titles: Big Jura John, Big Jura John and the Irish Earl, Gift of Tiree to MacLean by MacDonald of the Isles, The Laird of Callart and the Tenants of Tiree, John Campbell of Barranacarragh in Tiree, Donald of the Sound, Finlay Guibhneach, The Tiree Wrestlers – Malcom Clerk and Donald MacDougall, Grey and Shaw, Traditions about the Island of Tiree and Mull.
Includes photocopied pages of MacLean’s English translation (1881) of the Tiree tales, a printed summary of the tales prepared by the archivist, a letter regarding their use, and a copy of the license agreement between An Iodhlann and Argyll Estates.
Click here to view the summaries
Genealogy material relating to people of Heanish, 1793-2012, from the belongings of Robert Nisbet, Heanish: (1) handwritten family tree for descendents of James Nesbit and Sarah Fritt, (2) printed family tree for the descendents of Neil MacKinnon (1793-1872) and Marion Munn (1800-1887), (3) printed family trees for the descendents of ? MacKinnon, Donald MacKinnon (1803-1871) and Mary Sinclair (1824-1873), Donald (Red) MacKinnon (b.1773) and Mary McColl (b.1773), Alexander MacKinnon (b. 1846) and Jessie MacDonald (b.1859), Effie MacKinnon (1809-1891) and Coll MacDonald (1806-1883), and Marion Munn (1803-1872) and Neil MacKinnon (1794-1872), (4) family group sheet for Neil MacKinnon (1793-1872) and Marion Munn (1800-1887), (5) printed extract from the 1881 British Census, giving the names and details of 109 inhabitants in 21 houses at Heanish Farm, (6) collection of annotated photocopied birth, marriage and death certificates for Marion MacKinnon, Donald MacKinnon and Margaret Anne Murray (1855), Angus MacKinnon and Catherine Brown (1866), Neil MacKinnon (1872), Euphemia MacDonald (1891), Edward John MacKinnon (1954), (7) notes on other census and genealogy material for family of Neil MacKinnon and Marion Munn (1841), Brown (1861), Coll MacDonald and Euphemia MacKinnon.
Small, round, brass ‘Ancroid’ barometer belonging to Robert Nisbet, Heanish, and thought to have come from the tea clipper ‘Taeping’ that was sailed to victory in the Great China Tea Race of 1866 by Captain Donald MacKinnon, Heanish.
Article titled ‘Tiree and the Dukes of Argyll in the age of the Clearances and Crofters’ War: coercion, controversy and confrontation’ by James Petre, published in West Highland Notes & Queries, July 2017, pp 17-23. An account of how Tiree changed after the Dukes of Argyll took possession of the island in 1674, and the reaction of the islanders to that change.
Softback book ‘The Escape of Bonnie Prince Charlie’ by Malcolm Seddon, 2016. Describing the adventures of Charles Stewart over five months after his defeat at the battle of Culloden in 1746, including his 500-mile trek over the Western Isles and NW Highlands, and eventual rescue. The French ship carrying him away from Scotland passed close to Tiree, where it is said that two Tiree men from Ruaig were abducted to navigate the ship safely onwards. See ‘Donald the Pilot’ for further information.
Poem ‘The Sail Weaver’ by Michele Fermanis-Winward, 2017, inspired by the stories of emigration from the Scottish Islands to the New World. The poet’s four-times great grandmother was Mary (McKinnon) MacLean of Tiree, born 1796, and the subject of the poem. Keith Dash (Australia), Mary MacLean (Scarinish) and John Holliday (Balephuil) are mentioned in the acknowledgements.
Chanter belonging to Captain Lachlan MacPhail, Tiree and Glasgow (b. 1890), who was a great piper and writer of bagpipe tunes, and who had a pipe tune named after him. The chanter was presented to An Iodhlann by his eldest grandson on behalf of Lachlan’s three daughters Isabel, Cath and Margaret, who spent the holidays in Tiree in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s.
Iron cruisgean from Sliabh Cottage, Cornaigbeg.
An iron ‘crusie’ lamp that was used to burn fish oil and once belonged to Mrs Mary Campbell, grandmother of the donor. Notes accompanying the cruisgean tell that it came into the possession of the donor in 1996 and was initially offered to the Thatched House Museum in Sandaig. There it was photographed and returned to the donor with some notes suggesting that it was “an early 18th century iron hanging cruise lamp presented by the late Viscountess Gort”, and that “a cruse is a clay container which could be transformed into a lamp by being filled with oil and equipped with a simple wick – a rag would suffice, but a rush was more efficient and minimised the smoke.”
