No. 2 The APJ Magazine February 2007

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‘Farewell to Stromness’ – Linda Houston

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Farewell to Stromness

Linda Houston *

*Linda Houston is a professional librarian who lives in County Antrim but visits Scottish islands at every opportunity

View of Stromness: © Arthur Houston

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It begins with a song. Lord Franklin, with lead vocal by John Renbourn, was recorded by the folk revival group Pentangle in 1970 and tells the much romanticised story of the fate of the Royal Navy expedition led by Sir John Franklin in the 1840s to discover the final links in the North West Passage, the northerly sea route from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific.

The song has a haunting melody and is easy to pick out on the guitar and it became one of my regulars during my folk singing days as a student in Belfast. I can still remember all the words without difficulty.

As the years passed, I would occasionally come across books about Franklin and I would always leaf through them. A novel called The Ice Child by Elizabeth McGregor was in part a fictionalised account of the expedition and its awful fate. Franklin was one of the first to die and others succumbed, perhaps to lead poisoning or botulism, a result of imperfect canning technology, before the last of the party died of cold and hunger. My interest was somewhat sustained by the fact that Franklin’s second-in-command was Francis Crozier who hailed from Banbridge in Co Down and survived Franklin for a time to take over command of the expedition.

Crozier is a name in my family, although my people come from the other side of Northern Ireland, south Tyrone, almost Co Fermanagh. It is said that all the Croziers in Northern Ireland are descended from two brothers who left, or were chased from, Liddesdale in the Scottish Borders during the reign of James VI and I. One, presumably the ancestor of Francis, settled in Co Down. The other settled in Fermanagh. These two areas are certainly where you find the greatest concentration of the name and I know that in the early eighteenth century there were Croziers already living in the townland where my grandfather grew up and where my cousins lived until quite recently.

The Croziers were one of the significant reiver families of Liddesdale, together with the Armstrongs, Elliots and Nixons – also names that are common today in Co Fermanagh. Throughout the wars between Scotland and England, which lasted for centuries, these families fought on whichever side seemed expedient. They were governed by a strong instinct for survival and the urge to steal cattle and foment feud at every possible opportunity. They lived by their lights and everybody was at it. It was equal opportunity lawlessness. The union of the Scottish and English crowns under James finally brought this era to an end. But Francis Crozier must have retained some of that border toughness to head off with Franklin for the wastes of the Canadian north west.

But we shall return to the Franklin expedition later.

Approached from the sea, Stromness nestles by the shore under Brinkie’s Brae; a patchwork of roofs and gables in grey and fawn that looks as comfortable as a cat curled up in an armchair. Away from the town, the landscape of Mainland Orkney is at once gentle and dramatic with rolling pastureland dotted with farms, enormous skies, and sea or loch water never far away. Leaving Stromness we headed east past the Stones of Stenness and the brooding hump of Maes Howe, reminders that civilisation was here before the pyramids were built.

In Finstown we turned north and presently spotted, down near the shore, a house amongst trees. Trees are a rarity in windblown Orkney. We wondered “is that it?” A sign a few hundred yards further on did indeed direct us down a stony lane to Woodwick House. We crossed a bridge over a cascading burn and pulled up at a tall grey house with crow-step gables. It stood in a garden that was just about holding back the advances of nature. The dishevelment around the edges of the formal structure added to the charm of the setting. A few contented looking hens pecked in the gravel near the door. Fresh eggs for breakfast. We rang the bell.

Inside, the house was comfortable and welcoming. I was going to say that it reminded me of an old rectory but manse seems somehow more appropriate. Comfortable armchairs, a fireplace and lots of books. Even if it rained for the whole week we wouldn’t need to worry about being bored. As it turned out, the sun, which shone so brilliantly on the day we arrived after sailing past the dramatic cliffs of Hoy, continued to shine for us almost throughout our stay.

The next day Franklin put in an appearance.

We drove to Skara Brae. The little settlement seemed to offer all the basics you would need for a reasonably comfortable life although I did wonder about how much stooping would have been necessary with those low passageways. It all suggested domesticity and I wasn’t surprised when the guide, in answer to my question, told me that they hadn’t uncovered any weapons so I was able to hold on to my illusions. We had a cup of coffee and browsed in the bookshop in the visitor centre. I picked up a book called Fatal Passage by a Canadian author called Ken McGoogan. On the front cover Franklin’s name was mentioned. As I paid for the book the assistant said it was a good read. I replied that I was interested in Franklin and she warned me that I might not like it as it wasn’t very complimentary about Franklin. That just added to the intrigue.

We went back to Stromness as we hadn’t lingered when we drove off the ferry. The narrow street, known as The Street, winds through the town. Paved with local flagstone, it accommodates pedestrians and vehicles comfortably enough since nobody seems to be in a great hurry. Near the harbour is The Pier Arts Centre, now a somewhat self-conscious art gallery but the building was formerly the UK headquarters of the Hudson’s Bay Company. Stromness was a major port for expeditions making their way to North America and, as I was to discover, Orcadians have a long and fine tradition of seamanship and exploration.

Just along from the harbour we found Stromness Books and Prints. Andrew Greig, a Scottish novelist and poet who has made his home in Orkney, describes this as the best small bookshop in the world and I wouldn’t argue. The owner is from California and his partner is a Swede who is also Orkney’s best known photographer. Orkney has obviously been casting its spell on visitors for years. The tiny space is crammed with a wonderful range of titles and you get the impression that no request would be beyond the reach of this establishment. Although it isn’t a second-hand bookshop it has that kind of atmosphere offering the excitement of an unexpected discovery. I was happy to buy a copy of Willa Cather’s O Pioneers! and I remembered the last time I had bought a Willa Cather – this time in a great second-hand bookshop in Charlottesville, Virginia. I had bought a mug at the same time bearing the legend “Books and coffee – life is good”. How true!

Continuing along The Street we found Login’s Well. Here Franklin and countless other sailors drew fresh water for the long Atlantic voyage. And further along, the Stromness museum explores the social, maritime and natural history of the area comprehensively.

As the days passed we got to know the island and discovered a rich seam of high quality arts and crafts; silver and enamel jewellery, magnificent tapestries woven by the sister of the jeweller, sturdy and elegant pottery made on the island and in use every day in Woodwick House. We were a long way from the tartan and shortbread of tourist attractions in the Highlands. And of course Highland Park whisky takes its place in the cast of fine Orkney produce.

Evenings in Woodwick house were a pleasure. Excellent home-cooked food and stimulating conversation with the other guests. John Renbourn, after his Pentangle days, had played in the impressive upstairs salon at Woodwick House as part of the St Magnus Festival and his gentle guitar music on the CDs left behind at the house was the perfect accompaniment to conversation but could never be dismissed as wallpaper music. But despite all the other temptations I still found time to read Fatal Passage and the coincidences continued.

The book told the story of John Rae, an Orcadian explorer employed as a surveyor with the Hudson’s Bay Company. He discovered the fate of the Franklin expedition and can also be credited with finding the last navigable link in the elusive North West Passage – Rae Strait – but is now almost entirely forgotten.

Rae adopted the survival techniques of the local Inuit population and made many successful overland winter expeditions. It was the Inuit who told him how the Franklin expedition had abandoned their ships to trek over the ice, perishing finally but apparently not before resorting to cannibalism.

When Rae broke this news in correspondence to London Franklin’s widow launched an intense campaign against the slander, enlisting the services of Charles Dickens. A reward of £10,000 had been put up for anyone providing information about Franklin’s fate but she did all she could to prevent this going to Rae. She also cast doubt on Rae’s discovery of the North West Passage claiming that Franklin had the moral right to the honour despite that fact that he never actually found the final link. Rae finally received the £10,000 reward but, despite his record as one of the most successful Arctic explorers ever, he retired to a quiet life on his native island far from the public view. His effigy, a recumbent figure covered in bearskins, can be seen in St Magnus’ Cathedral in Kirkwall and he is buried in the adjacent churchyard. Franklin, in the meantime, was lionised and became the subject of a beautiful song.

Rae grew up in an extraordinary house, the Hall of Clestrain, across the Bay of Ireland from Stromness. The house is a Palladian mansion in miniature set in a bleak landscape. An oddity amidst the vernacular architecture.

The Hall of Clestrain featured on BBC2’s series, Restoration, while we were in Orkney. I felt the strangeness of the coincidences piling up as I read the book, watched the programme and drove past the house. But the Hall of Clestrain didn’t win the Scottish round of the series. Perhaps I should have voted for it. I hope that the local supporters can find the funding to complete the restoration project both of the house and of the memory of John Rae.

Together the coincidences, the company and the places we visited made for a memorable week. I arrived home and read Andrew Greig’s latest novel, In Another Light, partly set in Orkney and mentioning places I had got to know. I’d planned to take the book with me on the trip but had left it at home and this turned out to be a lucky mistake because it was so much better to read the book after the visit, when I had a feel for the magic of the island.

Months later, eating breakfast one morning, I was stopped in my tracks by a piece of music on the radio. “What’s that?” I asked my husband. As usual the only answer I got was “guess”. Stirring, melancholy, something Scottish about it. I hazarded Peter Maxwell Davies, another Orkney settler. I was right. It was Farewell to Stromness. But perhaps not forever.

REFERENCES:

McGoogan, Ken. Fatal passage. Bantam. 2002.

Greig, Andrew. In Another Light. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. 2004

McGregor, Elizabeth. The Ice Child. Bantam. 2001

FURTHER READING:

Smith, Michael. Captain Francis Crozier: Last Man Standing?. Collins, 2006

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Editorial material in the APJ Magazine is the copyright of APJ Publications and articles and features are the copyright of the authors. Articles and features may be copied for purposes of private or group research and study. Reproduction of any item in whole or substantial part in any publication requires the prior permission of APJ Publications: please contact us at the address above for this. Quotations within the normal limits allowed by copyright may be made without prior permission provided acknowledgement of the source is made.

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