It is a misconception that the Highland Clans were destroyed at the 1746 Battle of Culloden when Bonnie Prince Charlie ordered the charge across open heathland into the jaws of Cumberland's regiments. If you have visited the battle site you will know what a bleak and pitiless place it is. A new visitors' centre was recently completed on the battlefield, and its opening ceremony proved how strong the Clans still are.
The Scottish Government thought it would be a good idea to have children who are descendants from both sides take part in the ceremony in what they supposed might be an act of reconciliation. There was little problem in finding representatives from the Jacobite Highland clans. Not one descendent of the Government side volunteered - this despite the fact that almost as many Scots fought for George as did for Charlie.
Humans are drawn together in diversity and, it seems to me, the people of the Highlands epitomise this. Although the Highlands were, as a matter of UK Government policy, opened up following the '45 rebellion, they remain today remote and neglected. The area in which I live is designated a 'Region of Difficulty' and receives grants accordingly. Life here for many is hard yet its population is fiercely proud.
The Clearances followed the '45. Thousands of clanspeople were deported, usually against their will, to Canada, the US, Australia and New Zealand. Outside Scotland, more people speak Gaelic in Nova Scotia than anywhere else. Those that remained eked out a living by crofting on land which might politely be called marginal. Crofting remains today the main occupation in this village.
Kilchoan, which might be translated as the cell of St Columba, isn't at all what one would expect. It's strung out along over two miles of coastline surrounding a bay on the south side of the Ardnamurchan peninsula, facing across the Sound of Mull to Tobermory. Strictly it isn't a single village but three crofting 'townships', each croft running from the shoreline to the common grazings on the hills. Its population is a tenth of what it was at its height and, until recently, has continued to decline as the young people moved away to work in Glasgow and further afield. That this trend has paused is largely down to people like me, 'incomers'.
It is a wonderful place to be a writer, not only because of the breathtaking scenery and punishing weather. Living amongst these independent, tough people, watching the dynamics of their small society, is an education. It's a place which respects those who prefer to be solitary, which cares for its old and disadvantaged, which watches out for its neighbours and, despite often being riven by dispute, pulls together when things go wrong. The other day I was out searching for a girl who had gone missing in a nearby village. As we moved through the houses everyone already knew what had happened and was looking out for her.
Last winter we had too many funerals of the older people. Many were Gaelic speakers taking with them their memories and the village's history. At the latest, at the little cemetery on the hill high above the village, a piper played a lament at the graveside. The sound tore me apart.
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