This was an unusual expedition: a couple of weeks before I
had been given a copy of a map of the Samalaman area drawn
by the then parish priest Father John Mackintosh in 1922.
The map showed the position of thirteen houses and gave details
of the people living in them at that time. Our expedition
was to find all the houses.
We only had our three regular explorers, Fern, Robbie and
Rowan, ably assisted by six adults, John Dove, Nicci, Pamela,
Richard, Sandra and Sharon, with Ellie to investigate the
undergrowth.
We started out at Samalaman Beach, where we examined the old
pier, the boat winch and the site of a hut once occupied by
the MacBride family. Then it was back to the car and up to
Samalman where we found the next three houses, belonging to
the Captain, Sarah Fraser and Mrs MacPherson. Then we drove
on, passing the next two houses (Joan Macdonald and Ewen MacNeill)
before stopping to walk to the other houses at Allt Ruadh
and Smirisary.
The first house at Allt Ruadh, number six on the plan, was
Angus Macdonald’s and was now used as a shearing shed.
On the other side of the burn was number seven, a house with
two central chimneys and formerly occupied by Widow Sine Thomhullach(?
Father Mackenzie’s writing is small and spidery).
Then we walked back up the burn to house number eight, which
has recently been renovated. I knew this as Angus and Jean
MacIsaac’s house but before then it belonged to Wendy
Wood. In Father Mackenzie’s time it was slated but Wendy
Wood said it had a tin roof and was later thatched, so it
went through all the normal roof developments in reverse order.
It is now slated again.
The next house was a problem, but fortunately Sandra knew
where it was and we had a wet climb up the hill to get to
it. House number nine now has a tree growing out of it but
in 1922 it was occupied by ‘old grannie’ Jessie
Gillies. By this time we were well on the way to Smirisary
and it was a short walk to the top of the settlement where
we found the 1922 house of the MacIsaac family high up on
the hill. Below it and against the hill was the house of another
MacNeill family, this house also having two central chimneys
like number seven.
The last two houses were down near the shore; on the far side
was the home of Iain MacPherson and below and to the right
was that of his cousin Angus MacPherson. The last house was
the one later occupied by Margaret Leigh and featuring in
her book ‘Spade among the Rushes’. She gave a
map of the village in her book and we used it to try to locate
the old well, but with no success.
This completed out tour of the old houses and we were happy
to be able to return once more to the Blue Parrot for our
refreshments.
John
Dye
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