Girnock’s lost cotter-touns
December 2006
Bovagli’: Its glimmer may have faded, yet it remains the gem of Girnock.
by Peter Gordon
Glen Girnock has none of the celebrity of its neighbour, Glen Muick; indeed it is possible that you may not even have heard of it. Yet the Girnock carries us back in time, in a way that Glen Muick never could; for it has no tarmacadam running through it, just a rough, stony, twisting path.
Follow that path and listen for the whispering voices on the braes; carry on towards Lochnagar, and you will come across one abandoned farm-toun after another.
At one time the Girnock bustled like no other glen. The occupants, almost without exception, were kin and clan Gordons. So much so that Deesiders of the day were to remark for any puzzle, “that’s as inextricable as the sibness o’ the Gordons o’ Girnoc!” These families were yeoman farmers who tenanted and worked for the Laird of Abergeldie, for the Girnock was once at the very heart of Abergeldie.
I had my home at The Camlet, a farm secure in the heart of the estate, yet hidden within the Girnock’s elbow. Bovagli’, the neighbouring cotter-toun, was the forearm to Camlet’s elbow and reached out wide and far to embrace high Lochnagar.
At the other end of the glen, a small community developed around Girnock Bridge, yet back in the time of the Gordons, the gate to the Girnock was through Mill of Cosh. Halfway between the Cosh and the Camlet, sat Loinveg, the last of the main Girnock farms to be abandoned.
There were many reasons why the Girnock emptied like a quaich: the land was poor and badly drained; cattle droving was, by the 18th century, on the decline and the inclement and harsh conditions often ruined what grain was grown. The land was really better suited to sheep than to cattle, but in the early days small black cattle were raised and sold at southern trysts.
Glen folk clung on as best they could, but many were driven to desperate measures, particularly to the smuggling of whisky. The Girnock was truly notorious for its black bothies. There were at one time 13 smuggling brothers in the Glen, but that was put to a stop by the summer of 1826. By then the excisemen had got clout. A new Act of Parliament had seen to that.
The Camlet goes back to Abergeldie’s earliest days with a tied history stretching back to at least 1635, when it was itinerated, along with the other Girnock fairm-touns, in a list of Abergeldie teinds. At one time it had as many as 20 ‘thakkit-clay biggins’ each with heather thatched roofs.
The Camlet sits cradled in a sweeping track which climbs high above the main glen track before cutting back to it in a loop. This was the stomping ground of a notorious old worthy known as the Minister of the Camlet. His influence spilled well beyond the Girnock and with his “sanctified mien and semi-clerical get-up” he saw himself as a true prophet.
Camlet John, a man of intrigue, was born and married into Girnock, both dates marked bitterly by relentless winter inclemency. But John went on to farm the Camlet for more than half-a-century, to marry twice and to raise 12 children. He died in 1834.
At least one of his sons became involved in the smuggling of illicit uisquebaugh, or whisky. The shame of this pervaded the sensibilities of his many descendents, and some of the family emigrated to New Zealand and the United States.
One grandson, James Gordon, ended up on the sub-Antarctic Campbell Island – and was its first and last lessee. Having farmed the Girnock, young James must have felt he could cope with whatever Campbell Island could throw at him. He was wrong. He did not survive, but amazingly his story was uncovered by chance when an expedition to the island in 1991 dislodged a rusty tin box from a hanging rafter. The box contained a farm journal and a small portrait of James. A hermetically-sealed time capsule, it tracked him back to the Girnock and described how, at the age of just six years, he was set free from Camlet on the family stallion in order to flee the excisemen.
Others were not as lucky as young James. His cousin Alexander Gordon was the most notorious Deeside smuggler ever, equally brazen in his illicit trade and in his utter disregard of the law. Alexander Gordon was found guilty on several occasions, and imprisoned in Perth Jail, only to break free, and return to his Deeside black bothies. Finally he was committed for the brutal attack of old Donald Coutts of the Burnside Inn.
A daughter of the Camlet married into the family of Deeside’s celebrated sennachie. Hearts ached when Babs, the ‘flower of Deeside’, was drowned in a terrible accident when the bogie rope snapped at the Abergeldie crossing.
Several sons of the Camlet trailed a blaze south over the Mounth: Joseph Gordon became butler for Clementina, Countess of Airlie. Whilst serving at Cortachy castle Joseph dedicated a volume of poems to the Countess. Another son of Camlet, James Gordon, became the gardener for Airlie castle.
When artist Eric Auld painted The Camlet, abandoned in the decaying rickles was an old car. That car, an old Austin Seven, was without doubt the unstoppable force that met the immovable object. The challenge might be better understood when you realize that the postie Georgie Crawford from Loinveg had in the close season to use skis to deliver mail.
Geordie also had a car, an old Ford Prefect, which, he said, remained as good as new with “two new engines and one new body”.
Loinveg, hame of the cherry blossom, was the last of the Girnock farms to empty. Ancient folklore tells the story of how a Loinveg loon was raised by a pack of wolves. This lupine history was said to explain the dark swarthy beard growth of his many descendents.
In the last decade of the 19th century, Loinveg housed three tenants under the servitude of the old Gordon brothers. Somewhat remarkably, they were all umbrella makers. What took them to the Girnock is a mystery. The brolly makers got caught in a storm at Aultdrachty in Glen Muick and never made it back home.
Loinveg is fast becoming another stane rickle. In its old threshing shed, there survive scribbles from the last years of the 19th century. A jester among them teases a young lass called Emma about her exodus from Loinveg in her lover’s clothes:
Lost last night, Emma Gordon, last seen going down the road with Fred Duncan’s clothes on. A’body givin information on her whur-aboots will be rewarded.
Bovagli’ is a wonderful place which oozes sadness and spirituality in equal measure. Its glimmer may have faded, yet it remains Girnock’s secret gem. It was in its time a singular community, a township. It even had its own water supply in the form of a dew-pond.
This was the farm of Donald Gordon (1811-1897), Auld Prodeegous, who displaced his brother from his rightful share of Bovagli’. A hardened rascal, he nevertheless became a favourite of Queen Victoria. He had a fondness for liquor and used to rely upon his horse to get him back from the Inver Inn, up the Skylich to Bovagli’.
But Auld Prodeegous knew tragedy there, too, with the loss of three of his young children to scarletina. Not surprising then that he bought a granite townhouse in Aberdeen for his family to live in during the winter months.
The great Strathspey musician, J. Scott Skinner, wrote a tune called Bovaglie’s Plaid, inspired by a local saying that the wood ‘haps, shelters, Bovaglie ferm like a plaid’. Today the wood is a shadow of its former glory, with evergreen aforestation replacing the mixed hardwoods of ancient copses.
These days Bovagli’ is shuttered and silent. Yet not so long ago it was a busy working farm with a holding of about 1,500 acres of hill pasture. Wollie Merchant of Bovagli’ brought the first tractor into the area, also used as Girnock’s taxi. The old Victorian Bovagli’ farmhouse was far grander than any other in the glen and the only Girnock farm to have electricity. Today nature has reclaimed even that.
A peaceful, sweeping sadness now permeates Bovagli’; a sorrow for the forgotten bustling generations of the farm and days of inextricable sibness. It was just beyond Bovagli’ and towards the Coyles that a gamekeeper died in a sitting position, his flask at his side and pipe and matches in his hand.
Alistair Repper is the latest hearty young friend of the Girnock. Aged just 15 years he chose to study the glen for his Duke of Edinburgh bronze award. Some of the material for this account was provided by Alistair and he has joined a compatriot of friends known informally as The Deeside Detectives. While young ones still show an interest, the Girnock and the other Deeside glens will never be empty.
Dr Peter Gordon trained in Aberdeen as a doctor. He now works in Bridge of Allan, where his wife Sian is a GP.
This is an article from the December 2006 edition of Leopard Magazine. To read much more like this every month, see our subscription details.
I am a descendant of the Merchant family of Bovaglie, Wollie Merchant was my Grannys (Isabella Merchant) Uncle, they moved over the hill to Khantore and my Grannie lived at Ardieraar Lumphanan till she died in 1979, would love to know where you got your info
Regards
Alastair
— Alastair Ellis 9 December 2006 #