THE MAD LAIRD OF SKIPNESS Folklore created by Robert J Howie, rjhowie@yahoo.com This story goes back to the late 1570's here in Skipness and the Laird who went by the name of Benjamin Crawford. He had taken the castle outside the village many years before by conquest and was a tall, gaunt and sometimes frightening looking man. He was a strong built character with a beard and very pronounced eyes in a craggy face and long, often unkempt hair. Locals were wary of him and felt that when he scoured at them it was like looking into the face of the devil himself. The servants often locked their doors as a precaution and as we will find - a wise move. The village was larger and more spread out then and had a population perhaps three times what it is now in 1974 or whatever year). The road was just as narrow from the castle down past the house and many supersticious people would try and avoid being there in the dark. The wind whistling through the trees and the odd faint lights from the castle windows gave an unnerving picture to gossiping villagers. Even today you know what it feels like when you wander along here in the dark as we huddle round this paraffin lamp in this old ruined old kirk and it's graveyard - which in those days was the parish church. Anyway, never mind looking round at the tombstones come in closer, it's really dark tonight and wind is getting up and it sometimes makes you think....... Benjamin ruled his estate with a rod of iron and his appearance and attitude was enough in itself to frighten the people who depended solely on him looking after them and providing cottages and ram work. By 1575 he had stopped attending the kirk and attempts by the minister to redeem him failed. The minister was eventually glad to see the back of him as on his visits to the castle he would be met with obstanince cursing and moaning fits of rage from the Laird. This only served to frighten everyone all the more the minister eventually proclaimed one Sunday that their Laird was beyond the realm of God but an evil and ungodly man whom he was becoming to think was of the devil himself. This was helped by the strange chanting and moaning that came from the laird's apartments facing towards the kirk across the field and where we are now. The Laird became more and more aggressive in his rages and often struck people down for the least little mistake or misunderstanding. He threw people out of their houses and hoped they would starve to death. One Sunday afternoon he was driving back from Clonaig on a wagon sitting beside a terrified servant and seen the minister talking to a group of locals. He stood up and screamed abuse and cursed and damned the minister and everyone in Skipness. His mad, staring eyes silenced everyone. Grabbing the reins he cried he would see them all out of their homes and into hell and said he was riding back to his home to meet his "frein, the de'il himsel'". The people couldn't take any more and met together the next night. If they lost their homes they did not know what would happen in a lonely place like that part o the Mull and desperation and anger overcame their fear. An attempt to get assistance from the Magistrate at Tarbert resulted in a curt dismissal from him as he put it down to the imaginations of simple rural people. Rational thought went out of the window and even the minister's pleas for reason were ignored as many reminded him that he had been cursed and God and all people. The meeting descended into a rabble and that night they vowed together that they would have to do something final and that meant if need be putting their landlord to death. The fear and gloom that hung over the village was too much to take and so on Tuesday 20th November they quietly made their way in a large group to the castle where they were met by a servant at the door who knew what was to transpire. They rushed the stairs and above them they could hear the Laird's incantations to the devil and darkness. Storming into the room they found him in the middle pointing a finger at them with his widening eyes almost straining in their sockets and his mouth foaming in hate and terrible language. There was hesitation at first until those at the back shoved forward and a tremendous fight ensued. It took a great number of men to hold him and he was taken up onto the battlements and quickly hung with his body banging against the window of his room. As he slowly choked to death he spoke in a croaking voice (done by me) saying that he would take them all to hell with him (I yell the words at this point). The minister arrived the next day and ordered the body down for burial and he was to be laid to rest in a tomb almost like a room below ground. No-one would make a coffin and was laid on a catafulc - kind of stone table in the middle of the tomb. The minister was the only person present. The castle was to lie empty for a year until a distant relation eventually claimed it but in-between times strange happenings occurred. At first there was a feeling of pleasantness around and everyone felt happier as if the winter was no longer a depressing thing. People even felt content walking along the tree lined road just down from this camp. The Inn filled up again at nights and there was much singing and dancing until one winter's night just a month or so after the death of the evil Benjamin Crawford. A hedge cutter coming home as dusk was falling, stumbled and fell across something in his path and startled he leapt to his feet and found to his horror the body of a young girl who had been a servant in the castle - the very one who had opened the great door on the night of the hanging. Her head was a few feet away where it had rolled in a path of fresh blood. He rushed to the village and sounded the alarm. A search found no culprit. A week later someone heard a scream on the outskirts of the village and on searching people found another dead body - that of a tenant farmer just up the hill from where we are now. His throat was cut from ear to ear. This was followed up the following month by another local who hadn't returned from digging a new grave. He was found part in it with his heart almost gouged out and his eyes placed in his open, stiff hands. People started getting really frightened again and began to get suspicious of each other and many arguments ensued. Even an investigation from the Magistrate in Tarbert accompanied by 6 soldiers who stayed for a week could not allay the feeling of terror around. Even the minister had to admit at a packed Sunday morning kirk that there was almost a palpable feeling of evil around Skipness again. The Tarbert men left as nothing further happened. Five days after they left the village the schoolmaster, Mr. Duncan Brown who had taken his dog along the shore one evening was eventually discovered as a bloody remnant of a body with arms and legs torn off and blood everywhere. His dog was headless. Another week passed and a woman in a cottage near where the present shop is waited desperately for her husband to return home fishing. With a lamp and her sister she left her children and went along the beach and was surprised to find her husbands boat in the shallows with him just sitting there. Her shouts were ignored and on reaching the rowing boat they found him sitting dead with his eyes wide open in a frozen state of terror. It wasn't the fish that had been gutted it was him. On holding the lamp up the woman screamed uncontrollably as the corpse sat there with his hands in his lap and what had been his insides flowing out into his hands. The nightmare looked as if it would never end and then eventually after some 20 burials by almost sheer luck an incident was to bring things to a head. It was just getting dark as a farm worker was trundling wood in a barrow back along towards the village and thought he had heard something in the darkening trees and bushes on both sides of the narrow road. He cried out and asked who was there and the rustling stopped. He picked up a couple of large stones and threw them in what he hoped was the right direction and heard a grunting noise and something or someone falling. As this was happening a group of villagers who been taking turns patrolling with torches heard the commotion and the labourer's yelling and rushed up. He told them what had happened and they all took off into the darkness of the trees going after the culprit. The chase took them across open ground and more trees and then into what is now this field where we are camped. They couldn't quite see properly but a vague figure of a man was seen as they passed the castle and headed for the sea as they thought. Then he was gone. They cursed there misfortune but decided to make a final effort as he could only have headed along the rocks or back towards the village along the shoreline. They combed across the field and towards the kirk silhouetted against a darkening, broody sky. The building was searched where we are now amongst these present ruins and - nothing. Someone said they had heard a noise somewhere close and the cemetery was searched slowly to see if he was hiding behind a gravestone - again nothing then the Beadle (he is the man that looks after the church, etc.) yelled for everyone to gather where he was. At first they wondered what was going on because the Beadle was standing with a flaming torch held up looking down at the ground. He told everyone to look for they where standing around the grave of Benjamin Crawford and the large stone sheet across the grave had been move slightly. Puzzled they had thoughts that the fool was using a tomb to hide in and they started moving the "lid" to one side. They bent down shining torches to see if they could see anyone but they couldn't see the corners. After some shouting that he should come out there was nothing but silence and the dead body of the Laird covered in the sailcloth. After discussion it was agreed that someone would be lowered into the room to see if the murderer was there. A rope was sent for and then there was argument just yards away from where we are sitting and near where you will have to go out when we are finished in the dark. Okay wee Andy I know you are frightened but we are nearly there. Get in closer and wrap that blanket closer from the wind. Some noise out there and it really is creepy looking at all these tombstones isn't it? Just think how eerie it is with us right now and what it would have been like back then??. Anyway they drew lots and it was a dead body of Crawford that frightened most not a man they could all overpower because he could not escape. Andy Campbell was lowered the short distance to the stone floor and he gave an obvious shiver as he passed the body - wouldn't you? I know some of younger boys are a wee bit nervy in the darkness of this place (long pause and a slow look round) but it might be because of...well, never mind ..you are better not knowing. Where was I...oh, yes. Andy Campbell said there was no-one in the tomb and there was a feeling of disappointment and perhaps the man had moved the stone on the entrance to fool them? Then suddenly Campbell gave a stifled cry (I do it) and almost dropped his torch as he thought he had seen a movement where the corpse lay. Someone laughed and shouted that the man was pretending to be the corpse. Andy slowly pulled the sailcloth off the body's head and was met by 2 madly, staring eyes with a small smile on the lips of the white face...it was the Laird's body and the head moved and the 2 hands came up and grabbed Campbell by the shoulders. Andy screamed as the corpse wrestled with him and the Laird exclaiming that had already started sending someone of them to hell and would continue his devil's work that night. Stones were rained on the corpse's head and he reeled away long enough for the villagers to yank the rope up and take the screaming and almost berserk Campbell up. He crawled backwards away from the tomb to be helped by his friends. The minister said that the corpse would have to be brought up and finished with and he went down to try and tie the rope round the Laird. Enough stones had rained down for the corpse to try and protect himself with his hands and the minister got the rope round his neck. He was hauled up quickly and the thing struggled and screamed every conceivable swear word he could use but up he came. More ropes were tied to his arms and legs and he was held there until they decided how he should be finished once and for all from the nightmare that Skipness had become. Burning was decided and so a bonfire was lit and the body dragged over it when it was well lit and with branches poking at the moving corpse. He cursed and ranted until he became no more. The next day his ashes were scattered in the sea and the tomb filled in. I'm not sure where it was so be careful when you leave here and cross the graveyard. Skipness went back to being a quiet, pleasant and remote village and Benjamin Crawford has been mostly forgotten over the centuries but if you get to Edinburgh visit the National Museum of Scotland and go the section called "Scottish Folklore and Strange Happenings". There you will find the records of what happened here all those centuries ago. That is the story boys, of the" Mad Laird of Skipness". So perhaps when coming home here in the dark or down here you might feel something or hear an odd noise you will logically take it that it is all your imagination but perhaps in the dark corners of your mind or here....well, we will leave it at that. Now who is going to lead the way out?........... THE END During the story which is actually longer with perhaps changing detail over the years it is made very creepy by the way I use my voice use actions etc. The area lends itself to many stories I have told some even more macabre but you find that boys still want to hear the end!! One year some new boys came up to me and said they had asked the village storekeeper about the "Mad Laird" and he had told them it was a lot of nonsense. That was close call and got out of it by being "frank" with them. I won them over by stating this.... "Listen .....this is a lovely, quiet, beautiful place isn't it?" "Yes sir".