Letter from John MacIntosh 1921
Date Added: 21 May 2010
Year: 1921
Institution Name: dnhhl
Cat No: ◀ | 2004_316_0726 | ▶
Picture No: 8932
Letter from John MacIntosh, refusing land for allotments, dated July 4th 1921.
Dimensions: Height 248mm - Width 197mm
Album: Embo - 380 pictures
1 Comment
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Most, if not all, of Embo's houses were up until the 1950s built on land owned by Embo Farm to where a feu duty was paid anually. The "Allotment Scheme" encouraged by the Government to allow landless families to be self sufficient in vegetables and potatoes never got off the ground there and this was probably because of this letter.
However, in the distant past Embo people did rent plots of land between the Old Village Hall and Loch na Magan from Embo Farm to grow potatoes. This area was called the "Riggs". The potatoes grown there cropped well as large amounts of dry sea weed collected from above the sea's high water mark were carried there and used as fertiliser. Loch na Magan has since been drained and its area and the Riggs area are ploughed by Embo Farm and used for crops.
In addition to these rented "plots" most villagers did tend vegetable gardens adjacent to their homes but they were constantly frustrated by John Macintosh's sheep being allowed to graze freely and unattended throughout the village. This caused a lot of resentment as the sheep ate any greenery they could find and left undeniable evidence of this all over the village. The sheep also damaged the outside of houses by scratching themselves on the walls and making damaging shelters for themselves from the weather. Great vigilance had also to be kept to make sure that no garden gate was left open because if it was a whole growing season's vegetables would be eaten by these sheep in a matter of minutes.
My eldest brother Donald Mackay (Donnie James) tells an interesting story about these marauding sheep. In the spring of about 1944 he as a young teenager was planting out cabbages in the garden of our home at 2 MacLeod Terrance and by mistake left the garden gate open. Suddenly he realised that the garden had been invaded by a whole flock of Macintosh sheep that were busy eating their way through what vegetation was available. He then knew he was in deep trouble from our father for the cardinal sin of leaving the garden gate open. In a panic he began to chase these sheep and as is their wont they ran anywhere but out from the gate. Finally he was forced to use his iron tipped "t" handled dibber to throw at them to get them to leave. There was one particularly stupid sheep that kept running the wrong way and in frustration he threw his dibber at him with some force and hit this sheep on the head. He knew immediately that the sheep was badly injured but it finally staggered from the garden and made its way to the water pump fixed next to the wall of Headmaster Mr Alastair Calder's garden. There the sheep lay down and later died.
Later that day my father arrived from Golspie where he was working on the pier extension for the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and saw John Macintosh burying the dead sheep where the Swedish Houses now stand. He went to John Macintosh to commiserate with him on the loss of his sheep and asked him if the village dogs had been worrying his sheep again. John Macintosh replied that this was indeed the case but that this time it was the "two legged ones". My father was none the wiser as he was never told the story of the raiding sheep.
Later Donnie James was in the same class at Dornoch School as John Macintosh junior and they were friends. John Macintosh even visited Donnie James in Salisbury (Harare), Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) when he attended a farming conference in that city in the 1970s. But I am sure that in their happy reminiscences they never got round to pesky sheep and "t" handled dibbers!.
Comment left on 05 April 2011 at 22:13 by Kenneth Mackay