THE WITCH OF GIGHA.
William Jardine Dobie
This article is published by the permission, gratefully acknowledged, of Messrs. William Hodge & Co. Ltd., proprietors of the former Scottish Law Review in which this article first appeared in 1939. The author was the late William Jardine Dobie then Sheriff Substitute at Campbeltown, and a valued member of the Council of the Society.
Present-day writers on the Island of Gigha refer to the old beliefs which still linger in this little isolated community, and as recently as seventy-five years ago, a case occurred which well illustrates the strong undercurrent of superstition then prevalent. The story opens in the Steamboat Tavern in Port Ellen in islay, where, in a suitable atmosphere of spirits and peat-reek, James Smith, farmer in Gigha, held the assembled company with a tale of wonder. Some time previously, while he was engaged in the business of his farm, a woman from a neighbouring holding had appeared at his stable door and begged the use of a graip. In the momentary interval which elapsed while he sought the implement asked for, the woman vanished as suddenly as she had come, and Smith, with surprise that soon turned to consternation, saw in her place a brown hare which, after an unhurried scrutiny of the horror-stricken farmer, turned leisurely and loped off, in easy fashion, across the fields. The faculty of transformation into animal form which has always been an accepted tradition of witch-cult, and the farmer's experience deeply impressed his audience. Archibald McDonald, an elder of the Kirk, who was of the company, testified later on oath to the effectiveness of the story, and deponed that his hair stood on end at the recital of it. Impressed by the importance attaching to his queer experience, the farmer was not unwilling to repeat his tale, and, at the miller's and elsewhere, he recounted his adventure to an attentive audience. In this way the story readily gained currency and credence, not only in Gigha itself but in the neighbouring islands and the mainland.
The sequel to the story, though transferred to a more prosaic plane, is not without interest. For, within a short time after his original narrative in the Steamboat Tavern in Islay, the farmer found himself called as defender in the Sheriff Court at Campbeltown, in an action for damages for slander by the woman in the story, who was also of farming stock in Gigha. The slander alleged was in fixing on the pursuer the character of a witch. The defender - his solicitor for him - was apparently unwilling to accept the onus of proving veritas, and contented himself with a general denial, and with the argument that the imputation was in any case not only absurd but was not slanderous. Following a debate on relevancy, the Sheriff-Substitute (Gardiner) allowed a proof before answer, and, on appeal, the Sheriff (Cleghorn) adhered. The view taken by the Sheriffs was that, while the general belief in witchcraft had long since disappeared, there were still places -of which Gigha might be one - in which such a charge as was averred might bring not only ridicule but even persecution on the pursuer. It was sufficient for her case if she was exposed to odium or contempt. (Sheriff v. Wilson, 1853, 17D. 528).
The action naturally became a cause celebre in the district, and it may have been a result of the feeling it engendered that one of the pursuer's witnesses - the Gigha ferryman - failed to attend after due citation, and was decerned to pay the statutory penalty of twenty shillings to the pursuer. As it turned out, the pursuer had ample proof of her case. The defender's success and enthusiasm as a raconteur made it easy to establish the story that he had so willingly repeated, and the Sheriff had no difficulty in finding in fact that, in making the statements, the defender intended to convey that the pursuer had "exercised the power of transformation popularly ascribed to witches of turning herself into a hare," and that the story with this imputation "attained general currency throughout and even beyond the island of Gigha, and the pursuer thus became through the defender's means, the common talk of those among whom she dwells, as a person dealing in witchcraft." On the question of damages, Archibald McDonald, the elder of the kirk above mentioned, deponed - in a sentence that might have been expressed otherwise - "I think worse of her myself in consequence of her being connected with this story than I did before." And the pursuer herself - with commendable restraint - explained that she felt "very sore about it." In the result the Sheriff found that the defender's story was calculated to, and, according to the pursuer's testimony, did in fact cause much injury to her feelings, and that "in a district where a belief in witches is still a part of the popular creed, for a woman to get the character of one is to render her an object of suspicion and avoidance, and the accredited author of half the mischief that may befall her neighbours." The pursuer's averments were accordingly held relevant to support a claim of damages, and these were modified by the Sheriff at ten pounds, the defender being also found liable in expenses.
The books of Court show that decree was never taken for the amount of the pursuer's expenses, and that she did not apparently find it necessary to extract the decree for the principal sum. From this it may be inferred that the defender met his obligations promptly and without question. He seems to have paid not too dearly for his brief period of notoriety, and one can only hope that the ten pounds -with the possible addition of twenty shillings collected from the reluctant ferryman - were sufficient to assuage the "soreness" of the pursuer. In taking leave of the case one can also echo the Sheriff's hope that the result would have "a good effect upon the Gigha witch-believers by teaching them the salutary lesson that, whatever may be their own idle superstitions, the character of their neighbours will not be allowed to suffer therefrom with impunity."
END
The Kelpie
The following story is told by Cuthbert Bede, author of "Glencreggan" in "Argyll's Highlands."
A water-kelpie fell in love with a beauteous maiden walking on the sea shore, and persuaded her to come and see his wonderful coral cave. Her curiosity satisfied she wished to go back to land where she had a lover more to her taste. She told him she could not live with him unless she had her spinning wheel. He trusted her and took her through the waves and placed her safely on the sea-shore, where she was found by her lover in a swoon. He refused to believe her story about the kelpie, but was forced to change his mind, for after their marriage every morning they found three spotted trout placed just outside their door, ready for breakfast. It was the gift of the water-kelpie, who had not forgotten his love for the maiden.