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The Prisoner of St Kilda: The True Story of the Unfortunate Lady Grange by Margaret Macaulay
justabean_reads's review
2.5
The curse of way too much non-fiction: interesting subject, mediocre writing. In this case, it was to the point where I was really wondering what her editor's notes were like, or if the author got any.
This is a short look at Lady Grange, the wife of a minor Jacobite noble who was so loudly unhappy about her husband cheating on her that said husband decided to have her kidnapped and imprisoned in the outer Hebrides, where she eventually died. This caused less scandal than one would think, because humans are the absolute worst. Most of the book is based on the two letters Lady Grange was able to smuggle to her lawyer (the second of these included in full in an appendix), padded out with a few other contemporary letters and diaries, plus some oral histories collected a hundred years later. The latter are generally compared and evaluated for likeliness in a manner that seemed pretty balanced. We also get thumbnails of pretty well everyone who entered the story, to varying degrees of relevance.
Macaulay is staunchly pro-Lady Grange, which seems fair given how she was treated by pretty well everyone, but is perhaps over explained. I feel like she could've trusted her modern readers to take Lady Grange's side, rather than constantly reminding us that we do so. Macaulay's also oddly stingy with her primary sources. She frequently refers to diaries and letters, but often either doesn't quote directly or only quotes snippets, even when they seem like they should be there. It has the effect of making her points unclear or disjointed. For example, there's quite a bit of hinting that one of the reasons for kidnapping Lady Grange was that she was going to out her husband as a Jacobite (something that had gotten his brother exiled for life, and could've gotten him hanged), but this is almost breezed past with no evidence, as though we all understood what happened? What? Given it was a slender volume already, I don't see why we couldn't have gotten more/longer quotes, or at least quotes organised in a more sensible fashion.
Anyway, great topic, would've liked a longer, less muddled take on the same subject.
This is a short look at Lady Grange, the wife of a minor Jacobite noble who was so loudly unhappy about her husband cheating on her that said husband decided to have her kidnapped and imprisoned in the outer Hebrides, where she eventually died. This caused less scandal than one would think, because humans are the absolute worst. Most of the book is based on the two letters Lady Grange was able to smuggle to her lawyer (the second of these included in full in an appendix), padded out with a few other contemporary letters and diaries, plus some oral histories collected a hundred years later. The latter are generally compared and evaluated for likeliness in a manner that seemed pretty balanced. We also get thumbnails of pretty well everyone who entered the story, to varying degrees of relevance.
Macaulay is staunchly pro-Lady Grange, which seems fair given how she was treated by pretty well everyone, but is perhaps over explained. I feel like she could've trusted her modern readers to take Lady Grange's side, rather than constantly reminding us that we do so. Macaulay's also oddly stingy with her primary sources. She frequently refers to diaries and letters, but often either doesn't quote directly or only quotes snippets, even when they seem like they should be there. It has the effect of making her points unclear or disjointed. For example, there's quite a bit of hinting that one of the reasons for kidnapping Lady Grange was that she was going to out her husband as a Jacobite (something that had gotten his brother exiled for life, and could've gotten him hanged), but this is almost breezed past with no evidence, as though we all understood what happened? What? Given it was a slender volume already, I don't see why we couldn't have gotten more/longer quotes, or at least quotes organised in a more sensible fashion.
Anyway, great topic, would've liked a longer, less muddled take on the same subject.
readingisadoingword's review
informative
tense
4.0
This is an incredibly well researched and gripping account of the abduction and imprisonment of Rachel Chiesley, Lady Grange.
The intractable wife of James Erskine, Lord Grange - an advocate and Lord Justice Clerk - Rachel was a "difficult" character. Not content to quietly acquiesce to her husband's infidelity, she threatened him with exposure of his Jacobite connections, unless he give up his mistress. These men could not tolerate the presence of such a loose canon and it was arranged that Lady Grange should "disappear".
Abducted from her home in Edinburgh she was transported over an extended period, to the Highlands - being held initially on the Monach Isles and then taken to St Kilda for a number of years. She died in captivity on the Isle of Skye, having never returned to Edinburgh after over 13 years of imprisonment.
Margaret Macaulay's account of this unbelievable sequence of events is insightful and thought provoking. It seems universally accepted that Rachel Erskine was a wilful and tempestuous character. She didn't fit the mould of a submissive wife and society lady of the time. Despite his adultery her husband received the public's sympathy. It is noted that in the written accounts available, it is always men that are assessing Rachel's character and behaviour and often with a premeditated motive to cover their own backs should her treatment at their hands ever be discovered.
This account also highlights the stark division in Scotland at the time - not only politically but socially and culturally. During the period of the Jacobite uprisings, although there was some support in Lowland Scotland, and even in England, the majority of Jacobites came from the Highland Clans.
Getting Lady Grange out of Edinburgh and into the Highlands as quickly as possible was effectively removing her from everything she had known. The lifestyle and language were completely different. She didn't speak Gaelic and therefore could not communicate with the majority of her captors or the communities in which she was held.
After 8 years, she eventually managed to get letters to Edinburgh through a sympathetic minister and an attempt at a rescue was launched but her captors were a step ahead and she was moved before she could ever be found.
The story is engrossing and enraging and unfortunately one that still happens in parts of the world today when outspoken women are occasioned to "disappear".
Further information and digital copies of her letters are available here: https://libraryblogs.is.ed.ac.uk/diu/...
https://images.is.ed.ac.uk/luna/servl...
The intractable wife of James Erskine, Lord Grange - an advocate and Lord Justice Clerk - Rachel was a "difficult" character. Not content to quietly acquiesce to her husband's infidelity, she threatened him with exposure of his Jacobite connections, unless he give up his mistress. These men could not tolerate the presence of such a loose canon and it was arranged that Lady Grange should "disappear".
Abducted from her home in Edinburgh she was transported over an extended period, to the Highlands - being held initially on the Monach Isles and then taken to St Kilda for a number of years. She died in captivity on the Isle of Skye, having never returned to Edinburgh after over 13 years of imprisonment.
Margaret Macaulay's account of this unbelievable sequence of events is insightful and thought provoking. It seems universally accepted that Rachel Erskine was a wilful and tempestuous character. She didn't fit the mould of a submissive wife and society lady of the time. Despite his adultery her husband received the public's sympathy. It is noted that in the written accounts available, it is always men that are assessing Rachel's character and behaviour and often with a premeditated motive to cover their own backs should her treatment at their hands ever be discovered.
This account also highlights the stark division in Scotland at the time - not only politically but socially and culturally. During the period of the Jacobite uprisings, although there was some support in Lowland Scotland, and even in England, the majority of Jacobites came from the Highland Clans.
Getting Lady Grange out of Edinburgh and into the Highlands as quickly as possible was effectively removing her from everything she had known. The lifestyle and language were completely different. She didn't speak Gaelic and therefore could not communicate with the majority of her captors or the communities in which she was held.
After 8 years, she eventually managed to get letters to Edinburgh through a sympathetic minister and an attempt at a rescue was launched but her captors were a step ahead and she was moved before she could ever be found.
The story is engrossing and enraging and unfortunately one that still happens in parts of the world today when outspoken women are occasioned to "disappear".
Further information and digital copies of her letters are available here: https://libraryblogs.is.ed.ac.uk/diu/...
https://images.is.ed.ac.uk/luna/servl...
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