Most branches of my family have rural roots and were poor. The amount of illegitimacy is very high, but tradition in that part of rural Scotland seems to indicate that as long as you were pledged to one another having a baby before you married was fine. The kirk hated it, of course, and hauled the couple before them. But the kirk also condemned peasant weddings because there was too much drinking, dancing and merry-making stretching over several days. I have some marvellous kirk records which describe the lifestyles of my family back then and it makes for entertaining reading. I've also got a travelogue written about that area from 1832 which adds more colour to the portrait of the past. The writer also did sketches including the 'run-down hovel' where my ancestors lived and one of the 'bare-headed and bare-footed' female farm labourers in their dark blue dresses with pink aprons.
One of my great-great grandfathers - born in this parish in the wilds of Scotland - was anything but dull, thanks to his criminal record. He was arrested for 'raising sepulchres'. The wealth of detail in the court papers relating to his defence is extraordinary. He claimed he had borrowed a cart to use to visit a farmer he once worked for on the off chance the farmer may be able to give him some spuds so he could feed his starving family. On the way there, he chanced upon a whisky smuggler, who only spoke Gaelic (he spoke both English and Gaelic). The smuggler offered my gg grandfather some of the illicit hooch in exchange for a lift. The story describes the state of the road, countryside, houses, people, superstitions and much more. He was given a year - which the newspapers stated was an extraordinarily tough sentence when it was a first offence and only involved one body! Then he fades from any official records. But I know that he had 17 children by two wives - the youngest being one of my great-grandmothers.
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