Life's journey among the isles

A cairn on the abandoned island of Mingulay,. Beyond are the islands of Pabbay, Sanday, Vatersay and Barra.

BOOK REVIEW: My Journey by Elizabeth Campbell (Acair Books)

Elizabeth Campbell's autobiography

Although only 67 when she died, and having spent the majority of her days in one of the remotest parts of the British Isles, Elizabeth Campbell saw the world transformed during her lifetime.

Born in 1913, she grew up in a community where homes had bare dirt floors and where shoeless children were the norm. She witnessed the mixture of marvel and trepidation that greeted the appearance of the first car on the island of Barra, and she could recollect the famous shipwrecking of a cargo vessel loaded with whisky, as well as the arrival on the island of gramophones and finally electricity.

Campbell was a teacher all her life, mostly in Barra and Vatersay, but also in Glasgow.

She quietly lived most of her life in the Western Isles. In 1977, the year before she retired, she was bestowed the honour of MBE for services to the community of Vatersay, and she travelled to Buckingham Palace to receive the award from the Queen Mother.

In 1980 she completed writing her autobiography, Air Mo Chuairt [My Journey], in her native Gaelic. She died the following year. In 1982 the book was published. Now, 34 years on, an English translation has been released for the first time.

My Journey reveals what it was like to grow up and live on one of the islands of the Outer Hebrides. Campbell chronicles her life from childhood, when her father was away serving in the First World War, through her school years, the dances and ceilidhs, the weddings and how it was to walk the length of the island to reach the main town of Castlebay.

The shipwrecking of the SS Politician off the coast of the nearby island of Eriskay, an event later immortalised in the film Whisky Galore, is also recollected by Campbell, who was then in her late 20s.

She chose teaching as her profession and it was a career that lasted for 40 years.

In My Journey she does a tremendous job of creating a sense of place, setting and time, giving voice to her recollections in a natural, everyday manner. Indeed, reading the autobiography almost feels like being in Campbell’s company, sitting in her front room and listening to her stories.

Among the tales is an encounter with an elderly, former resident of Mingulay, the remote island to the south of Vatersay that was abandoned in 1912. Campbell does a fine job weaving in enlightening facts about the history of the islands, including stories of Mingulay.

Ruins at Uidh on Vatersay

My Journey takes readers back to a world far removed from the often frantic one of today. Community spirit was all encompassing, traditions were well observed, and even though worldly possessions were scant, the people were happy.

The children of the villages went barefoot, they had no choice. When new tackery boots arrived they would compete to see who could keep theirs in the best condition for the longest time. "Often a young girl would have them on a table beside her bed at night," writes Campbell in one of many touching vignettes that jump from the pages of My Journey.

The first car arrived in Barra in 1926, of which Campbell said: "People were truly amazed watching it (nearly lost the two eyes). If an old man or old woman was walking on the road, on seeing the car miles off they would dive off the road and run up on the hillside as fast as they could."

There are a few moments that are touched upon more than once, and therefore appear to carry extra poignancy for Campbell. One is the striking image of a boy declaring his independence from school life, in the days when children were allowed to leave school when they turned 14.

"One day a young 'hero' was fully ready to leave school the very day of his birthday," recollects Campbell. The bell rang and the schoolmaster called the boy to join the others inside the school grounds. "But instead the lad gave a speech informing the whole world that he was this day in a heaven of his own, free from all the restrictions that did not appeal to him. Thus he stood with one hand on his hip, the other raised upwards to the sky, and happy as one ever seen he bounded off over the hill of the bay. But that did him no harm. He got on well in the world, though his life was cut short. Each time I see that bridge, the memory of the 'Highland Fling' comes back to me."

Campbell's descriptive and highly accessible writing style is as much of a joy as the tales she relates. A good example is the story of George, who was the first to bring to Barra a gramophone player, complete with an elegant long horn.

"We thought the voice came from the next world! George used to take it on the rounds to each and every house in the village, and our group always followed him. Those who could not fit inside the house were like leftovers outside the door."

Later on we hear about that arrival of electricity in Barra in 1967, soon followed by television - or "the box".

Although there are moments when the book becomes almost a stream of conscience as anecdotes finish abruptly and a new thread is taken up, these instances are few and far between and hardly detract from the otherwise compelling narrative.

Kisimul Castle, in the harbour at Castlebay, Barra

During Campbell’s lifetime Gaelic was widely spoken across the Western Isles, but from an early age she was aware that it was viewed as "the language of the working people" in comparison to English. However, it is abundantly clear that Gaelic was, and is, one of the most important bonding elements within the island communities. And Campbell states her belief that even in the future native islanders "will allow no one under the sun to push Gaelic backwards out of the way".

Towards the end of the book, as she reflects on her life she wonders if the modern generation are as happy and fulfilled as she was in her youth.

"I don’t see young girls picking flowers as they did in my day. Neither do I hear young people complaining of lack of money. There is no word now of working hard all week to earn the shilling entrance fee for the dance. Everything is so easy for them, perhaps they are just as happy in their state as we were in our youth, but it is difficult to believe that," she writes

Though it was more than 50 years distant at the time she completed her autobiography, Campbell remembered the opening of the Northbay Hall in the late 1920s, and the first community dance held there and the happy steps and the noisy clatter on the floorboards.

Over the years there was plenty of joy and some hardships, but even the latter - such as clambering on hands and knees across rocks and seaweed to reach the little ferry that linked Barra and Vatersay - had an endearing edge.

My Journey is a pleasure to read with its vivid documentation of a world now mostly vanished, and is a reminder of how things once were, and how important it is to enjoy life’s journey through the good times, the hard times and all manifestations in between.

Air Mo Chuairt by Ealasaid Chaimbeul [My Journey by Elizabeth Campbell] is published by Stornaway-based Acair Books.

The first half of the new edition features the original Gaelic version. It is followed by a supporting English translation, compiled by another Barra native and teacher, Mary Flora Galbraith. Galbraith has done a sterling job bringing the book to a wider audience and preserving much of the flavour and quirks of the Gaelic original in the translated version, which includes numerous enlightening footnotes.