Sir Walter Scott was more than just a writer. He was a brilliant, romantic storyteller who informed the whole world about the beauty and power of his native land.
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Scotland's changes after the second world war
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William Alexander Smith
- Name : Smith
- Born : 1854
- Died : 1914
- Category : Other
- Finest Moment : Creation of the Boys' Brigade, 1883
Born in Thurso, in 1854, the son of an officer in the dragoons who later became a businessman. When his father died, Smith moved to Glasgow, aged 13, to be brought up by an uncle in the wholesaling business. He joined his business as an apprentice, and later started his own firm along with a brother.
Smith joined the Lanarkshire Rifle Volunteers, the YMCA, and the Free Church. In the latter he became associated with the Rev George Reith (father of the BBC's Lord Reith). All of these activities ignited one day in 1883. Smith was taking a Sunday School in North Woodside, full of young, energetic, but somewhat bored pupils. Why not, Smith thought, introduce some discipline to these pupils, in the way of a paramilitary youth organisation. And so 'The Boys' Brigade' was created.
It spread rapidly throughout Scotland, Britain and the Commonwealth. It was dedicated to 'the advancement of God's Kingdom among Boys'. Entrants wore a simple uniform of belt, diagonal sash, and a small, round hat which maintained its position via a chin-strap. Eventually, summer camps were part of the scheme, and always with a firm church base. The organisation was quasi-military, with companies, brigades and so on. There was a fair bit of drilling and marching, all intended to introduce some personal discipline into youthful hooligans, and it worked for many.
Smith married twice and had two sons; he gave up his business to concentrate on the organisation, becoming its Secretary and organiser. Knighted in 1909, he died the day after a mass rally in London, in the Albert Hall. He was succeeded by both sons, one of whom, Stanley, followed in his footsteps as Brigade Secretary.
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- Name : Angus VC
- Born : 1888
- Died : 1959
- Category : Other
- Finest Moment : Being awarded the VC for his outstanding bravery in saving the life of a British officer in 1915 during the First World War.
- website: http://www.forvalour.com/
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William Balfour Blaikie / Explorer
- Name : Blaikie
- Born : 1825
- Died : 1864
- Category : Explorers
- Finest Moment : Opening up the River Niger to navigation.
Born in Kirkwall, Orkney, Blaikie studied medicine at Edinburgh University, joining the Royal Navy as a surgeon in 1848. In 1854 he was the surgeon/naturalist on the schooner Pleiad, exploring the Niger river in West Africa. On the death of the captain, Blaikie took over the command of the ship, and succeeded in penetrating some 250 miles further inland than previous explorations. This success was due in part to a successful method of avoiding malaria. He returned and published a book on the voyage in 1856.
The following year Blaikie was back on the Pleiad again, but not for long as it was wrecked. He created a settlement at Lukoja, where the Niger and Benue Rivers join, and within five years he had opened up the navigation of the Niger, built roads, collated a native vocabulary, and translated part of the Bible and Prayer Book into Hausa.
He died when on leave, at Freetown in Sierrra Leone, in 1864.
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William Brown / Mountaineers
- Name : Brown
- Born : 1868
- Died : 1901
- Category : Mountaineers
- Finest Moment : Second ascent and first Scottish ascent North-East Buttress, Ben Nevis (May 1895); first ascent North Buttress, Buachaille Etive Mor (July 1895); first ascent Tough-Brown Traverse, Lochnagar (August 1895); first winter ascent The Castle, Ben Nevis (April 1896)
William Brown was the eldest son of ex-Sheriff Brown of Aberdeen. He was educated at Aberdeen, where he graduated with an M.A. and then at Edinburgh where he studied law, graduating with an L.L.B.
As a lawyer he soon showed much promise, being called to the Bar in 1892. He had joined the SMC in December of the previous year and his energy ensured that he served on the Committee from December 1895 to 1899.
As a climber too, Brown was energetic and full of enthusiasm; bursting in fact with the joy of exploratory climbing. On Ben Nevis, following the dramatic descent of Tower Ridge by the Hopkinson family in 1892, with the first ascent under winter conditions two years later, all eyes were fixed on the massive skyline ridge of the North-East Buttress. What was unknown to the Scots however, was that the Hopkinsons had also climbed the Buttress, three days after Tower Ridge. So it was that on the 1895 Easter Meet of the SMC, in Fort William, the buttress became the object of ambition.
Brown determined to be the first to climb the buttress, and enlisted his usual climbing partner William Tough (the latter pronounced "Tooch"). There was only one problem; the train timetables. The newly opened West Highland Line was not designed for climbers, so they devised the plan of taking the Friday night express to Kingussie, cycling to Fort William, climbing the route then cycling back to Kingussie the same day to return to Edinburgh tired but hopefully happy on Sunday evening. This was in May, 1895.
The weather, naturally, decided not to cooperate. When, after a tiring cycle journey, sharing one bike after the other one had suffered a burst tyre, they arrived at the foot of the rocks at 5.30 pm, the heavens opened and down it poured. Once it cleared somewhat they soloed up to the first platform and roped up. Things went steadily until, several hundred feet below the top and in thickening mist, they failed on slabby rocks, "which turned out to be the man-trap of the ridge". It was now 9.45 pm with daylight almost gone.
A bivouac crossed their minds but Tough egged on his friend and they succeeded in finding a variation avoiding the rocky step above their heads. With another few pitches the route was finished and reaching the Observatory on the summit just after 10 pm they grabbed an hour of sleep. A telegraph sent by the intrepid pair to the SMC Journal Editor read "Climbed our ridge reaching top 10.05 Saturday extremely difficult and sensational Brown."
Brown and Tough eventually reached Edinburgh, after 45 hours of continuous travel, to be met by William Douglas. Later that summer, the Alpine Club Journal came out with a short report by the Hopkinsons on their ascent of the buttress. It was impossible, however, to know exactly where the Hopkinsons had climbed but all routes lead to the man-trap and presumably that way had been taken. Probably in the damp gloom Brown and Tough had failed to see any nail scratches on the rocks from the first ascenders' boots.
In July 1895, Brown and Tough, along with Rose, made the first ascent of North Buttress on Buachaille Etive Mor. This rock climb, still a respectable and enjoyable route of about Difficult in standard may be regarded as the first climb in Glencoe recognisable as a clean, distinct and lengthy rock climb, Collie's earlier expeditions notwithstanding. It was another bold piece of exploration by William Brown.
In August of the same year, 1895, the same dynamic duo made the first rock climb on Lochnagar, climbing an ascending line across a steep, slabby buttress now known as Tough-Brown Traverse. In 1896 Brown was in the party which made the first winter ascent of the Grade III Castle Ridge on Ben Nevis. His partners that April day were Naismith, Maclay and Thomson.
Sadly, Brown was soon to fall ill and after a three-year struggle with a wasting illness he died on September 15th, 1901. He was then in his 33rd year and had just been made a lecturer at Edinburgh University. Undoubtedly the history of early mountaineering in Scotland would read very different had he enjoyed a normal life span.
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- Name : Cadell
- Born : 1708
- Died : 1777
- Category : Famous Historical Figures
- Finest Moment : Establishment of the Carron Company Iron Works, in 1759
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William Douglas / Mountaineer
- Name : Douglas
- Born : 1863
- Died : 1932
- Category : Mountaineers
- Finest Moment : First Ascent Naismith's Route, Crowberry Ridge
An Edinburgh man, Douglas joined the newly formed SMC in 1890 and immediately became one of its most energetic and likeable characters. Only two years after joining that club he took over the post as Journal Editor, a task he performed diligently for 18 years from 1892-1909. Having married Phyllis Procter in 1908, he probably found that family life was taking up too much time and energy for such a time-consuming job!
As a mountaineer Douglas was very experienced, having climbed, between 1895 and 1912, in Switzerland, the Dolomites, France and Italy, the Canadian Rockies, Norway and the Jura Mountains. One of his most notable climbs was a 21-hour traverse of the Meije, with J Rennie, a fellow club member. It was of this climb, in the classic book by Raeburn "Mountaineering Art" that Raeburn asserted it was one of the few Alpine routes for which a rope was probably useful. As a climber, wrote his friend Rennie, Douglas was bold, but not rash and willing to take a chance.
In Scotland his ascents ranged over a wide area from the Southern Highlands to the far North-West. On Ben Nevis he has a permanent memorial as the 700-foot Douglas Boulder is named after him. This rock feature lies at the foot of Tower Ridge and in 1896 on an Easter Meet of the SMC at Fort William, four climbers made an ascent of the Very Difficult Direct Route on the Boulder. The party consisted of William Douglas (who in an amusing account of the climb referred to himself as the "baggage"), William Brown, who led the crux pitch, Lionel Hinxman and Harold Raeburn, who made an early appearance as a guest on the meet.
It was a mark of Douglas' popularity that the Boulder be named after him; even his photographs indicate his good nature. Lord Mackay, writing descriptions of some of the earlier climbers, describes Douglas as "always modest but indispensable". At his wedding, the cake was designed in the shape of a mountain, with climbers wielding ice axes dotted about its surface.
Other ascents on which Douglas played a key role included: Naismith's Route on Crowberry Ridge on the Buachaille. This was climbed in August 1896 and as Naismith later remarked, one of the most difficult parts of the day was in getting Douglas past the ripe clumps of crowberries growing everywhere. It was the first ascent of the formidably appearing Crowberry Ridge; Black Spout Gully, Left Branch (March 1893) and the first recorded ascent on Lochnagar. The day before this ascent, they made an incredibly bold attempt on a formidable gully further left on the cliffs, only to retreat before the 60m headwall. This was only climbed in 1950 and is now a grade 5. In their honour it is called Douglas Gibson Gully.
Douglas was interested in every aspect of the Scottish hills and he wrote 50 or so articles or notes on their topography, history, ornithology and other aspects. He was one of the first climbers to describe the Brocken Spectre in Scotland and included along with his note a delightful little sketch of the phenomenon.
William Douglas died in 1932, leaving his wife and two sons. Phyllis, who was also a keen climber, became one of the original members of the Ladies Scottish Climbing Club.
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