Orkney Folk Tales Page 15

  THE STOLEN WINDING SHEET

  The following story took place in the Cross parish of Sanday. Babbie Skethaway was dying, and she knew it. All her life she had been very particular about everything and her death was to be no exception. She called the local howdy wife, Black Jock, to her house to discuss arrangements. The howdy wife was a midwife, district nurse and undertaker, all rolled into one. Black Jock was a rough woman with very little feminine charms and was so like her father in appearance and nature that everyone called her by his name. Babbie told her how she wanted her funeral to be and she pointed towards the large chest of drawers, telling Black Jock to look in the bottom drawer for her winding sheet; the shroud that she was to be buried in. Black Jock took out the garment and looked at it; it was beautiful, made from the finest silk and richly embroidered.

  ‘Do you think that it will fit me?’ asked Babbie. ‘Or should I try it on?’

  ‘No, no; I can see fine that it will fit you,’ said Black Jock.

  Soon poor old Babbie passed away and Black Jock washed her body and dressed her in her fine winding sheet ready for her final journey. At the funeral the drink flowed freely, for Babbie had made arrangements so that nothing was wanting. Black Jock drank like a beast, and as she grew more intoxicated so the more she hovered over Babbie’s open coffin, fingering the silken shroud and muttering to herself, ‘What a waste to put such a fine garment into the earth. What a waste; what a waste!’

  Babbie’s coffin was carried to the Cross kirk and she was buried in the kirkyard there. Back at Babbie’s house afterwards, more drink flowed and Black Jock drank her fill.

  Later that night, fuelled with home-made whisky and greed, Black Jock took a spade and set off under cover of darkness to the Cross kirkyard. She dug up Babbie’s grave and tore the silken winding sheet from her poor, wizened body, leaving her in her grave as naked as she had been when she had come into the world. She hurriedly filled in the grave and returned home with the stolen winding sheet, which she hid in the bottom of a big kist48 in her house.

  Not long after this horrible event a man called Andrew Moodie was walking home late one night. He had been sent on an errand by his master and, to his horror, he found that his way home led him past the Cross kirkyard and the sun was already setting. As it grew darker a terrible storm started to brew, with blue sheets of lightning tearing the black sky. It seemed to Andrew that the darkest piece of sky was right over the top of the Cross kirkyard, and a feeling of dread took a hold of him. As he drew nearer to the burial ground the wind rose and the rain lashed down so hard that he was blinded by it. But if that was bad it was nothing compared to the sight that next met his eyes, for as he approached the kirkyard gate he saw something which he never quite recovered from. Great pillars of coloured light, as tall as a ship’s mast, rose up from every grave, swaying slightly and burning like fire. The pillars were blue, yellow, green and red in colour, sometimes they changed so that it was impossible to say what colour they were. On top of each of these pillars of light stood the ghosts of the people who had been buried in the graves below. Some had only one ghost, others two, three or four ghosts, depending on the number who were buried there. They were of every age from old people to young babies and they were all talking together in voices that made Andrew’s blood run as cold as ice. He couldn’t understand the language of the dead, and he didn’t want to know what they were saying either. Among their number was one poor ghost who stood there naked. The other ghosts pointed towards her and shook their heads. Some pitied her, others mocked her, for the dead retain all the vices and nature of their living selves. Andrew recognised the naked ghost as Babbie Skethaway and he saw her staring around her, searching for something. Then, to Andrew’s horror, her head started to turn towards him. He knew that the look from a ghost is enough to break a man’s mind and he didn’t wait for Babbie’s gaze to fix on him; he turned and fled the scene. But the ghosts saw him and each one rose from their pillar of light, flew up into the air and began to chase him down the road. He ran like all the devils in hell were after him until he arrived at the nearest house, which happened to be Bea; Black Jock’s home.

  Andrew battered on the door and begged to be let in. After what seemed to be a lifetime to Andrew the door opened and Black Jock grabbed him and pulled him over the threshold before slamming the door shut. He saw that every hole in the house had been barricaded and protected with steel. Knives, awls, pins and a sickle were driven into the wooden barricades as a protection against evil spirits. Her cat sat quivering in the corner of the room, ears flattened against its head with fear. Black Jock’s husband was away for the night, so she was on her own. Her poor husband was a witless man who was bullied relentlessly by his wife. As a result he took every opportunity to go visiting people and then staying so late that they offered for him to stay the night. People felt sorry for him and so endured his company as an act of kindness.

  Andrew tried to tell Black Jock what he had seen, but she threw a peat at him, hitting him on the knee which made him cry with pain. Black Jock sat by the fire. She had drawn a circle around herself with a steel pin, which she held in her hand, muttering spells all the time. Suddenly the ghosts were upon them. They broke against the walls like a wave of malice, crying and roaring in their unearthly tongue. One ghost pulled the blocking from the hole in the flagstone roof above the door that the cat used as a door to get in and out of the house. However, as it did so it touched the steel blade of the sickle that was sticking there and it gave a loud cry of pain. This seemed to frighten the other ghosts as they all fled from the house. Then they grew angry and, returning, attacked the house with all their might. They went around the house, over the house and even underneath the house, roaring with rage as they went. Black Jock held her steel pin tightly in her grasp and muttered the spells that would protect her within the circle that she had drawn on the floor.

  Andrew lay crouched on the floor under a window, cowering with fear. Suddenly, the barricade over the window was torn away and what should he see but Babbie Skethaway’s ghostly head and long neck stretching in through the opening and moaning, ‘Where’s my sheet? Where’s my winding sheet? It’s cold, cold to lie in the ground, mother naked. Give me back my sheet!’

  Her long, bony arms were now thrust through the window opening and they waved to and fro, grasping the air as they went. One of her hands struck Andrew on the top of the head, knocking him unconscious. It was said that not a hair grew on his head where Babbie’s three fingers struck him. He collapsed on the floor, and one of his feet struck Black Jock’s hand, knocking the steel pin from her grasp. Without the protection of steel Black Jock was now vulnerable, so she ran to the kist and opened the lid. The stolen winding sheet leapt up into the air in a blue flame and flew straight towards Babbie’s ghost.

  ‘Take back your damned winding sheet, and my curse with it!’ cried Black Jock.

  A ghost struck Black Jock on the back and pushed her face first to the floor. Before they could exact any more revenge upon her the sun rose and the cock crowed. The ghosts rose from the ground and flew back to their graves, like a colony of bats returning to their cave.

  When her neighbours arrived at the scene Black Jock’s house was little more than a ruin. All the cattle that were tied in the byre were lying dead on the floor. Andrew was senseless and took a while to recover from the ordeal. But Black Jock remained fixed to the floor and no matter how many people pulled at her they could not move her. The ghosts had fixed her to the spot and it took magic and forespoken49 water to break the spell. The charms used to make this form of remedy were kept secret, especially from the minister. Black Jock did recover, but you can be sure that she avoided the Cross kirkyard after dark and she never dug up another grave for as long as she lived!

  JARL SIGURD THE STOUT’S GHOST ARMY

  Jarl50 Sigurd the Stout ruled Orkney from 995–1014 and was the last of the pagan jarls. Not long after he took over the rule of the islands he was threatened by a superior army of Sc
ots who wanted to control the north of what is now Scotland. Sigurd had an Irish mother called Eithne, who had a reputation for sorcery and witchcraft, and he asked her for her help in winning the battle. She looked at him scornfully, saying, ‘Had I known that you wanted to live forever I’d have reared you in my wool basket.’

  Sigurd’s blood boiled inside of him, but he held his tongue. His mother took a banner and handed it to him, saying, ‘I have made this banner with all the skill that I possess but it has this doom woven into it. It will bring victory to the army that carries it before them but death to the standard bearer who holds it.’

  The banner depicted a raven in flight and it looked as if it was flying in the air above them when they raised it. The raven was Odin’s bird and the life of the standard bearer was a sacrifice to him. It proved successful in bringing victory to Sigurd in that battle, but at the loss of three standard bearers.

  In 1114 Sigurd took an army from Orkney to fight alongside Sygtrygg Silk-Beard at Contarf in Ireland. Before he left Orkney, his faithful servant, Harek, asked to join him in the battle, but Sigurd refused his request as he thought that he was too old. To soften the blow Sigurd promised him that he would be the first to hear the outcome of the battle. The battle was long and hard but Sigurd’s men held their position in the centre of the army.

  During the battle a man in Caithness saw a group of twelve women riding to a weaving hut and go inside. He peeped through the window and the sight that he saw made his blood run cold, for these were no ordinary women but the Valkyries; the handmaidens of Odin and the choosers of the slain. They set up a loom and started to weave the web of war, directing the course of the battle. The uprights of the loom were made of spears and they wove a web made from human entrails, using arrows as shuttles and swords as weaving batons while human heads served as loom weights. They sang as they wove until the fate of the battle was decided, when they tore the web to pieces, each one taking a part.

  In Ireland Jarl Sigurd’s line was broken and three standard bearers had been killed. He ordered another man to take up the banner, but the man replied, ‘Bear your own devil, Jarl.’

  Sigurd tore the banner from its pole, wrapped it up and thrust it underneath his cloak. Just as he had done that he was run through with a spear and was killed.

  Harek waited at home for news of his master. One day he saw the jarl riding up with some of his men on horseback. Harek took a horse and rode out to meet him. People saw him stop and talk to Jarl Sigurd for a short while. Then they all turned their horses and Harek followed them behind a hill and out of sight. Harek and Jarl Sigurd the Stout’s ghostly army were never seen again.

  11

  SHIPWRECKS

  TALES OF THE SPANISH ARMADA

  In 1588 the Spanish Armada was driven north by the wind and scattered around the coast of Scotland and Ireland. One ship was lost on Fair Isle in Shetland, but despite tales of the Armada in Orkney there are no recorded wrecks. These low-lying islands have claimed many vessels over the years, however, and it would actually be strange if there weren’t any Armada wrecks amongst them. One thing that there is plenty of in Orkney is tales of the Spanish Armada.

  One of these tales is of a ship that foundered off North Ronaldsay. The crew took to the ship’s boat and headed towards this island. However, on approaching the coast they saw dark shapes huddled among the rocks on the shore and, thinking that it was men waiting in ambush, they turned their boat away. In fact, what they had seen was the ancient breed of North Ronaldsay sheep that eats seaweed and lives on the shore of the island.

  Another boatload of Spanish sailors arrived in the sheltered harbour of Pierowall in Westray and they were made welcome by the local people. Scotland was an independent country in those days and the Spanish were seen as nothing more than shipwrecked sailors in need of help and not as an enemy. These Spanish sailors married local girls and settled down. They were always called the Dons and many Westray families were said to be descended from them. Once these Dons had settled and started to raise families of their own they made a pact that no Don should marry outside of another Don family. This went on for some time before a young Don man fell in love with a Westray girl who had no Spanish blood in her. They courted in secret, as the other Dons would never allow them to be together. The young man went to the minister and asked if he could read their banns at the kirk three times that Sunday and then marry them, in order to prevent the Dons from stopping the wedding. This was agreed and the banns were read three times and the happy couple were wed. That night, as the young Don held his new bride in his arms, the other Dons arrived and pulled him from his marriage bed. He was roughly taken outside and received such a savage beating that he was hardly able to crawl back to his bed, where he died soon after.

  I remember being told a story from my own family, not about my brown-eyed and dark-haired mother’s side from Westray, but about my father’s side. The story went that a Spanish Armada ship was wrecked off Start Point in Sanday and one of the survivors was a dark-skinned Moor from North Africa; possible a galley slave. He settled on Sanday and started a family, which was where my family name of Muir came from.

  Walter Traill Dennison from Sanday had a sword in his private antiquarian collection at his home of West Brough that was said to have come from an officer of the Spanish Armada who died in the house of a Mr Traill (although we do not know which Traill this was). It was said that the officer thanked Traill for his kindness and offered him his sword as the only thing of value that he had left. The officer was said to have been buried in St Magnus Cathedral, but there is no historical evidence for this tale and no Armada burials in the cathedral.

  George Marwick (1836–1912) had many tales about an Armada ship that was smashed against the rocks at his native Yesnaby in the West Mainland. The survivors were also called ‘The Dons’, said to be from local people overhearing them refer to one or more of their number as ‘don’. A local man, who went to see what could be gleaned from the wreck, found a priest lying on the ground, near death. He held in his hand a large silver cross, which he was staring at with a fixed gaze. The local man gave him a stroke on the head with a staff, killing the priest, before stealing the cross. Some of the survivors saw this act of barbarity and gave chase. Eventually the offender took refuge in a church where the minister acted as mediator. It was eventually agreed that the cross could remain at the little kirk where it had been carried.

  One of the survivors walked a few miles down the coast before finding shelter under an earth dyke in the district of Outertown, Stromness. When the local people found him there, nearly dead from exposure, they took pity on him and gave him shelter and warm food. He was later allowed to build a home for himself; the site of his house is still called ‘The Don’ to this day.

  An infamous doctor called Tallian lived in Stromness and was said to be descended from a medical doctor on the Armada ship. He used to dig up dead bodies to remove the fat from around the heart, which was said to be a cure against certain diseases. He built a house which is still called ‘Wheeldon’ (spelt Quildon) to this day; meaning ‘quoy’ (enclosure) ‘don’. ‘Qu’ was pronounced ‘wh’ in olden times.

  Other survivors were said to have started families, of which there are more stories. One interesting tale is of a Spanish survivor called Sebastian. He married a local woman and they had a son, who was named after his father. The local children, who still spoke the old Norn language, found the name ‘Sebastian’ difficult to pronounce and could only say ‘Sabiston’, which is a surname still in use in the West Mainland.

  CHARLIE’S HOLE

  On Wednesday, 5 March 1834, the inhabitants of Outertown in Stromness saw a ship being driven by a storm towards the high cliffs called the Black Craig. The Dundee-registered ship was called the Star and was sailing to Wick from Bristol. On board the ship the crew could do nothing to save themselves as the huge seas pounded their vessel.

  The local folk gathered at the top of the Black Craig with simmans; ropes m
ade from twisted straw. As the ship was pushed right up against the side of the cliff they lowered their ropes to the crew that they could see on the deck below them. Suddenly, a huge wave rolled in from the Atlantic and broke against the ship with such ferocity that the vessel was smashed to pieces in an instant. The people found themselves helpless witnesses to a tragedy that they were powerless to do anything about. The ship was gone and there was no sign of the crew in the boiling water below. With heavy hearts they returned home to their firesides as the storm raged outside. And rage it did, for several days without a break, the wind howled and the seas pounded the cliffs and the shores.