Floods, Droughts and Drownings - Nature and Supernature

Water is a strange medium.  We have noted before, in previous posts, that certain flowing waters in our region  have had an uncanny reputation, including the 'Dowie' Dean which flows through Glamis and the life demanding River Ericht, in Gowrie, to the west of Angus. (The story of the rivers which lure people to death can be read here: Waters of Death and Tales of Bridges). Other, still waters, deep, mysterious wells were said to heal the sick, and details can be found here.  Floods are, unfortunately, a fact of life though not all that common of course in Angus.  Brechin has an inundation in 1914 when the South Esk burst following heavy rain on Wednesday 5th May.  The aptly named River Street was the first to feel the effects, with houses being under 4 to 5 feet of floodwater.  The Almshouse, Public Hall and other places had to used to decant victims, but thankfully the waters had largely subsided by Friday that week.

The Brothock Burn flooding old Arbroath

Mysterious River Droughts

      Mysterious droughts of rivers are naturally more uncommon that spates and floods.  But there have been examples.  The first recorded example which I know about is stated to have happened to the South Esk around 1633.  The following quote is taken from an earlier source by Violet Jacob in her book The Lairds of Dun:

About this time a pot of the water of Brechin called Southesk became suddenly dry and for a short space continued so, and bolts up again and turns to its own course; which was thought to be an ominous token for Scotland, as it so fell out.
    About the month of January there was seen in Scotland a great blazing star representing the shape of a crab or cancer having long spaings spreading from it . . .it was thought by some that this star and the drying up of the pot of Brechin . . . were prodigious signs of great trouble in Scotland, which over truly came to pass.  

The drought in the river may be the same one which Brechin historian  David Black describes:

In 1634 the South Esk suddenly subsided, from what cause was not known, at least is not reported; but the fact is recorded and imputed as a sign of the troubles which then hung over the kingdom.  Tradition has it, that the bed of the river was wholly dry for twenty-four hours, except at the Ee-o'-the-Weil, and Stannachee, and that the water gradually subsided, and as gradually returned.  Most probably the circumstance had arisen from a great drought.

   Again, in the following century, according to James Mitchell:

The North Water, near Brechin, was suddenly dried up, in the beginning of 1763, from  6 o'clock in the morning to 12 o'clock at noon, when the water began to flow again as usual. 

This being observed at the start of the year, in winter, drought is an implausible explanation.

Tragic Deaths by Water

Tragic Deaths by Water

In memory of David Whyte, aged 27, and of
bis younger brother, Archibald Whyte, aged 18.
As the two brothers were proceeding to leap across
at a spot where the Mark, contracted by craggy
rocks on either side into a narrow and rapid torrent,
anon pours headlong over a high precipice into a
deep eddying abyss, when the elder, having already
crossed with facility, perceived that his brother
had fallen into the impetuous stream, urged by the
impulse of holy affection and by the vain hope of
saving his life, rushed in heedlessly after him, and
both lamentably perished together, on the 27th of
October, 1820, in the glen (or valley) of Mark,
parish of Lochlee, and county of Forfar. To commemorate
the premature death, as well as the
illustrious example of mutual affection, the talents,
the piety, and other excellent endowments which
adorned the hapless brothers—alas ! so suddenly
snatched away from their weeping relatives— this
monument was erected by their bereaved and disconsolate
father, James Whyte.

   The above epitaph is the translation of a Latin epitaph of the Whyte brothers who died at the precipice known as Gripdyke in Glenmark.  They perished while they were collecting their father's sheep.  The words were written by their brother Rev John Whyte, minister of Lethnot.  His brothers were taking a flock of sheep from their home at Glenbervie  to Cullow Market at Cortachy.  The place Gripdyke was named after a barrier erected to stop sheep straying to lower ground.  It is said that Archibald, in an act of bravado leapt over the precipice with his hands in his pockets and therefore could not save himself when he began to plummet.

   Equally tragic, but not so dramatic, was the drowning of three-year-old William Lanrence, son of a vintner at Usan, who drowned in a well there in October 1787.  

Doth infant's pain and death proclaim,

That Adam did Rebel?

His destiny proclaims the same, 

Being drowned in a Well.

Let all who mourn his early death,

Hate sin the fatal cause, 

And flee to Jesus Christ by faith

Who saves from Satan's jaws.

     Another poor child is recorded by have drowned in the same manner in the parish of Maryton.

Mysterious Drownings

The Rev Frederick Cruickshank wrote a history of his own cojoined Angus parishes of Navar and Lethnot.  He shows from his writings that he was aware of the unexplained side of the world and was quite prepared to admit the possibility of 'otherness'.  These are two of his stories, relating to drowning, the second one relating the fate of an unfortunate lad:

The farm of Corrie in the West Water has long since ceased to exist as a separate place, but the site is marked by the ruins of old houses betwixt Glascory and Hunthill. It was tenanted in 1726 by Alexander Gibb, and towards the end of the century by a person of the same surname, no doubt a descendant. The dwelling-house happened to be burned down, and a considerable sum of money was destroyed. Nothing whatever was saved. The only remnant of what the house contained that escaped the flames, was part of a leaf of the Family Bible, and the only words upon it that were legible was the verse from Revelation, 'One woe is past, and behold there come two more woes hereafter.' This so preyed upon the poor man’s mind as to drive him to fulfil the second woe in his own person, by throwing himself into a pool of the adjoining West Water. The house was rebuilt, and the last person that lived in it was called Smart.

A boy, staying with his aunt, the housekeeper at Waterhead, for the purposes of attending the West Water School, which was taught only during the winter, was on his way home in the dark of evening. The frost had been severe, and the river was covered with ice. The ice gave way when he was crossing, and he was carried down beneath it. His body was not got for some time, as no one could know where to look for it. Just at the very time when the accident must have happened, and the boy was expected to come in at the door, a loud knocking was heard at the window. When the door was opened no person was seen. The knocking was repeated, but though search was made round the place, nothing was seen or heard to account for it. Of course, when the truth was known respecting the fate of the boy, there could be only one interpretation of the mysterious noise. (Navar and Lethnot, pp. 297-8.)

Vanished Lochs

   Old Angus is likely to have been a more watery place as a hold in past times.  Edward's map of the county in 1678 shows large bodies of water near Dunnichen and Barry.  Both locks have now disappeared.  The lochs which survive in the are of Forfar Loch were once much larger and a lot of them were joined together.  A map of 1814 shows Loch Fithie joined to Rescobie.  The much reduced body of water at Restenneth once covered 200 acres.  Many of the lochs were reduced by being drained by landowners during the process of obtaining shell marl which was used as a valuable fertiliser.  The largest of the lochs here, Forfar, was lowered sixteen feet when the Drain to the Dean Water was cut.  

Some Works Consulted

Black, James, The History of Brechin to 1864 (Edinburgh, 1867).

Cruickshank, Rev. Frederick, Navar and Lethnot, the History of a Glen Parish in the North-east of Forfarshire (Brechin, 1899).

Hosgood, Blanch, 'Southern Forfarshire: A Regional Study,' Scottish Geographical Magazine, 35:1, pp. 15-29 (1919).

Jacob, Violet, The Lairds of Dun (London, 1931).

Jervise, Andrew, Epitaphs and Inscriptions from Burial Grounds and Old Buildings in the North East of Scotland, volume I (Edinburgh, 1875).

Jervise, Andrew, The Land of the Lindsays (Edinburgh, 1853).

Mitchell, James, The Scotsman's Library; Being a Collection of Anecdotes and Facts Illustrative of Scotland and Scotsmen (Edinburgh, 1825).

Another stretch of the North Esk