A Day in Invergordon, Scotland

Today has been the last of the ancestor hunting days. We drove up to Invergordon to see what we could find out about my great-grandparents. It is a cloudy, drizzly, and raw day today, not really conducive to ancestor collecting, but since it’s our only day here, I had to make the most of it. We decided that since we would be visiting here on a Sunday, that we would go to church here, at the Church of Scotland where my family would have worshipped. C of S is the equivalent of Presbyterian at home, where the most important part of the service is the Word, not the Sacrament. There was no Communion this morning, but there were plenty of prayers, a long sermon, and lots of talking. We also sang five hymns. All had unfamiliar tunes except, “I, the Lord of Sea and Sky”. You know we sang that one heartily and loudly! All the other hymns were read from the hymnal which only has the printed words, no music to accompany the hymn. It was the same last Sunday at St. Thomas Church and it makes for a challenge. We arrived about a half hour early and had a short chat with one of the ushers. By the time the minister, Rev. Douglas MacLeod, started the service, he was already aware of our presence and asked the congregation to welcome us. Everyone was very friendly and we had a nice chat with the minister after church. There is something very comforting about going to church while in a foreign country….you realize that you all have your faith in common, no matter how different you are. The congregation looks fairly prosperous as they’ve just added on a brand new hall, toilets, and kitchen. This is in contradiction to the appearance of the town; well, at least of the High Street. It looked rather run-down, but there are much nicer homes up by the golf course. There is a large, deep port here, and that’s why my father’s ship came in here from the North Sea during the war. It is a protected firth, and made a good safe haven for many of the ships and seaplanes. When Hubby and I were here in 1976, there was an aluminum smelter and a whiskey distillery in Invergordon but neither one exists anymore. Now the port is used by the port authority and there were two big deep sea oil rigs being built at the docks. I’ve never seen one other than in photos, and they are huge! Their profile shadows the town and is visible from everywhere. One of the rigs is about to be placed on a ship and transported to Singapore.

To do my search today, I had some old photos to go on, a postcard addressed to my great-grandparents so I knew they lived on Tomich Road, and after emailing last month with the librarian at the Invergordon Library, I knew where the cemetery was that they should be buried in. To set the stage, my great-grandparents had four children: my grandmother who was the oldest and born in Kincardine, and three sons, Joseph, William and James. Joseph immigrated to Australia, William died at 25 of tuberculosis, and James, who continued to live in Invergordon until his death in 1970. (Hubby and I had visited his widow, Mabel, here in 1976. She was so pleased that we had come to visit, and I swear she had been cooking the meal for three days before we arrived. The roast beef, potatoes, and cauliflower were all the same color and consistency!). I wasn’t sure I would be able to find my great-grandparents graves, but I thought I should be able to find Uncle Jim and Aunt Mabel’s. The photo of my great-grandparents grave looked like it had a small stone marker but certainly not a big headstone. I just didn’t think that I’d have any luck finding it. Hubby and I fanned out, each walking up and down the rows and rows of graves. After about a half-hour of searching, Hubby discovered their son James’ grave, carved in pink granite with a large B on it. But, it left some mysteries: first, here the family name is spelled Beacon, with the N on the end instead of Beacom with an M. We know that sometime after 1921, the family changed the name, but why did they do that? My mother’s sister, the only surviving grandchild that I know of, thought that the name had been changed, but she doesn’t know why either. These families over here really don’t know much about each other! The gravestone is inscribed: James Beacon, died July 29, 1970, beloved husband of Esther E. M. Wooding. Now, here’s the second mystery. I only knew Aunt Mabel as his wife. Does the M in that name stand for Mabel? The fact that her maiden name is written here doesn’t seem to be unusual in this graveyard….most of the other stones had the woman’s maiden name carved into the stone, not their married names. But, the fact that she is called Esther is a curious thing. I might have thought we had the wrong grave, but first of all, Beacon is a rather unusual name, and even more so up here in Scotland, but the gravestone says that also buried here are James’ parents (names not listed) and his brothers, William and Joseph! But, here’s the fourth mystery: although William died here in Invergordon in 1932 and the grave is surrounded by others who had died in the 1930’s, Joseph was the brother who immigrated to Australia and had a wife and family there. Is he really buried in this grave after dying in Australia? Or perhaps he came back to Scotland before his death? So, I have some work to do. I will contact the Highland Council office to see if they can tell me who is buried in the grave. Also, I am going to try to locate the death record of James Beacon who died on 29 July 1970 because that will tell me his wife’s name and the names of his parents. That should prove once and for all if I’ve found the correct grave. This ancestor collecting is really like being a detective!

I took some photos of the Beacon grave in relation to the other things around it so I can find it again should I ever come back. In one of the photos you can see the enormous round hay bales that have dotted the landscape for our entire trip. This is hay harvesting season here. We also passed a farm today and though expecting to see sheep and cows, they had at least a hundred Shetland ponies grazing in the fields!

We found Tomich Road and there are two row houses there. It’s just a tiny street, having once gone all the way to the town of Tomich but when the railroad came through, it cut through the road, dividing it. There was only room for these two row houses, each with two side by side houses which, in the US, we’d call a duplex house. I know from old photos I brought with me that they either lived in #1 or #5 because their home was on the right of the house. So I took photos of each and I’ll go home and compare them to more photos that I didn’t bring with me.

And so, I felt a sense of awe being there where I believe my family is buried, and also in this place where my mother lived during the war and where my parents met. It makes me think about all the people who have come before us, how they lived regular lives with happiness, sadness, loves, and trials. And then they’re gone, just as we will be one day, and will be replaced with others whose lives go on where we once lived.

After a little drive around the town, finding Aunt Mabel’s house again, seeing the golf course, seeing the port, we headed back to Inverness. We’ve made a dinner reservation for this evening since last night we were turned away from several city centre restaurants for lack of a reservation.

Today’s interesting town names:

Kinkell
Culbokie
Muir of Ord
Hilton of Cadboll

Now in other news, I want to make a post about the British money. It takes some getting used to. The currency is the Great Britain Pound Sterling and the equivalent of their “$” is the “£”. One Pound is equivalent to about $2 US. Here is a photo of some of the money. There are £5 notes both in British money and in Scottish money. Although this is all the United Kingdom, the Scottish people maintain some independence. British money works fine here, but they do produce their own paper currency. Also in the photo are £10 and £20 British notes. The coins from left to right are the £1 coin, the 50 pence (penny) piece, the 20 p coin, the 10 p coin, and the 5 p coin. The coins missing are the £2 coin and the copper 2p and 1p coins. It’s so strange to get change that you expect to be around £4 and have it all be coins. Money certainly doesn’t go very far here. The price of things seems to be what I would expect to pay in dollars, but it’s in GBP, so twice as expensive as I would have thought. This morning in the hotel restaurant, we had the breakfast buffet which costs £14.95, or roughly $30 for breakfast! We looked at the ala carte menu, and for just a glass of orange juice and a cup of tea, you’re already up to £6
before even ordering something to eat!

The other thing we’ve noticed here is signs everywhere telling you to not leave valuables in your car. And I do mean everywhere….every car park, every shopping plaza. And my relatives never leave any valuables in their cars parked in front of their homes. It doesn’t seem like they live in a high-crime area, but this just seems to be the way of life here. If something is left in the car, it is locked in the boot (trunk) so it can’t be seen.

Now we’re back from a great dinner at a place called The Kitchen. It is located across the river from Inverness Castle. We parked behind the castle and walked across the bridge to the restaurant where we sat on the top floor right at the window and had a beautiful view of the castle. We shared an appetizer of grilled marinated chicken, shrimp, red and yellow peppers, and red onion with a beetroot coleslaw in pita bread, and a green salad all with a soy, tarragon, and lemon dressing. We both had the same “special” for dinner: a fillet of Scottish angus beef au jus (pronounced fill-it, not fill-lay, here) with mashed potatoes and vegetables, and then we shared a trio of sorbets for dessert. We also shared a bottle of red wine. So, before I left, I had lost 17 lbs in 4 months……I wonder if I will have the same 17 to lose when I get back after 2 weeks away??!!!

Tomorrow we leave for Glasgow by way of Fort William (where Brad and Allison had an infamous pub crawl prior to Charlotte and Robbie’s wedding). We’ll see Loch Ness, Ben Nevis (the tallest mountain in Britain…ben means mountain in Gaelic), Glencoe (a pretty valley), and Loch Lomond on our way. Hard to believe that we only have one more full day in the UK, but we’re excited to see Iceland. Once we get there, I’ll have to drop the “interesting town names” segment of my blog since every town will be something I can’t pronounce!