According to a report of 1841, the people's idea of comfort on Lewis was to possess a house with plenty of peat, some grain, one to five cows, and a few sheep.
Most houses were self-built, with no chimneys, no windows, no privacy for the inhabitants, and it was shared with the livestock. The house shown above is in the Gearrannan Blackhouse Village in Lewis. Given that the original versions had no chimneys, the insides would have been quite sooty and hence black. Any openings in the roof simply meant more chance for the wind to lift the roof off and for rain to get inside. Often these houses would be barely visible above ground, safely hunkered into the hillside for protection from the wind. You can see in this photo how the thatch is weighted down with stones to keep it in place. Making a sound roof with timber frames on islands with few trees was always problematic and frequently driftwood was used for this purpose.
Ruins of really old buildings may just look like a pile of stones to the uninitiated! Here is such a pile of stones called Barpa Langais on North Uist. It is a Neolithic chambered cairn, and typical of tombs in this landscape. Presumably there was habitation around here but we got thoroughly blasted by horizontal rain here so did not stay out too long enough to ponder what life might have been like when this tomb was built. Other than to assume the climate might have been quite different?
In prehistoric times, people made use of the natural terrain to find shelter in souterrains, or underground homes. These were stone-lined tunnels typically associated with Iron Age settlements. There are reportedly several of these structures found in Lewis, but we came across a prime example in Kilvaxter on the Isle of Skye.
On the left is a photo Dun Carloway broch on the Isle of Lewis. It was probably first constructed in 200 BC and continued in use until about AD 1,000. A broch is a drystone circular building formed by two concentric walls, the inner one perpendicular, and the outer one inclining inwards. The central area remained open to the sky. We visited this place on a very windy day and it was such a relief to enter under the low doorway and be out of the wind.
This particular broch was used as a stronghold for members of the Morrison Clan during the 1500s. You can learn more about the Morrisons in the section on history.
Dotted around the landscape of the Outer Hebrides today you will find smaller white-coloured houses perched on hill tops, hugging the coastline, or huddled around the main road.
In the Bays on Harris, the newer houses had the look of chalets, and often these are built as holiday homes for visitors. What their 'foreign' owners do not realise is that, while plenty of visitors would like to stay in Harris, there are insufficient locals to service these properties and travelling to and from these holidays homes is not a minor matter for the staff.
There are a few larger stone buildings, such as the Polochar Inn in South Uist, built sometime around 1750.
But for the most part you are likely to see this type of derelict building dotted around the countryside. We had gone in search of the site of Ormacleit Castle, an early 18th century ruined mansion on South Uist. This photo of a ruined building is not an ex-castle but does show the value of good roofing! This farm building was near the west coast and it was clear that this was a very fertile productive farm reaching down to the coast and spreading far and wide.
Perhaps the most famous house in the region is Flora MacDonald's House in South Uist, the ruins of which are shown below right, with her monument guarded by its own stone wall to the left. The monument text says "After the Jacobite defeat at Culloden 'Bony Prince Charlie' faced capture unless he could escape to France. While British troops were searching for him, he sought refuge in Uist. His supporters wanted to smuggle him from Uist to Skye, and then onto a boat to France. And Flora agreed to help.
On 28th June 1746, Flora MacDonald and her Irish maid 'Betty Burke' sailed from Benbecula over the sea to Skye. The maid was Prince Charles in drag! For her part in the escape plan, Flora was arrested and imprisoned in London. After her release in 1747 she returned to Scotland and went on to live an even more extraordinary life.
Flora MacDonald is buried in the Kilmuir Cemetery on the Trotternish peninsula of Skye. And Prince's Bay in Eriskay is a landmark on the tourist trail telling the story of Bonnie Prince Charlie.
The insecurity of tenure from 1610-1884 discouraged the building of substantial houses on the islands. But the one uniting factor of all houses in the Outer Hebrides is to protect the inhabitants from the wind! Often your front door has to be at the back of the property to avoid a rush of cold wind every time the door is opened.
