Yumpu_ May_June 2017_02

Skye Excites the Emotions
‘battle’ ‘At Balmeanach, the results of the fray are more
apparent today than yesterday. There is in the district an
almost entire suspension of work. The female relatives of
the prisoners, clad in the veriest of rags, wander about from
group to group, seeking sympathy from those who are not
in a position to give much.’
The journalist listed nine of the injured and their injuries in
some detail. For example, ‘Ann Nicolson - today it was found
necessary to feed her with a spoon and her life is despaired of.
According to information given, she is badly wounded on the
head by blows with a baton’. ‘Mary Nicolson, aged about 70,
was thrown to the ground and rendered insensible’
Power of Journalism
The story then moves from the Braes, via Portree and
Stromeferry to Inverness where the five Braes men were
found guilty of assault. The power of journalism and mass
communications came to the aid of the ‘Braes Five’. As
Hutchinson informs, ‘A cheque for the full amount of
their fines was promptly handed over by their supporters’.
As a result of the Battle of the Braes and other evidence
of unrest amongst crofters on Skye, as in Glendale, and
elsewhere in the Highlands and Islands, a Royal
Commission was set up by the Liberal Government ‘to
inquire into the condition of the crofters and cottars in
the Highlands and Islands of Scotland’. Chaired by Lord
Napier, it began by taking evidence from crofters at
Ollach Schoolhouse, Braes. There would be 69 more
evidence- taking events at various locations.
The connecting of place and emotion is intriguing, as we
know from ‘emotional history’. As I travel some or all of
the route of the police march to and from the Braes on a
regular basis by car or bike, I often try to connect to the
local events of the past, only a few generations ago, where
there was a conflict that had regional and national
repercussions.
Fibre Optic
Broadband
Gordon Eaglesham assesses its transformative progress
Page 40: Cover of book by Margaret MacPherson with the jacket designed in
1972 by Gavin Rowe.
Above: View of Braes, Skye; Commemorative stone of the event; Snow on Skye.
Photographs supplied by the author, Ron Hill.
Further Information
Dr Ron Hill offers guided walks taking in key events in Skye’s
history, including the Battle of the Braes.
Visit www.skyehistory.scot for details.
Unfortunate
But it is reasonable to reflect on the anger, survival, fear
communality, distress, oppression of some/many of the
residents of the Braes; the duty, determination, discipline,
bewilderment, agitation by the police; the duty, drive,
responsibility, status, control of the officials; the excitement,
enquiry, concern, trauma, humanity of the
reporters. These events in the Braes area were very
unfortunate.
Conflict, particularly violent conflict, is a deep and lasting
memory for those concerned. Thankfully, the struggle for
expression and a voice about underlying hardship and living
conditions by local people in the early 1880s contributed
to improvements for others in the years and decades that
followed. That is a good feeling to have about this beautiful
and now peaceful part of the Isle of Skye.
Fibre optic broadband across the Scottish islands is
now ready to transform the region’s economy, with
far-reaching implications for future generations. It has the
potential to make a somewhat quixotic notion of island
development, a reality. By the end of 2014, 250 miles of
subsea cable had been laid across 20 seabed crossings,
stretching from Orkney to Kintyre.
This milestone of a backbone to a vast network was
set by Digital Scotland which aims to bring highspeed
broadband to 86% of Highlands and Islands
premises by the end of 2017. The £410 million project
soon became the most complex subsea engineering
feat by BT in the UK, boosting speed and reliability
across the regions.
Another objective was to provide the infrastructure
required to enable better phone coverage. Prior to
the roll-out of Digital Scotland’s superfast project,
there were no plans to bring high speed fibre
broadband to the Highlands and Islands through the
mainstream commercial market. So it’s had a
dramatic, albeit sporadic, effect on connectivity
throughout rural communities.
Efficiency of Delivery
The core aim of the Digital Highlands and Islands
project is to provide everyone in these areas with access
to download speeds of at least 30Mbps by 2021. Three
years ago no island premises had access to the service.
Owing to the strong take-up figures and efficiency of
delivery, a further £2.3 million is to be reinvested into
the scheme by the Scottish Government.
The Western and Northern Isles will benefit directly
from this - through having their cabling route
42 SCOTTISH ISLANDS EXPLORER MAY / JUNE 2017
MAY / JUNE 2017 SCOTTISH ISLANDS EXPLORER 43