The forgotten storyteller of Achriesgill

Donald of Achriesgill became a storyteller almost by accident. The children who followed him along the shore were drawn by his strange clothes and his habit of talking to himself, and they gave him a good deal of teasing before they discovered what he could do. Once he started telling them stories, they wanted to hear more, and soon they were going to his house in the evenings. Their parents began coming too, until a home that had been falling into neglect became somewhere the township gathered. That is how he came to be known as Donacha na’ Chloinn, Donald of the Children.

To understand what that company meant, you have to go back to what happened to his family. Donald had grown up on a respectable croft, but two of his brothers drowned while fishing at a nearby loch. His parents were said to have died soon afterwards from grief, and another death left him and his sister alone. They gradually withdrew from their neighbours, allowing the croft, their clothing and the house to deteriorate. Donald would accept no help and refused to let anyone make repairs, although money was later found concealed in the walls and beneath the floor. Whatever had made him retreat, the children eventually found a way through it.

And once Donald was taking an interest in the township again, he took quite an interest. He made himself responsible for keeping an eye on the young people’s courtships, and word of an unsuitable romance could send him off to the house concerned to investigate. You can imagine how eagerly a courting couple might welcome that visit. Yet his loyalty to the same young people was remarkable. Boys once blocked his chimney and fastened his door from outside, but when the police wanted to know who had done it, Donald would not give them the names.

In later life he moved out of the unsafe house, dressed in smart suits and went to the Rhiconich Inn, sometimes returning home in song. I’d have liked to hear him, whether over a drink or telling stories to the children who had brought him back into the company of his neighbours. Folklore depends on people like Donald, who can make a roomful of listeners want to stay a little longer. His story gives us something to remember as we pass Achriesgill on the road to Kinlochbervie, where one man’s neglected house once became the place everybody wanted to spend the evening.

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