“It was so calm and so solitary…all seemed to breathe freedom and peace,
and to make one forget the world and its sad turmoils.”
– Queen Victoria’s diary, 1848, en-route to Balmoral.
In July 1224 ‘the Brewlands’ was given to the Abbey of Coupar Angus by King Alexander II. For 300 years Cistercian monks spent half the year in this peaceful place, tending their cows and honeybees, making wildflower and heather honey and brewing ale and mead from the pure spring water which continues to supply our houses today. Heather Hills heather honey which is stocked by good delicatessens across the UK comes from our hill. The River Isla is the principal tributory of the world-famous salmon river, the Tay. It rises in the Monega Pass in the Cairngorms National Park, 3000 feet above sea-level.
From the sixteenth to the nineteenth century the glen was a centre of illicit whisky production: the ruins of one such secret distillery are still visible on the Estate. Queen Victoria loved to picnic on our riverbank. More recent guests of the family include both American Presidents Bush and members of several Royal families.
Prince Dulip Singh, the hereditary ruler of the Punjab, became an equerry to Queen Victoria. We found a huge ironbound treasure chest belonging to him, marked HRH Prince Dulip Singh no 5, in one of our attics. It was empty of treasure, sadly, but was presumably left in the house by him after a visit. There has been much family speculation about what happened to the treasure and where chests numbers 1 – 4 might be.
During the First World War, Brewlands Lodge was used as a convalescent home for Canadian officers, most of them from the brand new Canadian Flying Corps, who, of course, had nowhere to go to recover to full fitness once they were well enough to leave hospital. Some of their descendants still keep in contact with our family. We have notebooks filled with thank you letters and poignant farewell messages from these young men. The certificate of thanks from the Canadian Red Cross overseas hangs in Brewlands Lodge. Many local people helped with their care and rehabilitation, especially those farmers not allowed to go to Flanders as they were needed to produce food for the civilian population. Most of those families still live in the Glen.
During the Second World War, the estate housed, briefly, children evacuated from possible bombing raids on Edinburgh, after which it was used as a centre for guerrilla training. As it lies at a crossroads of major and minor glens (valleys), with a high pass to the north to Balmoral and the Cairngorms, Brewlands Estate was prepared as a centre for guerrilla warfare against possible invasion by Hitler, with wirelesses, food and arms stored in the courtyard of the main house and in various secret locations round the estate. Our then head forester was given the task of listening in on local telephone calls to monitor for any potential suspicious activity. Thankfully Hitler did not invade, but our head forester always maintained that when listening in to a call between two local ladies, he acquired an excellent recipe for Christmas pudding!
In the Autumn of 2017 two of our estate employees discovered a perfect fossil of a fish inside a stone they had taken from a field to place behind an agricultural trailer to stop it moving. When they removed the stone they found it had cracked in two, revealing the c130 million-year-old fish. The fossil was examined by experts at the National Museum of Scotland. The astonishing conclusion they reached was that it could have originated only in the upper Amazon Basin. Further investigation is underway.
The present Glenisla hotel was built in the early 18th century, taking the place of the 15th century Inn. The ford across the river and the old road beyond can still be seen. Although there has been a church in Glenisla since before 1275, the present building dates from 1831. Church and hotel have always shared the same clientele. G Ure ‘s History of Glenisla quotes “…when in Glenisla in 1831 many of the last century’s customs still continued. A fine hospitable race they were. They came long distances to the Kirk. They came before the bell rang and all went to the ‘Public’ at the Kirkton – the men to have whisky and the women to have cordial or beer. When the bell ceased they all hurried to the Kirk.”
The Reverend Andrews (1806-1823) did much to strengthen the links between church and hotel. At the end of the Napoleonic wars the tax on spirits was significantly increased, making whisky, and the illicit whisky distilling for which Glenisla was well-known, highly profitable. (There remains the ruins of an illicit still on Brewlands Estate). The government customs men developed a keen interest in Glenisla production. When a party of customs men would enter the Glen, they would stop at the hotel to rest and refresh themselves and their horses. However, the minister’s windows conveniently overlooked the hotel and all approaches to it, and after the customs men were safely inside the hotel the Reverend Andrews would mount his pony and gallop off around the Glen, waving his hat over his head at every house he passed, shouting “the Philistines be upon thee Samson!”. The locals responded to his call and ran for the hills carrying their illicit stills, steaming from recent use.
The present-day visitor will see many of the same activities which have been essential to the Glen for hundreds of years; sheep and cattle farming, deer stalking, fishing and forestry. In the Glenisla school records of 1908 the headmaster tells us “a fairly good week notwithstanding harvest operation and grouse-driving.” On October 16th he writes “attendance very much improved this week. Grouse-shooting almost over and the greater part of the big folks (shooting tenants) have left the Glen. The victual (the harvest) is mostly in the stackyard”.
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