Ensay (Gaelic Easaigh) is a currently unpopulated and privately owned island in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. The island lies in the Sound of Harris, between the islands of Harris and Berneray. The name originates from the Old Norse for Ewe Island. It has nothing to do with the Gaelic for Jesus, "Iosa," as sometimes stated.
Although the island has had no permanent population since the 1930s, it is still used for summer grazing. The small chapel of Christ Church is maintained, and services are held biannually. The island is classified by the National Records of Scotland as an inhabited island that "had no usual residents at the time of either the 2001 or 2011 censuses."
The town of Ensay in Victoria, Australia, was named after this island by one of the early settlers, a Scotsman named Archibald Macleod: "This same Macleod named "Ensay" after the home of his aunt, who was married to Campbell of Ensay, with whom, I believe, Archibald Macleod, who named both Orbost and Ensay in Gippsland, frequently stayed when a lad, and probably had happy memories of the little island."
History The island shows signs of Stone Age habitation, with a prominent standing stone. Human bone from a burial in a midden site near the Manish Strand has been dated to the range 1000-820 BCE.D D A Simpson, R A Gregory & E M Murphy with contributions from L Cram, A Gibson, S Hamilton-Dyer &E Nelis. Excavation at Manish Strand, Ensay, Western Isles. Proc Soc Antiq Scot, 133 ( 2003 ), 173–189. It has a share of the general history of Harris, though it is not covered in the standard work by Bill Lawson.Lawson, B. Harris in History and Legend. Edinburgh: Birlinn, 2002-2017. In 1549 Sir Donald Monro, High Dean of the Isles, visited the island and wrote of "ane Ile callit Enisay, quhairin Mccloyd of Harey hes a dwelling place, ane fair mayne land, weill inhabite and manurit [= cultivated] ane mile lang, half mile braid". It was also described by Martin Martin in 1716: "BETWEEN Bernera and the main Land of Harries lies the Iſland of Enʃay, which is above two miles in Circumference, and for the moſt part arable Ground, which is fruitful in Corn and Graſs: there is an old Chappel here, for the uſe of the Natives; and there was lately diſcover'd a Grave in the Weſt end of the Iſland, in which was found a pair of Scales made of Braſs and a little Hammer, both which were finely poliſh'd."
The MacLeod chiefs of Dunvegan in Skye held Ensay and other islands as part of the lands of the Estate of Harris until 1779, when the Harris lands, together with the islands of St. Kilda and Berneray, were sold to a near relative, Captain Alexander MacLeod. In 1790 they were inherited by his son Alexander Hume (MacLeod) who sold St Kilda separately in 1804, and the remainder passed in 1811 to his grandson Alexander Norman MacLeod. In 1834 the bankrupt Estate of Harris was sold to the Earl of Dunmore.Mackinnon D., Morrison A. The MacLeods - The Genealogy of a Clan, Section Two - The MacLeods of Talisker, Berneray, Luskintyre, Orbost, Hamer, Greshornish, Uilinish and Dalvey. Edinburgh:The Clan Macleod Society, 1968, pp.77-80,95-97.
In 1856 Ensay, Pabbay and some small islets were sold to Archibald Stewart (1789-1880), tacksman of Eilanreach in Skye. Archibald died on Ensay and left his Estate to his nephew John Stewart (1826-1899) who was described as "JOHN STEWART, Scorrybreck, formerly at Duntulm, Proprietor of Ensay" when he was examined at the Napier Commission Hearings in Portree on May 23, 1883.
John Stewart left the estate to his son William (1852-1907), who was a military officerArmy and Navy Gazette, 4 January 1908, p. 18 and Secretary of the Piobaireachd Society."The Late Major Stewart of Ensay", Inverness Courier, 3 January 1908, p. 5 John's younger son Donald Alexander Stewart (1856-1935) of Lochdhu, was already the tenant for the grazings, and continued so after his brother's death in 1907.
William's will was complicated. He gave the property to his nephew George Fraser(b. 1884), a son of his sister Isabella Fraser (1854-1904) on condition that he adopt the name "William Stewart". He also gave a life-rent of the property to his recently widowed sister Jessie Scott (1859-1930) and his unmarried sister Jane (1850-1933). About 1931 there was a minor change to the property when the medieval chapel near Ensay House, restored by Jessie Scott about 1909-10, was made over in her will to the Diocese of Argyll and the Isles of the Episcopal Church of Scotland.
By 1937 the only survivor of these arrangements was William George Fraser Stewart, who sold the property to Simon McKenzie. By 1989 it had passed to Simon's son John.
In 1958 there was another subdivision of the property when Ensay House was sold to Dr John David.
Ensay House A gazetteer for Scotland states that Ensay House (Taigh Easaigh) was built in the Edwardian period. It may be that some parts were modified at this time, but as noted earlier there was already a residence suitable for a chief on the island by 1549. There was certainly a substantial residence built by 1803, when the writer and shepherd James Hogg was visiting Harris with a view to sub-leasing a farm at Luskentyre Hughes, Gillian. James Hogg: A Life. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007, pp. 52–57. and stayed several days with the tacksman Angus Campbell at his house on Ensay. Hogg writes: "You are still to suppose me in the house and island of Ensay; the former is large and commodious" Hogg also notes that "... one day ...the Table was surrounded by a dozen of Gentlemen and four ladies ..." and later that Campbell went "up Stairs" to dress for breakfast, so the house at that time clearly had a commodious dining room and an upper storey. A "mansion house" is shown at the same location in the 1805 Estate map of the Harris Estate prepared for Alexander Hume (MacLeod) by the cartographer William Bald. The 1829 reprint of this map at the National Library of Scotland also shows "Sold to Stewart" or "Stewart" as pencilled annotations against Ensay, Pabbay and some islets, so presumably it had been used in the Dunmore Estate Office around 1856.Wilkes, Margaret. Missing, presumed lost, pp 42-48 and Caird, James B. Early 19th Century Estate Maps, pp 49-78 in Macleod, Finlay (ed.) Togail Tir: Marking Time The Map of the Western Isles. Stornoway Accair Limited and Ann Lantair, 1989.
Archibald Stewart had substantial additions made to Ensay House before he retired to the island in the 1870s. On 13 July 1870 the excise man Alexander Carmichael noted that Archibald "had made good additions to a fine house but that it was too close to the bay - 'This is its only fault'". A Gaelic poem about the new house has been attributed to Neil Morrison, the Pabbay Bard (b. 1816) by the scholar George Henderson and a slightly different version appears in Appendix B of Miles, A.E.W. (1989). An Early Christian Chapel and Burial Ground on the Isle of Ensay, Outer Hebrides, Scotland with a study of the skeletal remains. Oxford: BAR Publications (British Series 212). with an English translation by Simon Mackenzie.
In his 1933 book of travels in the HebridesMacgregor, Alasdair Alpin, Searching the Hebrides with a Camera. London Bombay and Sydney: George Harrap & Co, 1933, pp. 100-133. the writer Alasdair Alpin MacGregor provided a detailed account of his stay at Ensay House, when the proprietor was "Willie Stewart" (William George Fraser Stewart, b. 1884, whose older brother John Stewart Gordon Fraser, DSO was a grandfather of the BBC broadcaster and presenter Ed Stewart).
In about 1958 the house was purchased by Dr. John Brooke David (1912-1980), for whom it was a holiday place, since he worked in Ghana. In 1975 he loaned the house to the writer Ken Duxbury, who lived there for six months and dedicated the resulting book to Dr. David.Duxbury, Ken. Lugworm Island Hopping. London: Pelham Books, 1976 p.98. Duxbury described the work of repairing the kind of dilapidation that might be expected after so many years out of regular use, but it seems the magic remained, since he described Ensay as a "paradise" that included:
...a small semicircular sandy bay, with a house at its head so old and full of character that it breathed history, and ages of work and love of the land, success and disaster ... (p. 88).
After Dr. David's death, his extended family continued to own, look after, and use the house, including re-slating, but by the time of the 2012 photo-essay by John Maher the interior was in serious need of more attention, some of which was addressed via crowd funding in 2018.
Ensay Highland cattle In 1870 Alexander Carmichael also noted the "beautiful" black cattle on Ensay. Archibald Stewart and his brothers Alexander and Donald came from cattle country in Fortingall, and maintained folds of prize-winning West Highland cattle at all their tenancies from the early 1800s."The Lewis Cattle." Letter to the editor of The Inverness Courier September 28, 1854, from Archibald Stewart, Ellanreach, Glenelg, 25th Sept. 1854. Most of those appearing in the list of winners at shows of the Royal Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland pre-date the creation of a herd book for the breed in 1885 but a search for animal names that include "ENSAY" finds 15 beasts born between 1862 and 1892 where the Owner and Breeder is recorded as "DA Stewart of Lochdhu". This Donald (1856-1935) was a grand-nephew of Archibald who lived mainly on his property in Nairn, but leased Ensay from about 1900 to 1935, during the ownership of other family members.
Ensay Chapels Most modern accounts of Ensay only mention the restored chapel near Ensay House, which is probably the "old Chappel ... for the uſe of the Natives" mentioned by Martin in 1716, rather than the sand-buried chapel near the Manish burial ground, which is presumably where Martin's "...Grave in the Weſt end of the Iſland, in which was found a pair of Scales made of Braſs and a little Hammer" was located. It is best to treat them separately, and refer to the latter as the Manish Chapel, following the name given by AEW Miles (1989), its discoverer and so far its only investigator. The former is most appropriately known by the name used by the Diocese of Argyll and The Isles of the Scottish Episcopal Church in the first available version of its website captured the Wayback Machine on 8 July 2008: "Harris - Christ Church". Only key points from that history are presented here.
Christ Church Chapel
About 1909 Mrs Jessie Scott, one of the members of the Stewart family who owned Ensay, decided to have the old chapel beside Ensay House restored and returned to its original purpose. The first entry in the register is for 14 October 1910 and there were services from then until 1914. There were no recorded services during the First World War, but the church re-opened and periodic services continued until 1935. When Jessie Scott died in 1931 her will made over the chapel and its contents to the Bishop of Argyll & The Isles, together with a small sum to endow the upkeep.
Part of this restoration was a stone plaque over the entry door, which was photographed during a RCAHMS field trip in 2012. The engraving of the image is hard to read but the Gaelic text and a translation into English may be found in MacgregorMacgregor, Alasdair Alpin, Searching the Hebrides with a Camera. London Bombay and Sydney: George Harrap & Co, 1933, pp. 103-104. or Calhoun.Calhoun, Marc. Exploring the Isles of the West: Journeys to the Western Islands of Scotland: Skye and Tiree to the Outer Isles. Kershader, South Lewis: The Islands Book Trust, 2012, p117
In the early 1950s the chapel was again restored, as recorded in a plaque inside: "THIS CHAPEL WAS RESTORED BY JOHN BROOKE DAVID FRCS, OF ENSAY HOUSE, LONDON AND ACCRA, BEFORE HE DIED 30TH SEPTEMBER 1979."
In 1973 the chapel was re-dedicated by the Bishop of Argyll and the Isles.