Rachel Chiesley (baptised 4 February 1679 – 12 May 1745), usually known as Lady Grange, was the wife of Lord Grange, a Scottish lawyer with Jacobite sympathies. After 25 years of marriage and nine children, the Granges separated acrimoniously. When Lady Grange produced letters that she claimed were evidence of his treasonable plottings against the Hanoverian government in London, her husband had her kidnapped in 1732. She was incarcerated in various remote locations on the western seaboard of Scotland, including the Monach Isles, Skye and St Kilda.
Lady Grange's father was convicted of murder and she is known to have had a violent temper; initially her absence seems to have caused little comment. News of her plight eventually reached her home town of Edinburgh and an unsuccessful rescue attempt was undertaken by her lawyer, Thomas Hope of Rankeillor. She died in captivity, after being in effect imprisoned for over 13 years. Her life has been remembered in poetry, prose and plays.
Early years
Rachel Chiesley was one of ten children born to John Chiesley of Dalry and Margaret Nicholson. Her parents' marriage was unhappy and Margaret took her husband to court for aliment. She was awarded 1,700 merks by Sir George Lockhart of Carnwath, the Lord President of the Court of Session. Furious with the result, John Chiesley shot Lockhart dead on the High Street of Edinburgh as he walked home from church on Easter Sunday, 31 March 1689.Macaulay (2009) pp. 23–24 He made no attempt to escape and confessed at his trial, held before the Lord Provost the next day. Two days later he was taken from the Tolbooth to the Mercat Cross on the High Street. His right hand was cut off before he was hanged, and the pistol he had used for the murder was placed around his neck.Macaulay (2009) pp. 29–30 Rachel Chiesley was baptised on 4 February 1679 and would have been born not long before that date, making her about ten years old at the time of her father's execution.Macaulay (2009) p. 19
Marriage and children
The date of Chiesley's marriage to James Erskine is uncertain: based on the text of a letter she wrote much later in life, it may have been in 1707 when she was about 28. Erskine was the younger son of Charles Erskine, Earl of Mar and in 1689 his older brother John Erskine, became Earl of Mar on their father's death."Mormaers of Mar and Earls of Mar" . Tribe of Mar. Retrieved 5 February 2012. These were politically troubled times; the Jacobite cause was still popular in many parts of Scotland, and the younger Earl was nicknamed "Bobbing John" for his varied manoeuverings.Keay & Keay (1994) p. 359 After playing a prominent role in the Jacobite rising of 1715 he was stripped of his title, sent into exile, and never returned to Scotland.
The young Lady Grange has been described as a "wild beauty", and it is likely the marriage only took place after she became pregnant."Uncovered: the lost manor of Lady Grange, Scotland's 18th century it girl" . Archaeology Daily News. Retrieved 8 May 2010. This uncertain background notwithstanding, Lord and Lady Grange led a superficially uneventful domestic life. They divided their time between a town house at the foot of Niddry's Wynd off the High Street in Edinburgh and an estate at Preston (now part of Prestonpans in East Lothian), where Lady Grange was the factor (or supervisor) for a time.Maclean (1977) p. 83Macaulay (2009) pp. 34, 42 Her husband was a successful lawyer, becoming Lord Justice Clerk in 1710,Brunton (1832) p. 484 and the marriage produced nine children: Charlie, born August 1709.Macaulay (2009) p. 169 Johnie, born March 1711, died age two months. James, born March 1713. He married his uncle "Bobbing" John's daughter Frances. Their son John eventually became Earl of Mar after the title was restored.Gibbs, Vicary; Doubleday, H. A.; Howard de Walden, Lord (eds) (1932) The Complete Peerage VIII London: St Catherine Press pp. 425–27Mosley, Charles (ed) (2003) Burke's Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage: 107th edition II Wilmington, Delaware: Burke's Peerage & Gentry pp. 2604, 2608–10 Mary, born July 1714, who married John Keith the 3rd Earl of Kintore in August 1729."Kintore, Earl of (S, 1677)" . Cracroft's Peerage. Retrieved 5 February 2012. Meggie, who died young in May 1717.Macaulay (2009) p. 36 Fannie, born December 1716. Jeannie, born in December 1717. Rachel. John.
In addition, Lady Grange miscarried twice and one of the above children is known to have died in 1721.
Acrimony and separation There was evidently an element of discord in the marriage that eventually became public knowledge. In late 1717 or early 1718, Erskine received warnings from a friend that he had enemies in the government. At about the same time one of the children's tutors recorded in his diary that Lady Grange was "imperious with an unreasonable temper".Extract from James Erksine's diary recorded by James Maidment in 1843, quoted by Macaulay (2009) p. 37 Her outbursts were evidently also capable of frightening her younger daughters and after Lady Grange's kidnapping, no action was ever taken on her behalf by any of her children, the eldest of whom would have been in their early twenties when she was abducted. Macaulay writes that "[t]he calm acceptance by the family of their mother's disappearance would persuade many that it need not be a matter of concern to them either".Macaulay (2009) p. 41 This restraint may have been influenced by the fact their mother had previously disinherited all of them when the youngest were still infants, an outcome described as "unnatural" by the Sobieski Stuarts,Macaulay (2009) p. 161 two English brothers who claimed descent from Prince Charles Edward Stuart.
As the Erskines' marriage trouble increased, Lady Grange's behaviour became increasingly unpredictable. In 1730, the factorship of the Preston estate was removed from her, further increasing her angst. Her discovery of an affair her husband was conducting with coffeehouse owner Fanny Lindsay can only have made matters worse. In April of that year, she threatened suicide and to run naked through the streets of Edinburgh. She may have kept a razor under her pillow and attempted to intimidate her husband by reminding him whose daughter she was. On 27 July, she signed a formal letter of separation from James Erskine but things did not improve.Macaulay (2009) pp. 33, 41, 45, 47, 49 For example, she barracked her husband in the street and in church and he and one of their children were forced to hide from her in a tavern for two hours or more on one occasion. She intercepted one of his letters and took it to the authorities alleging it was evidence of treason. She is also said to have stood outside the house in Niddry's Wynd, waving the letter and shouting obscenities on at least two occasions. In January 1732 she booked a stagecoach to London and James Erskine and his friends, afraid her presence there would cause them further trouble, decided it was time to take decisive action.Macaulay (2009) pp. 54–55, 57, 64
Kidnapping
Lady Grange was abducted from her temporary home of lodgings on Niddrys Wynd off the Royal Mile on the night of 22 January 1732 by two Highland lairds, Roderick MacLeod of Berneray and Macdonald of Morar, and several of their men. After a bloody struggle, in which they knocked out several of her teeth,Grant's Old and New Edinburgh vol.2 p.249 she was blindfolded and taken out of the city in a waiting sedan chair occupied by Alexander Foster of Carsebonny. Going northwards they transferred out of the sedan chair near Multres Hill (now St Andrew Square) and then taken on horseback westward to the house of John Macleod, advocate at Muiravonside, west of Linlithgow for a night.Grant's Old and New Edinburgh vol.2 p.249 She was next taken northwards to Wester Polmaise near Falkirk, where she was held until 15 August on the ground floor of an uninhabited tower.Macaulay (2009) pp. 65–70 She was by then over fifty years old.
From there she was taken west by Peter Fraser (a page of Lord Lovat) and his men through Perthshire. At Balquhidder, according to MacGregor tradition, she was entertained in the great hall, provided with a meal of venison, and slept on a heather bed covered with deerskins.Macaulay (2009) pp. 73, 77 The existence of St Fillan's Pool on the River Fillan near Tyndrum would have provided useful cover for her captors: it was regularly used as a cure for insanity, which would have helped to explain her presence to the curious.Macaulay (2009) p. 78 The details of the onward route from there are not clear but it is likely she was taken through Glen Coe to Loch Ness and then through Glen Garry to Loch Hourn on the west coast. After a short delay she was then put on board ship to Heisker the main isle of the Monach Isles. The difficulty of her position must have quickly become evident. She was in the company of men whose loyalty was to clan chieftains rather than the law, and few of them spoke any English at all. Their native Gaelic would have been incomprehensible to her, although as her years of captivity wore on she slowly learned something of the language.Macaulay (2009) pp. 78–83 She complained that young members of the local aristocracy visited her as she waited by the shores of Loch Hourn, but that "they came with design to see me, but not to relieve me".Macaulay (2009) p. 83
Monach Isles
The Monach Isles, also known as Heisker, lie west of North Uist in the Outer Hebrides, an archipelago itself lying off the western coast of Scotland. The main islands are Ceann Ear, Ceann Iar and Shivinish, which are all linked at low tide and have a combined area of . The islands are low-lying and fertile, and their population in the 18th century may have been about 100.Haswell-Smith (2004) pp. 254–56 At the time they were owned by Sir Alexander MacDonald of Sleat, and Lady Grange was housed with his tacksman, another Alexander MacDonald, and his wife. When she complained about her condition, she was told by her host that he had no orders to provide her with either clothes, or food other than the normal fare he and his wife were used to. She lived in isolation for two years, not even being told the name of the island where she was living, and it took her some time to find out who her landlord was. She was there until June 1734, when John and Norman MacLeod from North Uist arrived to move her on. They told her they were taking her to Orkney, but instead set sail for the Atlantic outliers of St Kilda.Macaulay (2009) pp. 84–86
St Kilda One of the more poignant ruins on the island of Hirta in the St Kilda archipelago is the site of Lady Grange's House. The "house" is in fact a large cleit or stone storage hut in the Village meadows that is said to resemble "a giant Christmas pudding".Fleming (2005) p. 135 Some authorities believe it was rebuilt on the site of a larger blackhouse where she lived during her incarceration,"St Kilda, Hirta, Village Bay, Cleit 85" . Canmore. Retrieved 8 May 2010. although in 1838 the grandson of a St Kildan who had assisted her quoted the dimensions as being "20 feet by 10 feet" (7 metres by 3 metres), which is roughly the size of the cleit.
Hirta is more remote than the Monach Isles, lying west-northwest of Benbecula in the North Atlantic Ocean"St Kilda" . National Trust for Scotland. Retrieved 8 May 2010. and the predominant theme of life on St Kilda was isolation. When Martin Martin visited the islands in 1697,Martin, Martin (1703) the only means of making the journey was by open longboat, which could take several days and nights of rowing and sailing across the open ocean and was next to impossible in autumn and winter. In all seasons, waves up to 12 metres (40 ft) high lash the beach of Village Bay, and even on calmer days landing on the slippery rocks can be hazardous. Cut off by distance and weather, the natives knew little of the rest of the world.Steel (1988) pp. 28–30