Drum – finding that there was madness in my method
‘It is well know that the postscript to a lady’s letter contains what she has most at heart, & is generally the most interesting part of her epistle.’[1]
I’ve never been strong on method, other than to throw myself into an archive and see what can be found. For this project, this has meant focusing on periods of fertility or sterility in a family, and this has generally yielded results. This blog post contains my reflections on when it didn’t work so well in the anticipated manner…
With the support of Ian Riches, Head of Archives at the National Trust for Scotland, I was fortunate enough to be allowed access to archival material concerning the Irvine family, held at Drum Castle. My thanks also go to Marianne Fossaluzza (Visitor Services Supervisor/ Collection Care at Drum), for facilitating this visit: Marianne generously shared her expertise on the Irvines and knowledge of the archival collection with me. By also sharing her heated office at lunchtime, she allowed me to defrost in a timely way during my two atmospheric days in an only lightly heated thirteenth-century keep.
Yes – a keep. As Drum had just closed for the season, I was lucky enough to sit in the castle’s former billiards room - now the library - housed in the original castle tower. As its walls are around 12’ thick, this should safeguard all the books from fire and marauders. It also contains some spectacular paintings, so I worked away under the gaze of a naked Archangel Gabriel: this was painted by the family’s most celebrated artist, Hugh Irvine (1783-1829). (You can see receipts for his art lessons in the archives, as well as invites to Hallowe’en parties).
Hugh Irvine - The Archangel Gabriel ( 1783–1829) [Image credit: National Trust for Scotland, Drum Castle, Garden & Estate]
So much for man/angel stuff. What about the women?
Well, they were hiding. This visit to Drum has forced me to confront some of the problems associated with researching early modern women. Given that I’ve mainly researched well-documented men, these are relatively new problems to me. The challenge has also provoked a lot of ‘imposter-syndrome’ feelings as I tread tentatively into an area where other scholars have a great deal more experience and where I want to make my RHS funded research as worthwhile as possible.
From my selection of bundles of documents, it seems that women and their personal lives are 95% absent from the archives, at least until 1750. This is no criticism of the NTS or the Irvine family and may be a reflection entirely upon my ability to select the right archival fonds from a fairly vague catalogue. However, the kinds of document where I have been able to trace women’s voices and ‘family matters’ in other archives – apothecaries or tailors’ bills, personal letters, wages for personal servants etc – were for the large part missing. Frustratingly, in an invitation to Hugh Irvine to Craigston Castle in 1822, his female correspondent urges him ‘It is well know that the postscript to a lady’s letter contains what she has most at heart, & is generally the most interesting part of her epistle.’[2]
I just couldn’t find those epistles.
Why and what to do?
A colleague recently remarked to me that women’s letters risked being systematically destroyed in the past as they were ‘either too boring or too full of information to keep’. Was this the guiding rationale for the early modern Irvines and their stewards? Or were personal papers pruned at a later stage? Or, and most probably, have I just not been able to identify them from the catalogue? I suspect that this trip illustrates my lack of familiarity with the type of records more than anything else, so I am having to rethink my initial methods and do a lot more family research before attempting my next visits.
Equally, I did find illuminating family letters just beyond my focus- period, addressed home to Scotland from London and the Caribbean. So, if I extend my parameters a bit, these will be useful for the wider emotional context of childbearing and parenthood. Finally, I also have information on the sex-lives of peacocks…
Drum Castle, Drumoak, Aberdeenshire [image credit: Alan Findlay]
Archival gems
More seriously, Drum’s archives contain some wonderful case-studies for women in other ways. For (non-emotional) women’s history, may I point you to the papers of Mary Irvine, tutrix of Drum? These are a fantastic case-study of an early modern businesswoman. A younger daughter of the family, she ran the family’s estates for its young heirs and in the interests of the wider family for a significant period of the eighteenth-century. Her correspondence demonstrates her care for business and legal interests, as well as the well-being of the tenantry.
If you want something spicier, I refer you to the case of Murthill v. Forbes, concerning the unlikely marriage of Alexander, 12th Laird of Drum. Apparently ‘altogethir weak and distempered in his judgement’, he was forced into marriage with Marjorie Forbes by the scheming Marion Irvine, who ‘practised several immodest methods to incite him to ane inclination for women’. The wedding ceremony involved a lock-in, the imbibing of vast amounts of ‘beir…dansick water….and sack’ and half the town-council of Aberdeen decrying its validity. Nonetheless, the marriage was allowed to stand and when Alexander died in 1696, Marjory was pregnant.[3]
I would certainly encourage any interested and serious researcher to visit Drum: Warwick University also hold family papers for those interested in their Baltic trading activities.
References
[1] NRAS 1500/53, 29 [October] 1822, Margaret (?) to Hugh Irvine, Craigston Castle
[2] NRAS 1500/53, 29 [October] 1822, Margaret (?) to Hugh Irvine, Craigston Castle
[3] NRAS 1500 bundle 96; Donald M. Macintosh, The Irvines of Drum and their cadet lines (Southern Historical Press: 1998), pp. 195-243.