In Byways of Scottish History

Spottswood states, in his List of Religious Houses in Scotland, that the Priory of the May, originally put under the patronage of All Saints, was subsequently consecrated to the memory of St. Adrian. He does not, however, mention on what occasion. He adds that William Lamberton, Bishop of St. Andrews, purchased it from the Abbot of Reading, and notwithstanding the complaints made thereupon by Edward Longshanks, King of England, bestowed it upon the canons regular of his cathedral. Fordun and Prynne both give details of the transaction; but from documents discovered at a later date and published in the Records of the Priory of the Isle of May,222 it appears that neither of them states the case quite fully nor quite correctly. It is to be gathered from the proceedings relative to the claim of the Abbot and Convent of Reading on the Priory, that it was Robert de Burghgate, Abbot of Reading, who sold the Scottish "cell" to William, Bishop of St. Andrews, and that he received from him 1100 merks on account of the price. It would seem, however, that he effected this transaction contrary to the wish of the majority of his monks; and, on this ground, his successor, Abbot William, attempted to overturn it. In the Parliament of John Baliol, held at Scone on the 10th of February, 1292, John Sutton and Hugh Stanford, appearing as his representatives, demanded either possession of the Priory of May or payment of the balance of the price agreed to be paid for it, together with the fruits and rents accruing from it during the preceding four years. Failing recognition of their claims, they were empowered to appeal to the judgment of the King of England – a significant instruction which shows that Edward intended to turn the dispute to account in the prosecution of his designs against the independence of Scotland.

When the English representatives presented their abbot's petition they were asked whether he was prepared to repay to the Bishop of St. Andrews the 1100 merks already received on account. They cautiously replied that they had not been sent to make any payment, and could not undertake to do so; and they requested that the case, which had been brought to a deadlock by reason of the Scottish counterclaim, might be adjourned to the next, or to some subsequent Parliament, so that they might have time to consult both the Abbot of Reading and the English King. To escape from the necessity of either recognizing or challenging the sovereign authority which Edward claimed, and by virtue of which it was intended to get the dispute settled in favour of the Monks of Reading, the Bishop of St. Andrews, on his side, appealed to the Roman See. The case being thus removed from the Scottish Court, Baliol had a plausible reason for refusing to proceed further in the matter. The English abbot's attorneys were not, however, satisfied with this move on the part of their opponents. Alleging a denial of justice in the Scottish Court, they appealed to King Edward as Lord Superior of the Kingdom of Scotland. He consequently issued a writ, dated at Dunton on the 2nd of September, 1293, by which he cited John Baliol to appear before him within a fortnight of the feast of St. Martin. Baliol disregarded not only this first summons, but also two others, which respectively called upon him to appear within the octave of the feast of the Holy Trinity, and within a month after Easter. A fourth writ was then forwarded to the Sheriff of Northumberland. It was to be served by him in person on the Scottish King, whom it commanded to appear before his suzerain within a month after Michaelmas, and to bring with him the record of the proceedings in the Scottish Court prior to the appeal to the Holy See. In the absence of further documents bearing on the case, it may be assumed that "the final overthrow of the paramount claims of England, which was one of the happy results of Bannockburn, of course precluded any further English interference with the agreement which had rescued the Priory of May from an alien mother".223

The first extant document subsequent to the severance of the connection between the Scottish cell and the English monastery is dated the 1st of July, 1318, and is a deed of gift by which William, Bishop of St. Andrews, makes over to the Canons of the Monastery of St. Andrews an annual pension of sixteen merks formerly due by the Priory of May to the Monastery of Reading.224 In 1415 there is an obligation by Henry, Bishop of St. Andrews, for payment to the same canons of twenty pounds Scots out of the sequestrated revenues of the Priory of May. About the middle of the century the "Priory of Pittenweem or May" was annexed by Pope Paul II to the See of St. Andrews, as a mensal possession of the bishop's, during his lifetime. In 1472 this annexation was made perpetual by Pope Sixtus IV.225

In this deed of annexation, and in others anterior to it, from 1318 onwards, the alternative appellation "May or Pittenweem" occurs. According to the editor of the Records, the explanation seems to be "that the Monks of May had, from the first, erected an establishment of some sort on their manor of Pittenweem, on the mainland of Fife, which, after the priory was dissevered from the House of Reading and annexed to that of St. Andrews, became their chief seat, and that thereafter the monastery on the island was deserted in favour of Pittenweem, which was less exposed to the incursions of the English, nearer to the superior house at St. Andrews, and could be reached without the necessity of a precarious passage by sea".226

By a charter bearing the date of the 30th of January, 1549, John Roull, Prior of Pittenweem, feued the Isle of May to Patrick Learmonth of Dairsy, Provost of St. Andrews. The deed of conveyance describes the island as waste and spoiled by rabbits, which had once been an important source of revenue, but of which the warrens were now completely destroyed. As reasons justifying the alienation of the May, Roull referred to its remoteness and to the consequent difficulty of access to it, to its unprofitableness, and to its liability to invasion by those ancient enemies, the English, who on the outbreak of hostilities were wont to take possession of it, thus rendering it a useless adjunct to his monastery. Amongst the rights ceded to Learmonth was that of patronage of the church, which was to be maintained, and to which he was to appoint a chaplain, for the purpose of continuing divine service therein, out of reverence for the relics and sepulchres of the saints interred in the island, and for the reception of pilgrims and their offerings, according to the custom of old times, and even within memory of man.227

Numerous records testify to the reverence in which the island shrine of St. Adrian was held during the fifteenth and the sixteenth century. Thus, it is stated that when Mary of Gueldres was on her way to Scotland in June, 1449, to become the wife of James II, she anchored near the May, and performed her devotions in the chapel before proceeding on her voyage to Leith.228 It may be seen from entries in the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer for Scotland that King James IV was a very assiduous pilgrim to the island, and a liberal patron of the hermit who had established his cell there. They record a visit which he paid in 1503. It was not his first, as there is a brief notice of his having landed in 1490; but it is the earliest of which any details are supplied. He sailed from Leith, accompanied by a considerable retinue, amongst whom were the clerks of the Chapel Royal, who sang mass in the chapel on the island. After the celebration the Royal party took boat again, and, safely piloted in "the litill bark callit the Columb" by Robert Barton's mariners, who got fourteen shillings for their trouble, landed at Anstruther. On that occasion the hermit of May received nine shillings by the King's command. In the beginning of July, 1505, John Merchamestoun was commissioned to pass to Kinghorn, Dysart, and Kirkcaldy to seek mariners against the King's passing to May. Previous to the voyage, the King himself drew a hundred French crowns for his own purse. The men that rowed him to the ship received six shillings, and next day, those "that rowit the King fra his schippes to Maij, and to the schippes agane", got seven. Nine shillings were paid "to the botemen that brocht the Kingis stuf, and the maister cuke with the Kingis souper fra the schip to Maij, and fra Maij to the schip agane". The donation to the hermit amounted to five shillings and fourpence. Similar entries occur in 1506 and 1507; but those of the former of these years show additional sums for offerings of candles and of bread, and for a donation on behalf of the Queen. They also show that the royal ship was provided with nine cross-bows. In 1508 there is evidence of a shooting party on the May. On the last day of June in that year sixteen pence were paid "to ane row bote that hed the King about the Isle of Maij to schut at fowlis with the culveryn". There were other three boats "that hed in the Kingis folkis and chanounis, with pairt of lardis of the contree". It was in the Lion that James came over from the mainland; and amongst the provisions with which she was supplied for the voyage mention is made of one puncheon of wine, three barrels of ale, and one hundred and four score "breid of wheat". It is not unworthy of notice that a charter, dated only a few days before the death of James IV at Flodden, makes special mention of the May.229 It erects certain lands into a free barony in favour of Sir Andrew Wood of Largo on condition that he or his heirs should accompany the King and his Consort, or their successors, on their pilgrimages to the island.

III

An entry in the Register of the Privy Council for the year 1577 not only bears out de Beaugué's statement with regard to the presence of pirates about the May, but it also suggests the complicity of the people on the neighbouring coast. It sets forth that "the Council has thought convenient that the persons, buyers, and intromettors with the goods taken in piracy by a French ship of war lately frequenting about the May, shall be called before my Lord Admiral and his deputies, as well to make surety that the same shall be forthcoming to the just owners, friends, and confederates of this realm, as to underlie punishment for buying and resset of unlawful gudis upon the stream, according to the laws and justice".

A peculiar use to which the May was put in 1580 is recorded in the same Register. Certain persons "infectit with the pest" having arrived within the waters and river of Tay, on board a ship of which John Anderson was master, charge had been given them to withdraw themselves, together with their ship and goods, with all possible diligence, to the Isle of May, and to remain there, under pain of death, till they were cleansed and had obtained licence to depart. In spite of that, they had gone farther up the Tay, with the intention of landing and selling their goods. They were consequently ordered a second time, under the same penalty, to be rigidly executed, to repair to the Isle of May; and the lieges were commanded, by open proclamation, at all places needful, not to suffer any of them to come to land or harbour, under the same penalty of death. If any of the infected persons violated the order, the Provost and Magistrates within whose bounds the transgression had taken place were to cause them and those who harboured them to be apprehended and executed; the infected houses were to be closed, and the ship, boats, and goods to be burnt.

The first lay proprietor of the May, Patrick Learmonth, retained possession of the island for only two years. In 1551, it was conferred on Andrew Balfour of Monquhannie. Seven years later, it was again granted to John Forret of Fyngask, with the proviso that, in view of the exposed situation of the isle, he should not be bound to pay the feu duty at any time when there was war between Scotland and any foreign nation. A still later owner of the May was Allan Lamont, by whom it was sold to Alexander Cunningham, Laird of Barnes. Cunningham built on it "a convenient house, with accommodation for a family". It was he, too, who, at the request and for the benefit of the seafaring population of the towns situated on the northern coast of the firth, set up a lighthouse, the first on the Scottish seaboard, on the Isle of May. The Register of the Privy Council enables us to follow some of the negotiations entered upon with a view to its erection. In January, 1631, the Lords of the Privy Council, in consequence of Cunningham's application, ordered letters to be directed, charging the Provosts and Bailies of Edinburgh, Dundee, St. Andrews, Crail, Anstruther, Pittenweem, Dysart, Kirkcaldy, Kinghorn, and Burntisland to send commissioners to represent them before the Council, and to give their advice and opinion "anent ane propositioun made to the Kingis Majestie for erecting of lichts upon the Isle of May, as ane thing thought to be most necessarie and expedient for the saulfetie of shippes arryving within the Firth". The question of the costs which the upkeep of the light would entail appears to have presented considerable difficulty at first. In spite of petitions from skippers and others most directly interested in the scheme, "the Lords of the Secret Council having heard and considered the report made by the commissioners for the burghs touching the lights craved by Alexander Cunningham of Barnes to be erected on the Isle of May, and being well advised therewith, and with the reasons and grounds of the same", found "no reason for imposing any duty to be uplifted towards the maintenance of the said lights". The matter was not, however, allowed to drop; and on the 22nd of April, 1636, the King at length acceding to the request of the coast towns, authorized Cunningham to build a lighthouse and to keep it up for nineteen years. Funds for its maintenance were to be obtained directly from those most benefited by it, by the imposition of a duty of two shillings Scots – that is, two pence sterling – per ton, on all ships sailing between St. Abb's Head and Dunottar. Cunningham erected in the same year, "a tower forty feet high, vaulted to the top and covered with flagstones, whereon all the year over, there burned in the night-time a fire of coals for a light". Sibbald states that the coals employed were from Wemyss, and that these were preferred on account of their hardness and of the clearness of their light, that about three hundred and eighty tons were consumed annually, and that three men were employed in keeping the beacon, two of whom were always on watch during the night. In the edition of Sibbald's work published in 1803, it is mentioned that prior to 1790, but subsequently to the time when the dues had been fixed at three-halfpence per ton for Scottish ships, and threepence for foreign – including English – vessels, the revenue of the lighthouse was farmed at £280 per annum, that it then rose to £960, and that in 1800 it was further augmented to £1500 – "a striking proof of the increase of trade in this country". To commemorate the erection of this earliest of the Northern Lights, and to indicate – not absolutely correctly, however – the date, a scholar of St. Andrews composed these two lines of Latin doggerel:

Flumina ne noceant neu flumina lumina MaiaPrebVIt et MeDIIs InsVLa LVX et aqVIS.

There is a tradition that the architect who planned and built the tower perished, on his voyage to the mainland, in a storm which some old women, then supposed to be witches, were burnt for raising.

In the description of the May contributed to the Statistical Account of Scotland published in 1792, the Rev. James Forrester reports a very melancholy accident which happened whilst he was employed in drawing up his notice, and which he thinks ought to be recorded as a warning for future times. "The keeper of the lighthouse, his wife, and five children were suffocated. One child, an infant, is still alive, who was found sucking at the breast of its dead mother. Two men, who were assistants to the keeper, were senseless, but got out alive. This truly mournful event was owing to the cinders having been allowed to accumulate for more than ten years. The cinders reached up to the window of the apartments where these unfortunate people slept. They were set on fire by live coals falling from the lighthouse, and the wind blowing the smoke into the windows, and the door below being shut, the consequences were inevitable. These persons were the only inhabitants, and all of them lodged in the lighthouse. The families who formerly resided there lodged in houses detached from it. The old plan is to be again adopted, and houses are preparing for lodging the keeper and a boat's crew, which will be of advantage to all the coast, as they will be ready to give intelligence when the herrings come into the Firth."

After the Union the unequal incidence of the duties leviable for the light of May – English and Irish vessels being charged double rates as foreigners – gave rise to much dissatisfaction. In addition to this, there was a general feeling that anything that was payable in the form of a tax ought not to be held as private property. With regard to the light itself, it gradually became more evident that a coal fire, exposed in an open choffer to the vicissitudes of the weather, was altogether inadequate to the requirements of the shipping trade. After the appointment of a Lighthouse Board in Scotland in the year 1786, those most directly affected often expressed a wish that the light of May should be included as one of the Northern Lights; that it should get the benefit of the most recent improvements; that, in accordance with the spirit and conditions of the Act for the regulation of the Northern Lighthouses, the invidious distinction between the shipping of the three kingdoms should be done away with; and, further, that there should be some prospect of the duties being modified and ultimately ceasing altogether. Moved by these various considerations, the shipping trade of the Firth of Forth repeatedly approached the family of Scotstarvit, into whose hands the property and light of May had come by purchase, in 1714, with a view to the improvement of the old beacon. In consequence of representations from the Chamber of Commerce of Edinburgh, which visited the island in 1786, the choffer was enlarged to the capacity of a square of three feet, and the quantity of fuel annually consumed increased to about 400 tons. The Chamber further recommended that the stock of coals, hitherto exposed to the open air on the island, should in future be kept under cover, and that the supply should invariably be obtained from the collieries of Wemyss, of which the coal was considered fittest for maintaining a steady light, and was consequently employed at Heligoland and other coal lights on the Continent. All these conditions were complied with by Miss Scott of Scotstarvit's tutors, and from that time the May beacon became the most powerful coal light in the kingdom, the capacity of its choffer being double that of any other. But even these improvements could not prevent it from being unsteady in bad weather, and there still remained the great disadvantage that limekilns and other accidental open fires upon the neighbouring coast were apt to be mistaken for the May light. To obviate the possibility of such mistakes, the Trinity House of Leith, in 1790, presented a memorial to the Duke of Portland, who, through his marriage with Miss Scott, had become proprietor of the May, and requested him to replace the coal-beacon by an oil-light with reflectors, enclosed in a glazed light-room. In spite of this application and of many others from various quarters, no further improvements were introduced at the time.

In the year 1809, Robert Stevenson, engineer to the Northern Lights Board, foreseeing that, notwithstanding the recent erection of the Bell Rock Lighthouse, the navigation of this part of the coast would still be very dangerous unless the light of May were improved, took an opportunity of bringing the matter under the notice of the Commissioners, who were not of opinion, however, that it could be taken up by them except at the instance of the proprietor. In the following year the question was brought into prominence by an event of serious importance. Early in the morning of the 19th of December two of His Majesty's ships, the frigates Nymphen and Pallas, were wrecked near Dunbar, in consequence, it was believed, of the fire of a limekiln on the Haddingtonshire coast having been mistaken for the May light. The ships were completely lost, but, the weather being moderate, only nine men were drowned out of the joint crews of some 600. It was a remarkable circumstance attending the catastrophe, that, although the two ships had sailed in company, and had struck within a few miles of each other, their similar fate was perfectly unknown to the respective crews till late in the day.

This loss of £100,000 roused the Government to action. Lord Viscount Melville, who was First Lord of the Admiralty at the time, applied to the Lighthouse Board to take over the light of May as one of the Northern Lights. In the negotiations that ensued, the Duke of Portland proposed a scheme, in accordance with which he was to carry out the suggested alterations, and the Commissioners were to become his lessees. This proposal did not, however, meet with the approval of the latter, their opinion being that the only position they could assume in the transaction was that of purchasers for the public. The ultimate result was the acquisition of the Isle of May, together with the light duties, for the sum of £60,000 – £3000 less than the Duke of Portland had originally demanded. This was in 1814. That same year an Act was passed reducing the light duty to one penny per ton for all British ships. Immediate measures were also taken for carrying out the necessary improvements. In the course of the following summer, a new lighthouse was erected, and a light from oil, with reflectors, was exhibited on the 1st of February, 1816. The following official description of the new light of May was published at the time: —

"The lighthouse on the Isle of May is situate at the entrance of the Firth of Forth, in North lat. 56° 12´, and long. 2° 36´ west of London. From the lighthouse Fifeness bears by compass N. by E. 1/2 E., distant five miles; and the Staples Rocks, lying off Dunbar, S. by W. 1/2 W., distant ten miles. The light, being formerly from coal, exposed to the weather in an open grate or choffer, was discontinued on the night of the 1st of February, 1816, when a light from oil, with reflectors, known to mariners as a Stationary Light, was exhibited. The new lighthouse tower upon the Isle of May is contiguous to the side of the old one, and is elevated 240 feet above the medium level of the sea, of which the masonry forms 57 feet, and is therefore similar to the old tower in point of height. The new light is defended from the weather in a glazed light-room, and has a uniform steady appearance, resembling a star of the first magnitude, and is seen from all points of the compass, at the distance of about 7 leagues, and intermediately, according to the state of the atmosphere."

In the summer of 1814, shortly after the May had been acquired by the Northern Lights Board, Sir Walter Scott accompanied the Commissioners on their visit of inspection. In the Diary which he kept during the cruise, the following entry occurs under date of the 29th of July, the day on which the lighthouse yacht sailed from Leith: – "Reached the Isle of May in the evening, went ashore, and saw the light – an old tower, and much in the form of a border-keep, with a beacon-grate on the top. It is to be abolished for an oil revolving-light, the grate-fire only being ignited upon the leeward side when the wind is very high… The isle had once a cell or two upon it. The vestiges of the chapel are still visible. Mr. Stevenson proposed demolishing the old tower, and I recommended 'ruining' it 'à la picturesque', i.e., demolishing it partially. The island might make a delightful residence for bathers."230 Scott's romantic suggestion was not, however, adopted. The old lighthouse tower on the Isle of May was reduced in height to about 20 feet, and by direction of the Board was converted into a guardroom for the convenience of pilots and fishermen. The square, battlemented, white building is still standing at the present day. Above the door there is a tablet with a figure of the rising sun over the date 1636. It is surmounted by a lion holding an escutcheon, on which the armorial bearings – probably those of the builder – are no longer decipherable. In the vaulted room within the tower there is an old iron grate with the initials A. C., which suit Alexander Cunningham, and are doubtless his.