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| EWEN MACPHEE |
| Outlaw - (1785 - 1850) |
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Ewen MacPhee is the prototype upon which
a large portion of the modern support of Glasgow Rangers football
club is modelled,
according to some folk of FirstFoot's acquaintance.
Breaking out of custody after being arrested
for desertion from the Army, Ewen MacPhee chose a remote location
as his hideout; an island in the middle of Loch Quoich.
He remained there for the next 45 years,
living in conditions which were horrible in comparison with his
Highland contemporaries but probably luxurious when compared to
today's conditions in Govan.
Living in a hut of birch sticks with goats
and a 14 year old girl, MacPhee raised a family and was never re-arrested.
Perhaps the fact that he was a huge bear of a man who never left
the island unarmed had some influence over this.
He was held in awe and was well provisioned
by sympathisers whose numbers were increased when, in the 1820's,
the Inverness Chronicle publicised his plight.
When in 1830 the Loch Quoich estate was
sold to English millionaire Edward Ellice, MacPhee offered to respect
the Englishman's rights so long as he was left undisturbed and offered
a bowl of goats milk in payment, an offer that Ellice accepted and
honoured.
MacPhee's island was submerged when the
level of the loch was raised by a hydroelectric dam in the 1960's.
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