Strathglass, the Upper Valley of the River Beauly, which belonged to the Chisholm clan, is a remarkable instance of a district which remained faithful to the Catholic Faith long after the “Reformation” of 1560. This was not a peaceful transmission from father to son. The laws and penalties enacted to destroy the Ancient Faith led to the area being without any priests for almost 100 years.
The years between 1660 and 1680 saw the revival of Catholicism in Strathglass. This was largely due to Mr Robert Munro, a secular priest, who has been called “The Apostle of Strathglass.” (Secular priests were addressed as Mr until roughly 1880.) He was a convert from Ross-shire and a visiting missionary from 1671–1704. He may have been induced to come by Father Francis White, an Irish Vincentian, with whom he had worked in Lochaber and who had been in Strathglass before him. Mr Munro may also have been invited to come by Alexander Fraser of Kinerras, a small estate above Eskadale in Lower Strathglass — a fellow-student at Douai.
In 1677, Alexander Leslie was sent by Propaganda to make a visitation of the whole of Scotland. In his report of 1681 he stated that “the Chief (of the Chisholms) is a most zealous Catholic and so are practically all his vassals, having been reconciled to the Church by the missionary Munro.” The Chisholm of 1742 was a Catholic, but a later generation abandoned the Faith. There is no lack of evidence, however, to show that in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the Knockfin Chisholms were the leading Catholic family and indeed the most powerful and influential after the Chisholms.
After 1681, Father Hugh Ryan, an Irish Barnabite, visited Strathglass from time to time. Mass centres were opened at Ach-an-Eaglais (Tomich) and at Clachan Comar.
In 1699, Bishop Nicolson visited Strathglass and administered Confirmation for the first time in the Highlands since the “Reformation.” In his report it was stated “that all in the Chisholm country are Catholics.”
In 1704, Mr Munro, who had been imprisoned and twice banished from the country, was taken prisoner in Glengarry and died a few days later as the result of the brutal treatment he received. It was a fitting end to the 30 years’ apostolate of the first Highlander to become a priest since the “Reformation.”
In 1701 (or 1703), Strathglass was entrusted to the priests of the Society of Jesus. Father Alexander Macrae served this district till 1741. The most famous of these Jesuit missionaries was Father John Farquharson, 1729–1746 and again from 1748–1753. In 1741 he was joined by Father Alexander Cameron S.J., a brother of Lochiel of the “45”, who ministered principally to the people of Lower Strathglass and in Glenstrathfarrar.
As both the Chisholms and the Frasers of Lower Strathglass had fought on the Jacobite side in the “45”, soldiers were sent to Strathglass and the two Farquharsons arrested (Father Cameron was arrested in Lochaber). These three priests were sent as prisoners to London where Father Cameron, S.J., died.
In 1748 Father Farquharson returned to Strathglass, but under the penalty of death if he should fall into the hands of the authorities. He left in 1753 and was succeeded by Father Norman McLeod, S.J., a convert and a native of Lewis. In his time there were said to be 1,321 Catholics in Strathglass.
In 1777, John Chisholm, son of Valentine Chisholm of Inchully (of the Knockfin family), returned to Strathglass from Douai — the first native priest of Strathglass since the “Reformation”. He built a small house and chapel at Fasnakyle, near the junction of Glen Affric and Strathglass, where he laboured with much success for 15 years.
In 1789, he was joined by his younger brother, Mr Aeneas Chisholm. In 1792, Mr John became Vicar-Apostolic of the Highland District, over which he ruled from 1792–1814. Mr Aeneas succeeded his brother in the mission at Fasnakyle, where he replaced the earlier chapel by a slated one in 1803 (replaced by the present chapel at Marydale in 1866). In 1804 he was consecrated as Co-adjutor to his brother; in 1814 he succeeded him as Vicar-Apostolic of the Highland District. He died at Lismore on 31 July 1818.
In 1793, Mr Austin MacDonell was entrusted with the charge of Lower Strathglass. Mr Fraser of Moulie, a convert, gave a grant of land to build a new chapel at Aigas, the first slated one in Strathglass, opened in 1801.
In 1825, Lord Lovat, desirous to provide better accommodation, built a chapel at Eskadale on a scale of grandeur hitherto unknown in the Highlands. It was opened in 1827. How splendid St Mary’s Eskadale was can be realised when it is remembered that a Catholic chapel at this time anywhere throughout the Highlands was usually a barn-like structure with no windows and a mud floor.
The centenary of Eskadale was fittingly celebrated on 22 August 1926, when Mass was said by Bishop Bennett in the presence of the clergy of the diocese. The special preacher was Father (afterwards Monsignor) Ronald Knox, a frequent visitor to Eskadale. Not only does this parish owe its fine church to Lord Thomas, but for almost 150 years the Lovats have been generous benefactors, both to the church and to the school.
Well might Strathglass be called “a nursery of priests”. In all, five bishops and at least 25 “home” priests were directly or collaterally descended from Colin of Knockfin. Owing to the evictions and the great wave of emigration from 1750–1850, there were at least 35 priests of Knockfin descent in Nova Scotia by 1935. Among emigrant priests of Strathglass origin, two were destined to become bishops: Father Alexander Macdonell, Bishop of Kingston, Ontario, 1826–1840, called the Apostle of Ontario; and Father William Fraser, Bishop of Halifax and afterwards of Arichat (Antigonish), Nova Scotia, 1844–1851. Both played an important part in building the Church in Eastern Canada.
1977 marked the 150th anniversary of the opening of St Mary’s, Eskadale. It would be a pity if the story of the penal times, which only ended in 1829, were not known to the people of Strathglass and their descendants, wherever they may be. It has all the elements of a thrilling tale: heroes, living under fictitious names and going about in disguise; suffering hunger, thirst and privation; making night journeys and having hair-breadth escapes. Surely such a story would give them a pride in the history of the Faith in their land.