A Self-Sufficient Coastal Settlement
Uisken Clearances History tells the story of a small Gaelic-speaking community on the Isle of Mull. Tucked into the island’s southwest coast, the hamlet of Uisken formed part of a network of townships on the Ross of Mull. Before the upheavals of the nineteenth century, a modest but stable population lived here. In 1851, census records listed about 241 people in the Uisken district. Stone cottages, often thatched, stood close together in small clusters surrounded by shared fields and grazing land.
Life in Uisken followed the runrig system, which divided arable land into strips and redistributed them among families each year. This rotation aimed to keep the process fair, giving every household both fertile and poorer soil. Residents grew oats and barley, while potatoes, introduced earlier in the century, thrived in raised lazybeds. They brought seaweed from the shore to enrich the soil and maintain productivity.
Working the Land and Sea
Local fishermen launched small boats from the bay to catch herring and other coastal species for food and trade. Women and children gathered seaweed, dried it, and burned it to make kelp ash, which soap and glass makers valued as a key ingredient. Around 1850, the Duke of Argyll financed the construction of Port Uisken, a small quay built to support the local maritime economy. Although the quay later fell into disrepair, it marked an attempt to link sea and land more closely.
Gaelic filled the homes and churches of Uisken. Religious life centred on the parish of Kilfinichen and Kilvickeon, where services were held in Gaelic and the Sabbath was kept strictly. During winter evenings, people sang waulking songs, told stories, and gathered for ceilidhs. These traditions strengthened community ties and kept the Gaelic culture alive.
The Coming of Famine and Clearances
The potato blight of 1846 destroyed the crop that had become central to the crofting diet, bringing years of hunger. Relief efforts followed, with emergency grain landed at Bunessan’s Maize Pier and public works like the road to Uisken and pier repairs. Despite this help, hardship remained severe across the Ross of Mull.
At the same time, estate policy shifted to favour large sheep farms over small tenancies. Crofters who failed to meet higher rents faced eviction. John Campbell, the Argyll estate factor, gained a reputation for harsh enforcement. Nearby townships such as Shiaba and Knocknafenaig emptied through the 1840s and 1850s. Uisken experienced the same loss and pressure, even though few formal eviction records have survived.
Emigration and Decline
With land converted to grazing and few alternatives available, many families were forced to leave. Emigration to the Lowlands and overseas destinations such as Canada, the United States, and Australia was widespread. By the early twentieth century, the population collapse was evident. From 241 residents in 1851, only a few crofts remained occupied by the 1920s.
Efforts were made to sustain the settlement. Estate-issued nets and boats allowed local fishermen to keep a share of the catch. People ran small-scale fisheries and took on sporadic jobs, and a salmon netting operation operated in Uisken Bay during the 1970s and 1980s. The local schoolhouse stayed open until 1946, when the last pupils were bussed to Bunessan. Despite these efforts, the settlement lost economic viability, and families gradually abandoned the crofts.
The Landscape of Abandonment
Today the place is marked by roofless croft houses, low stone walls, and scattered relics of a vanished way of life. The corn-drying kiln at Knocknafenaig stands alongside longhouse ruins. Visitors can still see the deserted township of Am Fan in the bracken above the modern crofts.
On the ridge above the bay, funeral parties paused at the cairn called ‘The Last Look Back‘ while carrying coffins to Kilvickeon cemetery. Each mourner added a stone as a farewell, and the cairn remains a quiet reminder of departure and loss.
Earlier inhabitants also left visible traces of occupation. Dun a’ Chiabhaig, an Iron Age fortified farmstead, and the Druim Fan standing stone show long human presence and ritual use of the landscape. These remains highlight how abruptly the settlement’s continuous agricultural tradition ended.
A Legacy Remembered
Although the crofts lie silent, people have not wholly forgotten Uisken. The Ross of Mull Historical Centre in Bunessan holds names, maps, and stories of the people who once lived here. Descendants of emigrants return to trace family roots, and visitors walk the shore to imagine the life that was once sustained.
The story of Uisken mirrors that of many Highland communities: a way of life formed by a balance of land and sea, fractured by famine and eviction, yet preserved in memory and place. In the stones, the place names, and the songs that people sang, traces of that past remain.
Before eviction notices were hammered to croft doors and families forced from their ancestral glens, the Isle of Mull thrived on tradition, language, and community. The Mull Clearances: 1846–1856 is a deeply researched, emotionally resonant visual history of the decade that dismantled centuries of Gaelic life.
