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Clan Sutherland

WITHOUT FEAR


Clan Sutherland take their name from the county of Sutherland in the north of Scotland. The name is derives from "Sudrland", loosely translated as southern land, and this refers to land south of the Norse earldom of Orkney and Caithness.

Sutherland’s are believed to be of Flemish origin as they are descendants of Freskin who, interestingly, is an ancestor of the clan Murray. Despite their seemingly close ties with another clan, the Sutherland clan had several longstanding feuds with other families – the Sinclairs of Caithness, the MacKays and the MacLeods, to name a few. One of these feuds ended with the poisoning of the 11th Earl of Sutherland and his wife at the hands of the Earl of Caithness.

The Sutherland clan motto is "Sans Peur" (Without Fear), and their clan crest depicts a Scottish wild cat.

Scottish History

of Clan Sutherland


Revenge and repression

The Sutherlands’ history is overshadowed by the Clearances of 1814 to 1820 and the bitter controversy which followed them.

Until that date they were one of the best examples of co-operation between Gaelic clansmen and a non-Gaelic chieftain line.

But the Clearances in a mere decade brought about the most spectacular collapse of clan loyalty in Highland history. The Lairdship of Sutherland forms an instructive paradox – how did the most northerly part of mainland Scotland become known as the southland? Because to the Norsemen, who first conquered it, it was to the south, not only of their Norwegian homeland but to the south of their great Scottish provinces which in the 10th and 11th centuries included the whole of the modern counties of Caithness and Sutherland (which they called ‘Sudderland’).

The Sutherland family established itself by helping to drive them out. Their first known ancestor was a Flemish mercenary called Freskin who was given a commission by King David the First to gather all the Sutherland Gaels together to clear the Norsemen from the north. Freskin was therefore probably the hero of the first great clan legend – the story of the Killing of the Last Norsemen, the crucial battle which are told took place at Embol near Dornoch where the Norse chief had gathered all his men in a desperate attempt to reverse the Scottish advance. Indeed the fight at first went the Norsemens’ way when they penetrated to the heart of the Scots’ formation and cut the Sutherland chief to the ground. As the chief lay wounded, though, he spotted the Norse General coming up to support the attack and, finding a horseshoe conveniently at hand, threw it with all his force, striking the Norseman square on the forehead and turning the whole battle round.

The Lordship of Sutherland title was first given to one, Hugo, who strengthened the family’s royal favour by ridding the north of a ferocious robber band whose leader was called Chisholm. Among other crimes this Chisholm tortured a number of Sutherland churchmen by nailing horseshoes to their feet and making them dance to entertain his followers before putting them savagely to death. On hearing of this outrage, King William the Lion ordered Hugo of Sutherland to pursue Chisholm to the death and a great fight ensued near John O’Groats in which all the robbers were either killed or captured. Chisholm and the other leaders were given a punishment to fit the crime – horse-shoeing and hanging, the rest being castrated “less any succession should spring from so detestable a breed”.

In 1222 trouble started with a row over rights imposed by the Bishop of Caithness. His seat was at Dornoch and the Sinclair Earls of Caithness, based at Wick and Thurso, had long resented the fact that the bishopric was under Dornoch Sutherland control. Therefore, Caithness determined to exploit the discontent to get rid of the bishop and have the seat moved. Soon there was a riot incited by the Caithness supporters and the unfortunate Bishop was roasted alive on his own cow spit and soon the rioters were heading north. Once again the Lord of Sutherland was given responsibility by the Crown for restoring law and order and punishing Caithness for his instigation of the incident. The far north east was ravaged by a ferocious campaign of revenge and repression. Wick and Thurso were burned, the Caithness stronghold raised to the ground and 80 men beheaded or hanged in a summary court session at Golspie. To the end there was strict punishment for the rioters. Four of the ringleaders were roasted on their cow spit and then fed to the Crown dogs for good measure. This campaign set the pattern for the centuries to follow.

The great slaughter

By 1275 the earls of Sutherland had taken Sutherland as their family name as well. Their close allies were the Bishops of Caithness, the Scottish Crown and the Gaelic clansmen round Dornoch and Helmsdale. Their habitual enemies were the Sinclairs of Caithness, the MacKays from the far North West and the MacLeods of Assynt.

It was the backing of the Crown which mattered most and this was retained by the Sutherlands through their services during the War of Independence, culminating in the success of the 5th Earl William who in 1343 married King David Bruce’s sister and who won many favours from him, including the overlordship of the MacKay lands of Strathnaver, the captaincy of Dunnottar Castle south of Aberdeen and, lastly, the very succession to the Scottish Crown itself for his son by Margaret Bruce. Both the latter gifts lapsed since the son died and Dunnottar was given up as too far from the Sutherland homeland but the expansion into Strathnaver was crucial since it was the first and largest step towards the Sutherlands’ eventual ownership of almost all of the county which bears their name.

However, before that, in 1500 the Gordons took over the Earldom of Sutherland. The long dispute with the MacKays first came to a head in 1372 when the head of one of the junior branches, Nicholas Sutherland, treacherously murdered MacKay and his heir in their beds at Dingwall Castle for both sides had met in an attempt to patch up their quarrel. Much bloodshed followed these killings, including a retaliatory raid on Dornoch in which the much-wronged cathedral was once again set on fire and Sutherland men hanged in the town square.

After this the feud quietened down as both sides were called away to fight against the English. Robert Sutherland, the sixth Earl, stood with Douglas against Percy at the famous moonlight battle of Otterburn in 1388; and in the lull brought about by the English wars built the strong fortress of Dunrobin to secure himself and his men in future clan conflicts. His long chieftainship even saw a temporary alliance with the MacKays against the MacLeods who invaded Strathnavar in 1407 after rumours that MacKay was mistreating his wife, a MacLeod heiress. Since both Sutherland and MacKay country was laid waste, the old rivals joined forces to pursue the MacLeods as they returned east, catching them somewhere near Loch Shin where the invaders were massacred to the last man.

This day became known as the Great Slaughter and gave the Sutherlands the upper hand in Assynt, completing their domination of local clan rivals but there was one weakness running through the Sutherland history, always threatening to destroy them. Their line was ancient, although not in the legendary sense of many of the Gaelic families, and the rights to the title and estates were always open to challenge. There was no charter for the Earldom though it was widely recognised to be the oldest in Scotland and there were many obscurities in their descent. It was always possible for a cadet branch, or even a complete outsider, to claim superior descent from some half-forgotten ancestor and to successfully challenge the ruling line to show otherwise. This is what happened at the end of the 15th century when the male line was eliminated and the Gordons took over the Earldom.

The central figure in this change was John Sutherland, eighth Earl who in a long reign of 30 years from 1460 seemed to have secured his house by patching up the MacKay feud again and by eliminating contenders for his position like the two illegitimate brothers he stabbed while playing football in 1470. He made a fatal mistake, though, in marrying his daughter Elizabeth to Adam Gordon of Aboyne, younger son of the ambitious Earl of Huntly and a man whose family had a long standing claim to the Sutherland estate. In 1494 Gordon and his wife obtained a claim of idiocy against the Earl, who was kept in close confinement for the next 14 years. When he died, the same couple had his eldest son declared incapable, too, and the estates put into their effective control although officially both title and lands reverted to the Crown. After Flodden in 1513 when the King and a great many of the great nobles, except the earl of Huntly, were killed, Adam Gordon and his wife had a free hand and were soon styling themselves Earl and Countess of Sutherland.

There was another claimant, though – Alexander Sutherland, son of the old Earl by his second marriage. The Gordons dealt with this threat by having a writ of bastardy written against Alexander and banishing him from Sutherland where the clansmen were dangerously inclined to his cause.

A couple of years later Alexander succeeded in raising a force against the new regime and in winning temporary control of Dornoch but his supporters fled when the Gordon army attacked them and Alexander was quickly captured and beheaded. His head soon perched on the loftiest point of the cathedral. This fulfilled the prophecy of a local witch who had told him that his head would be the highest that ever was in Sutherland, though doubtless Alexander himself had interpreted the saying rather differently.

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Family History Mini Book


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121 Clan Sutherland

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The Crests

of Clan Sutherland

Clan Sutherland
Clan Sutherland
Clan Sutherland
Clan Sutherland
Clan Sutherland

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Divisions

of Sutherland

Cheyne
Clyne
Duffus
Federith
Gray
Keith
Mowat
Murray
Oliphant
Sutherland of Duffus

Spellings

of Sutherland

Chaney
Chayne
Cheen
Chein
Cheine
Chene
Cheney
Chesne
Cheyney
Chisnie
Chyine
Chyne

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