East Kilbride, 6th December 2009

Got back from my last tour two thirds of the way through October, and I knew that I really had to get my head down and get my latest book finished. I’ve been working on it for what seems like ages, and had to put it to one side as other aspects of my life got in the way, but I was determined to finish it off before Christmas. I can at least now report that it is done and dusted, and I popped it in the post to my publisher at the end of November, along with a disc containing all the photos to go with it, so at least there is new product in the pipeline.
This book is about Scottish women, or at the very least women who had an impact on Scotland’s history, but I have not gone for any of the obvious ones like Mary, Queen of Scots, or Flora MacDonald. It is more about some of the unsung heroines who have interesting stories that should be better known. I just, when asked, call it “my book about Scottish women”-which really means I do not have a finished title for it as yet!
It will be a few months before it hits the shops though, as all the bits and pieces like cover design and typesetting have to be taken care of.
Other than writing, my early mornings are spent in the gym, and I always manage to get back to some semblance of fitness just as its time to go on tour again. The boys in there push me on though, and I miss their camaraderie when I’m away.
And I have been doing speeches here and there, some for schools, some for church groups, right up to speaking on the steps at the Scottish Parliament at the St. Andrews Day rally in Edinburgh, and the following day I said a few words at the John MacLean rally in Glasgow. At both these events the pipe and drum band Albannach were playing, and as I work with them in the States and they have had a line up change, it was interesting to see the new guy Colin’s effect on their sound. Kyle whom he has replaced, I will miss, and I wish you all the best in any future endeavours Kyle. Colin seems to be bringing his own style to things though, and I’m glad I got to see his first gigs, as I know in six months time when he has moulded into the job it will be like he has been there since the dawn of time.
The Wallace Society annual dinner was held in Elderslie on the 4th December, and that was a great night. The extremely talented Ted Christopher supplied the entertainment, but it is a bit different to hear him in a small bar with a low ceiling. It is a bit like having Ted play in your front room!
My time seems to become tighter and tighter, and I would like to be able to spend more of it in the landscape of Scotland just learning all I can, or being astride a motorcycle following lines of invasion through England, or just being able to stop and wander old churches or castles or battle sites at will. I have been out and about of course, and the other day I went down to Loudoun Hill, a place where both Wallace and Bruce fought battles. In 2004 a monument to Wallace was unveiled at Loudoun Hill, and though it is very different to other monuments in Scotland, I am very fond of it, especially the way it frames the Hill and the site of Wallace’s fight. There is a granite monument on the hilltop to Bruce too. I sometimes just sit on the grass bank there, the only human in the landscape, watching the buzzards wheel on the thermals created by the crags, then drop my eyes to look at the ground where my forefathers fought to release Scotland from tyranny. Days like that are always the ones that stick in my memory, and re-kindle my love affair with the landscape of Scotland.
I often listen to the oath to the Stars and Stripes when I am touring in the States, and I wanted to have an equivalent for the Saltire of Scotland. So I penned the following few words, and have used them at my last few speeches. I mean them from the heart, and some folk have already commented on how much they like them, and I would be humbled and flattered if they were to seriously catch on.
I’m sure most people now know where the flag of Scotland originated. A white cross appeared in the sky at the battle of Athelstaneford in 832A.D. An x-shaped cross like the one on which St Andrew was crucified, and the Scots saw this as a sign and though heavily outnumbered, fought and won. So they adopted the symbol of the cross in the sky as our national flag, the oldest flag on the planet (that is still in use), and St Andrew became our patron saint, and the day on which he suffered, 30th November, became our saint’s day.
So here goes..

“I stand before this flag. The white Saltire of St Andrew in the blue summers’ sky.
It represents the soil from which I sprang, and to which, one day, I must return.
It represents Scotland.
As it was. As it is. As it always will be.”

Wallace sculpture at Loudoun Hill.	Myself, with Jamesie and Aya from Albannach at the St Andrews Day rally.

October 24th 2009. East Kilbride

Between American tours i was at the Wallace events that take place in Scotland through August.
    Firstly at Robroyston at the scene of Wallace's capture on August 3rd 1305. My vice convenor at the Society of William Wallace, Duncan Fenton, did a sterling job in putting together this event.
    Wallace Day went particularly well this year, especially the evening event. Albannach and Ted Christopher both played a blinder, and the hall was pretty packed. Folk said later that the spirit they had seen in London for the Wallace 700 event in 2005 was present, a real feeling of patriotism and friendliness running through the hall. " A big family wedding" was one description.
    What was brilliant was the fact that several American acquaintances of Scottish blood showed up.
I asked Donna Johnston to lay the wreath, as her and her partner John had travelled over from Florida. I was delighted to see Jonathan Aultman and family there too, as they have been brilliant hosts when ive been in the vicinity of Maryland. But some Canadian friends showed up too, and there was even a Russian girl in a sci-fi mediaeval dress. So a very international gathering, and im glad they got to be present on a night of such top notch Scottishness (for want of a better description).
    The following week was the north east Wallace event at Stonehaven. I was flattered to have been asked to give the speech at Dunnottar Castle, and to have said a few words at the evening event, where Gaberlunzie were the entertainment. Organisers Graeme and Lesley have plans to expand this event in years to come, and i wish them every success.
    Ive worked away on my forthcoming book on Scottish Women. I did intend to have it finished long before now, but life gets in the road of writing sometimes. Its mostly done right enough, and i have a plethora of photos i have taken ready to illustrate it. It has been fun scouring Scotland on the bike to get the shots i wanted.
    I did some voice overs for the release of the Braveheart DVD on Blu-Ray, and i did spot it in stores in the USA, and i saw it had an extra about the events of 2005, so im assuming that the stuff ive done has been used, but i actually haven't seen a copy myself!
    I worked away on several Scottish projects, including having a meeting at the Scottish parliament to try and get Scottish artefacts kept abroad, sent back to Scotland where they belong. And ive got involved in trying to erect a new Wallace monument in Glasgow.
    The latest American tour, through September and October 2009, started off in Ohio. Im indebted to Shawn for giving me a roof over my head while near Dayton. He told me about the aircraft museum there, so i checked it out during some free time. What a treat! And free admission! I ended up spending two days seeing it all. It is contained within several gigantic aircraft hangers, with some others parked on the tarmac outside, and it begins at the age of the Wright Brothers, and proceeds through the history of flight in chronological order. History is my thing, and this was up my street on a grand scale.
    From the earliest made-from-string-and-brown-paper models, it moved swiftly on to such legends as the Sopwith Camel, and there were pieces of the shot down Fokker Tri-plane of  Von Richthofen, the famous Red Baron.
    From here i got to see rows of aircraft from World War II, stuff i had only ever read about, or seen in movies. Typhoons, Spitfires, Messerschmitts, Fokke-Wulfs and Junkers. They had V-1 and V-2 rockets too. My mum was bombed out three times in World Wart II, and she was in London, England for a spell during the war and she used to tell me when i was a kid, about seeing the V-1 rockets going over, and how people would just ignore them while they heard the distinctive noise of their rocket engine. But these V-1s were filled with just enough fuel to get them over the English capital, and if the noise of the engine suddenly stopped, everyone would dive for cover, and a few seconds later there would be a massive explosion. So i was seeing things that related to my own family history. My father fought in World War II, so he would have recognised many of these planes.
       There were examples of the first jet fighters that were developed by the Germans, like the Messerschmitt 262.
    But a few paces further on i was confronted by the familiar shape of a Boeing Superfortress. Familiar, not because i had seen one before, but because i had constructed a model one when i was a kid!
    I stood and looked at it for a while, then read the info board. It turns out that this aircraft was named by its crew, "Bockscar", and it was the very aircraft that had dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki.
The bomb doors were open and i stood in awe looking at them and realising that a bomb had dropped from there that had instantly vaporised 100,000 people. I just stood for several minutes taking it in.
    I went through the rest of the museum, and was flabbergasted at the intercontinental missiles like the "Minuteman" that were on show. They were huge! More like moon mission rockets! I looked at the size, thought about all the silos that were built to house and launch them, and realised i was thinking about the money all this must have cost, not just to built such things, but the cash spent on research. Billions.
    There was a space capsule that had actually landed on the moon, and the end pieces of the museum were ultra modern aircraft like the Stealth bomber.
    For someone with my interest in history, the shock is the realisation that everything on show, from the first heavier-than-air flight of the Wright Brothers, to the ultra-sonic Stealth with its sophisticated weapons systems, was only a century in the making.
    War is a big part of that of course. There are always great leaps forward in technology during wartime. But 100 years from the first flight in a home made plane to the Stealth? Amazing.

    My daughter Kimberley flew into New York to join me for ten days of the tour. We fought constantly, as that is what we do, but that does not mean i don't love her, and she me. We are just Scottish at the end of the day. We question everything, and i suppose that is why the Scots invented everything at the end of the day (although i will give Edison the light bulb, but we did everything else). But she got to see Times Square, the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge, which i suppose everyone should get to see at least once. She at least put up with a twelve hour drive to pick up books. But she actually looked interested when we visited Civil War battlefields, so perhaps her dad has had an influence.

    In a similar vein to the aircraft museum, i was lucky enough that my friends, a couple i know from the Scottish circuit in the States, Randy and Barry (Barry is a girl, just in case you were not sure) asked if i would like to visit the American Atlantic Fleet at Virginia Beach.
    They are getting married in Scotland next Spring, and Barry asked if i would give her away. I am honoured Barry.
    We went out to the docks, and three aircraft carriers were tied up in a row, flanked by many frigates and battleships, and there were submarines plying in the water. We toured the USS Eisenhower, the flagship of the battle group. It has a crew of 5,500, and is a nuclear powered aircraft carrier. The scale of things is staggering. The aircraft decks, lifts to get the aircraft up onto the flight decks. Operating theatres, and the facilities for feeding all those sailors. It is like a floating city. On the bridge i was shown the admirals chair. Very smart, in leather and sheepskin. I asked if i could sit in it, and was surprised when i was told "yes".
    So i sat in the admirals chair of the Eisenhower. I don't suppose there are many daft boys from East Kilbride who can claim that. "Full steam ahead ya scurvy knaves".
    Randy, a day i will never forget as long as i live. Thank you.

    And again, i realised the historical significance. The very first "modern" naval battle took place out in the water before us, some 150 years before, when two iron clad ships, the Merrimac and the Monitor, fought for either side of the two opposites in the Civil War, out in Hampton Roads. In 150 years it had gone from two iron clad wooden ships firing a cannon ball at each other every several minutes, to a nuclear powered enormous carrier with computer powered weapons systems.
    See history?

    Doing talks to various Scottish societies between large weekend events became the norm. At one event i was presented with an award for my "services to Scotland". A diploma and a medal. The most flattering thing is when you are recognised by your peers, and i find such presentations emotional indeed. I did a talk on the Scottish influence in the southern States to a group of the Sons of the Confederacy too. They are descendents of those who fought in the Civil War, and a couple of the members took me out and about in the following days. Tim took me out to the little woodland clearing near Appomattox where Robert E. Lee made the fateful decision to surrender the Army of Northern Virginia to Grant in 1865. We stood there in the trees in the cool weather, and it struck me it was like standing in woodland in Scotland during Autumn. Tim fired up his bagpipes and played "Dixie" as a lament. I listened to it echo back off the trees, standing on the very spot where Lee stood when he decided to surrender his starving troops against the overwhelming odds stacked against him. A tear ran. Some shade of the history here still lingered in the trees. As the pipes drew to a close, i gave a rebel yell and listened to it echo for several seconds.
    I was lucky enough to have previously purchased a recording of the rebel yell made in the earlier part of the 1900s from the Daughters of the Confederacy, who were presented with copies, and was very intrigued by the six note cadence of which it is comprised. It is so much like the "hooch" of the Highland Charge, and it actually sounds like bagpipes. The Scottish influence is obvious to me. 
    One of the other members, Dave, took me out to some of the plantations lining the James River in Virginia. I had never seen a cotton field before, and although it was Autumn, and i did not expect that the cotton would be ready to be picked at that time of year. The fields were white, and i went out to pick a little, and it was just like the lump you would find in the neck of an aspirin bottle. A learning experience, and thank you for your input Dave.

    I visited some other sites of the Civil War. Bulls Run, Fredericksburg, just trying to absorb all i can to understand the bigger picture. I stood on the very spot where General Jackson stood firm on the edge of the trees at Bulls Run, from which he gained the epithet "Stonewall".

    So, its back in Scotland, where much to my surprise both my old Mercedes and my bike started "first time". I hit the ground running, as i have so much of a backlog of work to take care of. The weather is not too bad, and ive been lucky enough to already get out in the landscape that i love so much.
    Ill be back over in the States in January/February. but in the interim i have a book to finish, and i have several ideas that i wish to put into operation, including talking books, and DVDs.
    And i did learn from that trip. One of the things that became apparent to me was that Americans have their statement to "the flag", as in " I pledge Allegiance" etc, and i feel that Scotland should have something similar to inspire patriotism here. I intend to write something suitable, and ill share it with you when i actually put my thoughts to paper!  

Some of the original natives in Ohio. Their tribal system has so much in common with the Scots. Chiefs, clans, badges etc.	My first rodeo! I was speaking at a large event and had time between shows to look at what else was going on. There was a cowgirl competition, and the skill of some of these girls in the timed events was breathtaking.
The plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Strange to stand there and look at those open bomb doors.	At the evening event at Williamsburg Scottish Festival in Virginia.
The statue of William Wallace in Druid Hill Park in Baltimore.	The USS Eisenhower.
The certificate and medal i was given in Richmond.	On board the Eisenhower.
My daughter Kimberley at the entrance to the tunnel at the Battle of the Crater.	Giant cairn to the Civil War dead in Hollywood Cemetery in Richmond Virginia. Reminiscent of the traditional cairns in Scotland, no mortar is used in this huge example over 100 feet high.

A smaller version of the stone cairn at Hollywood Cemetery, beside the Richmond-Fredericksburg-Potomac line, marking the site of the Battle of Fredericksburg to passengers. I counted the huge wagons as the train went past, and there were 110 of them. In little Scotland 10 half the size would seem a lot!

Boy fights to protect his hero! CLICK HERE

July 23rd 2009. East Kilbride.

Been back from the States a week or so, but I’m really bad at dealing with jet lag when I fly ‘against’ the sun, so I’m just getting back into the swing of things. Back in the gym at least, getting shouted at to lift heavy things, so I’m getting there.
I was six weeks in the States, and I decided that on this trip I should make an effort to immerse myself in American history. Seems only right, when I’m espousing Scottish history to Americans, that I should at least know their story. Have read several in depth books on the matter- but using exactly the same criteria as I do in Scotland, I really need to get out into the land itself and walk over the sites where extra-ordinary events took place and immerse myself in them to really understand them.
I know quite a lot about the American War of Independence, where they severed from British rule. (Well done!) So it was time to really get to understand the Civil War. As I was based in Richmond, Virginia, I was right in the middle of the thick of things.
Visits to relevant places during every spare minute became the norm. The Museum of the Confederacy and the Civil War Museum in Richmond. A visit to Chimborazo, the military hospital. All the fields where the Seven Days Battles took place. Standing in the little clearing at Cold Harbor where 7,000 Union boys died in the first six minutes of the charge against the entrenched Confederate positions.
I stood in that space in the trees where so many lives were lost, and had the place to myself, sun beams filtering through and bird song, in a place where absolute carnage had once rained. Hollywood Cemetery and the myriad of graves.
Gaines Mill and the turtles in the creek, and even turtles in the trees above the water-not an everyday sight in Scotland!
At Guinea Station I was shown the bed that Stonewall Jackson died upon. At the Burnett Place in Pennsylvania I visited the house where General Johnston surrendered and finished the War.
A tour round the many, many miles of the defences around Petersburg. With the replica of the ‘Dictator’-the huge mortar that shelled the town being something I really wanted to see, especially as it stands ‘in situ’ of the original. The earthworks are still pretty much in evidence, and many cannon are still on site for many miles round the town.
But I got to see something I’ve always wanted to see, and that was the place where the Battle of the Crater took place. Many miners among the Union troops reckoned they could tunnel under the Confederate positions, and pack the mine with gunpowder and blow the opposition to Kingdom Come. So mine they did, and dug a tunnel 511 feet long with several chambers on the end. Four tons of explosive were put in place, and the troops were instructed that when the explosion occurred (although nobody was sure it that the efforts would either explode or work!) they had to charge through the Confederate lines and on to Petersburg.
The explosion was bigger and more devastating that anyone imagined, and as the dust cleared the Union troops surged forward.
Unfortunately they did not run round the rim of the resultant crater, they ran into it, but its sides were so steep that they could not get back out its thirty foot sides. The Confederates soon recovered their composure, and realising that the Yankees were trapped, it became a ‘turkey shoot’ with them merely firing into the mass below.
To give you an idea of the mayhem, the last 1,100 in the bottom of the hole surrendered, leaving many times that number dead.
I stood on the edge of the crater and cast back my mind. Then I walked to the Yankee positions and looked at the remains of the entrance to the mine.
And the most surprising thing about all this? At nearly all these places I never saw another soul. Just the spirits of those boys who died a century and a half ago were there with me. I did circular walks of various fields, got to stand on the exact spots where Robert E. Lee had stood several times, and never saw another person.

Back at the accommodation, I told Jamesie from Albannach about the stuff I had seen that particular day, and especially the details of the ‘Crater’. As he listened, he told me that this sounded exactly like the opening twenty minutes or so of the movie ’Cold Mountain’.
So when I first got home, I bought the movie for the princely sum of £3 out of my local music store, and settled down to watch it. They captured the events of the Battle of the Crater perfectly. Spot on in fact.

One of the other wee revelations was during the visit to the Museum of the Civil War. As I turned one corner I was confronted by the Flag of Scotland, our beloved Saltire, the diagonal cross of St. Andrew, facing me from a glass case. The men of Arkansas had flown it during the Civil War. The south was partly settled by many incoming Scots of course, especially the Carolinas, with many Scots point of entry being Cape Fear. Strangely, it is reckoned that the word Yankee may be from the same source as the French ‘Anglais’-meaning English.
And like the attitude of the Highlands of Scotland after the Battle of Culloden in 1746, where the Jacobite failure was said to be a ‘Lost Cause’, I have seen this same term used for the ambitions of the south after the Civil War.
The men of the south knew the flag of the Confederacy as the “St. Andrew’s Cross”, interestingly enough.

The tour was a good one, culminating in my fourth year at Grandfather Mountain. When I started attending, there were many Union Flags on display, and God Save the Queen was sung at the opening ceremony. I am glad to say that no Union Flags were on display this year, and that above mentioned anthem, so offensive to Scots, was not sung.
“Rebellious Scots for us to crush, God Save the Queen”, run the lyrics, just in case you didn’t know!
I hope my influence has been productive. These games and events are Scottish occasions, and these are no place for symbols of foreign interference to be on show.

No animal attacks on this tour that I can recall, which is strange for me! Nearly stood on a snake in Pennsylvania, but I had no idea if it was dangerous or not. I was the recipient of some outstanding hospitality, and my heartfelt thanks go out to Karen from Texas, Heather (nice house!!), Liz as always, and Suzan and Donnie at Grandfather showed me what legendary southern hospitality is all about.

Its always a learning process, and I realise that there are wide gulfs sometimes in what Scots think is acceptable behaviour, compared to that of our north American friends. Listening to the Scots round about me puts it into perspective. For instance, if someone is singing badly out of tune, a Scot will remark, not really out of earshot of others, “if that does not stop, I’m going to go over and kick him till he is soggy”. Now I don’t really believe that this is going to take place, and the Scot concerned is unlikely to rise from his seat, but I have seen Americans take this information as literal, and look somewhat alarmed!
The best I can say regarding this, is a new slogan. “We Scots are not necessarily violent-we just like to vent!”
I might even have that printed on a t-shirt.

Since I got home I have done several newspaper interviews, two regarding missing documents from the National Library of Scotland, I’ve picked up the thread of my new book again and getting back into the discipline of writing, everything is more or less in place for Wallace Day on Saturday 22nd of August, with the march from Ludovick Square in Johnstone to Elderslie where Wallace was born, during the afternoon, and the evening event with Albannach and Ted Christopher. There is an article on Wallace in place for a forthcoming Scots Magazine that mentions my patriotic efforts back in 2005 to commemorate the great man, and I have a forthcoming three part series on rivers to be broadcast on BBC Radio (I was partly responsible for the one on the River Clyde).
I have many of my usual speaking engagements to do in Scotland too.
So that’s that. Now I have to try and break the back of this new book, and prepare myself for returning to the States through the ‘Fall’ to see if I can beat my record of 24 seconds for sending a whole audience to sleep!
Thanks to everyone who travelled to one of my events, for your continued enthusiasm and support. And at events, you may get to catch a glimpse of the “Shiny Shiny”, that great talisman of the Scottish people!

At the mid -winter festival near Philadelphia.

Back in Scotland where i thought i had missed the worst of the winter, but it snowed here quite heavily last night.
I travelled up to Pennsylvania for the last weekend of the tour. It shows what a huge country the States are, when you can drive from "swim in the sea" sunshine to snow and a huge indoor event. It was 22 hours of driving to get up north.
En route i stopped at Aberdeen Proving Ground, not far from Interstate-95. I had read an article about the place and i wanted to see it for myself. I had always noticed the signs for Aberdeen. As a Scot you tend to notice all the places with Scottish names. And there are so many of them, showing the influence my people have had on the New World!
But i had no idea of the goodies on show here, prior to reading that magazine article,.that would appeal to my sense of history no matter what era it comes from.

At the gate at Aberdeen, i was asked for my passport and car documents. All being in order, i was issued with a day pass, and instructions on how to find my way to the ordnance section. Aberdeen Proving Grounds are enormous.

After the Allies landed in Europe in 1944, every German tank or piece of artillery, that the US War Dept thought might have some value in new technology etc, was shipped back to Aberdeen for inspection. They are all still there and parked up in rows, scores of them, many, many examples, and you are permitted to wander round them. There was every type of German tank you could think of,. Panzers, JadTigers et al. Plus World War I tanks, Russian T-34's from the eastern front, and a few more modern American examples.