An Idiosyncratic contribution to Scottish nationalism
Máirtín Seán Ó Catháin rediscovers an often neglected Gaelic toff, Erskine of Marr
No Language! No Nation!: The life and times of The Honourable Ruaraidh Erskine of Marr
Gerard Cairns Rymour Books (July 2021) pp. 189
Paperback: £13.99
ISBN: 9781919628608
Considering the advance of Scottish nationalism over the last 20 years, it is surprising that the history of the movement is still relatively neglected. This is particularly true of the movement’s formative years and some of its leading lights, none less than the subject of this lively biography, Ruaraidh Erskine of Marr. Perhaps because of the marginal status afforded to Erskine by a great many historians or their frequent tendency to pastiche his perceived eccentricity, he has often been a neglected figure. However, Gerard Cairns not only demonstrates Erskine’s value, but encourages others to feel the same.
Stuart Richard Joseph Erskine was born in Brighton in 1869, the second son of the 5th baron, William Macnaghten Erskine (1841-1913), who was a hereditary peer. Educated in England, Erskine began a career in journalism and ploughed a lonely furrow for the old Jacobite cause with which his family had once been involved. Alive to his Scottish roots from an early age and under the influence, Cairns argues, of an aged Gàidhlig-speaking nanny, Erskine quickly found his life-long passion for all things Gaelic and it is around the turn of the century that he appears to have begun using the Gaelic version of his (second) name, Richard, as his personal name, Ruaraidh.
Erskine of Marr was chiefly known as a propagandist for a form of cultural nationalism akin to that associated with Sinn Féin and the Irish separatist movement of the early 20th century. However, his ideas propagated via the newspaper between 1904 and 1925, and then his political movement, the Scots National League, were actually contemporaneous
