The street in Australia named after my great great grandfather

My family history stuff is put away and I'm far too hot to go and look for it, so this is written from memory, but I think it's right.

I've posted a lot about my great great grandmother's brother Sandy Campbell and also about her sister Johanna Robertson Campbell. Both were senior members of Queen Victoria's staff at Balmoral. But what about my great great grandmother Jane Clark Campbell?

She died aged only 22, having already had an illegitimate son with a man called Alexander Calder.

The boy, my great grandfather, was brought up by the Campbell family in Scotland, but Alexander left for Australia. He became one of the first residents of the town of Smeaton in Victoria, and this road there is a street named after him.

Calder Street is the one going off to the right in the photo above – you can see the Calder St. signpost pointing the way. The inscription below is on the Campbell family monument in the old kirkyard at Crathie.

GUEST POST Why have the Lib Dems given up fighting most parliamentary by-elections?

Lib Dem HQ has decided to stop making an effort in unpromising Westminster by-elections. Regular guest poster Augustus Carp argues that they've got it wrong.

Today I want us to think about a rather unusual chap called Ian Stuart – he was the "area manager" or whatever it was called of the Liberal Party in the Home Counties in the 1980s. On our rare meetings I found him to be a rather genial cove, although I gather he was not always popular with the party hierarchy. Anyway, it was his lot to be the Liberal Party candidate in the long-forgotten Uxbridge by election of 1972.

Long forgotten because, on the very same day (7 December) the Liberal Party won a Famous Victory in Sutton and Cheam. Graham Tope triumphed, Liberal hearts were gladdened, and progress suddenly seemed a little bit more inevitable. 

Ian Stuart told me that the only instructions he received from party HQ regarding his campaign were given to him by Jeremy Thorpe himself: 

"Go to Uxbridge and make a nuisance of yourself. You are going to fight a futile campaign, but in a good cause. You are a diversionary tactic from the main battle in Sutton & Cheam. If you don’t come back with at least two writs issued against you, then you haven’t been doing your job!"

I don’t think any writs were issued, but Ian certainly did his job. As he was the Convenor of Shop Stewards at Heathrow Airport at the time he was fully acquainted with the intricacies of the largest employer in the area, and was indeed able to stir up mischief. He certainly generated enough press releases, silly stunts and outrageous quotes to distract from Sutton and Cheam and keep Conservative and Labour activists away from the target seat. And he went down to a heroic defeat.

Bit here’s the thing – at least he tried. He knew what was needed of him – to fight as good a good campaign as he possibly could, with no money, half a dozen members, and no prospect of any external help. 

Now compare that with the situation today. The Liberal Democrats are infinitely richer in terms of money, activists, experience, MPs and councillors – but the national party seems to have given up on the idea of fighting elections, even as diversionary tactics. 

Why has the national party made so little effort recently, in Rochdale, Gorton, Makerfield, South Aberdeen? No doubt we could name others as well. I have no doubt that the candidates and local parties were doing their best, but where was the support for those campaigns? There wasn’t even an email asking for money. 

My local party is amazing. There’s perhaps only a dozen or so of them, but they are always coaxing me to deliver a few more leaflets, come out canvassing, give them some idea for Focuses etc. Their enthusiasm is infectious, and I am happy to help them – so much so that I probably don’t even qualify as an armchair member anymore. They deserve all the support I can give them. 

But why do I continue to pay my subscriptions to the national party (index-linked since the merger!) when I see so little bang for my buck? Why doesn’t the national party seem to want to put up a fight any more? I wouldn’t want to join a football club that wasn’t particularly interested in playing (or winning) football matches. As a member of a political party, I want to see it – and help it - fight elections. 

I heard the explanation given that the party doesn’t want to spend £50,000 just to save a £500 deposit. That might make economic sense, but it doesn’t make political sense anymore. Getting 2 per cent in a parliamentary by election is actively harming us. It makes us look irrelevant, even to voters in places where we are successful. 

The current political environment needs us to spend the £50,000 just to make sure that we retain some sort of credibility – not just in the relevant constituency, but nationally as well. We might at least try to come third, assuming that the first two places are out of reach – that might get us an honourable mention in news broadcasts. 

If that’s too much to ask, at least we might try to save our deposit. We cannot choose where by elections will fall, so we just have to make the best of a bad job. At least when they do happen, we should fight the good fight, and do the best we can.

Ian Stuart's other great observation to me was that every member of the Liberal Party, with the obvious exception of the two of us, was too bloody clever by half – always overanalysing problems and reinventing the wheel, rather than just getting on with the basics. Perhaps that’s the problem we have in the Liberal Democrats at the moment.

Augustus Carp is the pen name of someone who has been a member of the Liberal Party and then the Liberal Democrats since 1976.

In which my great great grandmother's brother stuffs a ptarmigan

I've written before about my great great grandmother's brother Sandy Campbell - about how his dog Sir William Wallace and how the last Tsar of Russia gave him a pair of binoculars.

An item in a Dundee Courier (8 May 1973) column by "Craigie" about a laburnum tree in a Carnoustie front garden soon turns to him:

Back in those Victorian times Queen Victoria herself an eye for quaint and picturesque effects of this sort.

When visiting Loch Muick (near Balmoral) she often had a word on the subject with Sandy Campbell, her stalker at Glasallt Shiel. 

Sandy had the road along the loch planted with rowan trees to form dainty arches. And here and there he planted seedlings together and intertwined their pliant stems giving the same unusual appearance as the Carnoustie laburnum.

Stalker Campbell also kept an interesting "museum" in the coach house at Glasallt Shiel. He was an amateur taxidermist, and stuffed a whole collection of animals and birds like wild cats, grouse and ptarmigan, along with foxes' masks and brushes.

There was also an impressive array of antlers, and horns of sheep and wild goats.

He also collected bits of quartz and rock crystal found in the hills round about, as well as a sample of the 6-foot-long heather that grew in some of the mountain ravines.

GUEST POST Defections Update: Lib Dem Conference Special

The Conservative and Labour Parties are continuing to lose councillors in significant numbers, finds Augustus Carp in his latest survey of political defections.

Danny Kruger, MP for East Wiltshire, may be getting the headlines in the defection newsfeeds, but he’s just the tip of the iceberg. The rate at which councillors are changing their political allegiance doesn’t seem to be slackening.

Since June, 39 councillors have defected from the Conservatives and 56 from Labour. The Lib Dems are unchanged, Nationalists have lost 1 and the Greens are up 4. Reform UK has gained 29 and the Independents (widely defined) make up the balance with 63.

The pattern over recent years has usually been for defecting councillors to become Independents and then, if so inclined, to join a new party after a respectable period in the wilderness. Straight switches from Party A to Party B are not as frequent, but they do happen – 18 of the former Conservative councillors have moved straight to Reform UK, but one has joined them from the Greens.

The Lib Dems have lost one councillor to Reform UK (in Burnley). Three Labour councillors have moved to the Lib Dems, with the same number joining the Greens and one going to Reform UK. The remainder of the departing Labour councillors have aligned themselves with a variety of Independent political mini-groups, ranging from the Broxtowe Alliance to the Potteries Party.

The net figure of departing Labour councillors would have been much higher had it not been for a large number of suspended and unwhipped councillors being readmitted to the party over the summer. One hopes that the majority of them have learned their lessons regarding the inappropriate use of social media.

Some of these defections have had a significant impact on the local councils – Labour have lost notional control of South Tyneside, and the Labour group on Reigate and Banstead has evaporated. Senior figures have been involved in recent defections – the former leader of the Conservative group on Aberdeenshire Council is now an Independent, as is the former Labour leader in Caerphilly.

As Jonathan Wallace has noted in his blog, we are now also seeing defections from Reform UK – perhaps the most curious of which is a councillor in Kent moving from them to UKIP. Jonathan has provided some useful background on the defections of Reform UK office holders in the North East of England, but only elected councillors have been included in these figures.

Augustus Carp is the pen name of someone who has been a member of the Liberal Party and then the Liberal Democrats since 1976.

Did Victoria and John Brown have a child and did my family know?

Regular readers will know that my great great grandmother's siblings Sandy Campbell and Johanna Campbell were both trusted servants to Queen Victoria at Balmoral. So I take a particular interest in the subject of this podcast.

I remember reading a paper that pointed out that Conservative historians hotly denied that Victoria and John Brown were lovers, while left-wing historians sniggered at the idea. The author hoped they were lovers and it made Victoria happy.

In this podcast Fern Riddell describes her researches and discoveries, which make you think that - maybe, just maybe - there was such a child.

And if Victoria and John Brown did have a child, it's not ridiculous to think that Sandy, a friend of Brown from their boyhoods, and Johanna, the housekeeper at Victoria's retreat even from Balmoral, must have known.

Sandy Campbell and the Royal Family after Queen Victoria

We left my great great grandmother's brother in 1900 with a post about his being presented with a pair of binoculars by Nicholas II, the last tsar of Russia.

He enjoyed another burst of press coverage in 1907. Here's the Aberdeen Press and Journal for Monday 22 July 1907:

The Queen comes early to Deeside, along with Princess Victoria. Both are keen trout anglers, and will spend most of their time on the lochs in and around Balmoral, which have from time to time been re-stocked and improved with both "natives" and Lochlevens. 

The young Princes of Wales will soon be at Abergeldie, and, with Old Sandy Campbell as their special guide, they are expected to make some grand baskets on Loch Muick and its feeders. 

Campbell, although in retirement, is, like Donald Stewart, somehow or other indispensible. They knew the wiles of the fario and where the big "boys" lie. They know the side of the loch which is most favoured to-day; and was not Donald the favourite keeper of the King, the Prince Wales, and his late brother in days gone by? 

The Queen in 1907 was Edward VII's consort Alexandra, and Princess Victoria was their daughter, the Princess Royal. The Prince of Wales in that era was the future George V. so perhaps the "young Princes of Wales" was an inaccurate reference to the future Edward VIII and George VI, who were then lads.

"The fario" are trout, while the Prince of Wales' late brother is Prince Albert Victor, seen by some as a candidate for being Jack the Ripper.

Moving hurriedly on, another report appeared in The Sphere on Saturday 31 August 1907. It describes a visit to Balmoral by Queen Alexandra, which was shorter than usual because of the illness of the Princess Royal:

Old Sandy Campbell and her favourite breed of collies are granted a morning interview, for it was the father of this half-collie, half-deerhound, that found the King, then Prince of Wales, when he was lost with his gillie one misty day among the hills. Sandy still keeps up the breed, and a shaggy but hardy cross it is and well named the Balmoral collie.

In 1900 Sandy's dog was called Sir William Wallace (not to be confused with our own Lord Wallace of Saltaire), but I don't know if he was, or was related to, the dog that found the future Edward VII.

Finally, The Sphere published an article about Edward VII on Saturday 12 October 1907. In it we read:

There is nothing he likes better than a crack with old Sandy Campbell, his gillie and guide in his younger days when stalking on "dark Lochnagar," or with Donald Stewart, who taught him first to shoot straight and hit his first stag.

Sandy Campbell died on 20 May 1912, aged 76.

Sandy Campbell grew potatoes on an island in Loch Muick

The Scots Magazine for 1 July 1970 has a snippet about my great great grandmother's brother Sandy Campbell:

Winter lingers right into early summer in this area between Dee and Spey, and this must have meant a very late sowing. But crops can be grown in unpromising places. 

In Queen Victoria’s day the stalker at Glasallt Shiel, Sandy Campbell, used to grow a crop of potatoes on a little island on Loch Muick. "Weel, ye see, it's the best bit o’ soil roond aboot," was his explanation.

I think I'll take to speaking like that myself.

Johanna Campbell, my great great grandmother's sister and housekeeper to Queen Victoria at Glas-allt-Shiel

My great great grandmother Jane Clark Campbell died at the age of 22, having had a son with one Alexander Calder. We've seen plenty about one of her brothers, Sandy Campbell; now it's the turn of one of her sisters.

Thanks to Don Fox and his blog, I can tell you about Johanna Campbell. (According to the article in The Sphere I blogged about earlier this year, Jane, Sandy and Johanna's father - my great great great grandfather - was a keeper rather than a labourer.)

Johanna Campbell was born at Khantore, Crathie in 1852, the daughter of a labourer. She was initially employed as a housemaid and was eventually appointed to the Queen’s service as housekeeper at Glasalltshiel, the Queen’s retreat on the shores of Loch Muick. There she developed a reputation for being welcoming to both visitors and passers-by. Her brother, Sandy, was also in royal employment as a keeper and was well-known for his trout fishing acumen.  

In December 1898, Johanna Campbell became ill and was referred to Professor Alex Ogston in Aberdeen. After examining Miss Campbell, he wrote to James Forbes, the new commissioner on the Balmoral estate and successor to Alexander Profeit (RA VIC/ADDQ/7/65) to inform him of his opinion.  

“My Dear Sir, I was favoured with your letter about Miss Campbell and saw her when she called today.  She has cancer of the left breast which requires to be removed forthwith.  And I have arranged that she will come into the Infirmary on Thursday at 12.30, when I shall be pleased to do all in my power to cure her".  

Sadly, the referral was too late, as was often the case in those days, and Johanna Campbell died in January 1900, the cause of death being given as “carcinoma of the breasts and secondary thoracic and abdominal deposits of 4 months’ standing”, as certified by Alexander Hendry, at the time a general practitioner in Ballater.  

In her final days, Johanna Campbell was cared for in the Balmoral estate sanatorium.  She too was buried in the Crathie churchyard.

And the Fishing Gazette for 27 January 1900 reported:

Miss Johanna Campbell, the Queen's housekeeper at Glassalt Shiel, Deeside, died last week, after a painful illness. Miss Campbell was of an extremely kind and obliging disposition, sod many a tourist and angler will long remember her with gratitude for the welcome cup of tea which was ever ready in her own room to whoever came her way. No introduction was required, and to all she dispensed a queenly hospitality as became a prime favourite and representative of the Queen. 

Her brother, Mr. Alexander Campbell (Sandy), is one of Her Majesty's keepers, and as a trout angler in these part cannot be excelled. He is guide, philosopher, and friend to the princesses and Court party when they go a-trouting on Loch Muick, and at other times supplies the Queen's table with trout.

I shall merely add that if Queen Victoria and John Brown were lovers, then Johanna, as housekeeper at Glas-allt-Shiel, would surely have known.

The illustration shows the monument that Sandy Campbell erected to his parents, and those of his brothers and sisters who already died, in the old kirkyard at Crathie. Johanna is remembered on it, but my photo of her side of he monument did not come out well. So my great great grandmother Jane Clark Campbell features here.

Don Fox's blog post is about Professor Sir Alex Ogston, a remarkable man, and you can read more about his role in the first world war (he was 70 when it broke out) on the University of Aberdeen site.