The Ghille Dhu
From October 2023’s Wyrd & the Wisp
There’s an intriguing story about a young girl who ends up marrying a Mackenzie but as a girl, she encountered with the Ghille Dhu. This would be, if my research is correct, post Battle of Colloden by a few decades.
According to “Gairloch In North-West Ross-Shire,” by John H. Dixon, F.S.A. Scot and written in 1886 (and can be found in Project Gutenberg):
The best known Gairloch fairy of modern times went by the name of the Gille Dubh of Loch a Druing. His haunts were in the extensive woods… There are grassy glades, dense thickets, and rocky fastnesses in these woods, that look just the places for fairies.
…The Gille Dubh was so named from the black colour of his hair; his dress, if dress it can be called, was of leaves of trees and green moss. He was seen by many people on many occasions during a period of more than forty years in the latter half of the eighteenth century; he was, in fact, well-known to the people, and was generally regarded as a beneficent fairy.
He never spoke to any one except to a little girl named Jessie MacRae, whose home was at Loch a Druing. She was lost in the woods one summer night; the Gille Dubh came to her, treated her with great kindness, and took her safely home again next morning.
This starts as a sweet tale of a black-haired fairy dressed in forest attire and helping a child; however, the tale turns toward harming the fairy after Jessie grows up and marries John Mackenzie.
…Sir Hector Mackenzie of Gairloch invited Sir George S. Mackenzie of Coul, Mr Mackenzie of Dundonnell, Mr Mackenzie of Letterewe, and Mr Mackenzie of Kernsary, to join him in an expedition to repress the Gille Dubh. These five chieftains together repaired to Loch a Druing, armed with guns, with which they hoped to shoot the unoffending fairy.
This historical recounting tells of these lairds wearing their usual Highland dress and being entertained by John Mackenzie, Jessie’s husband. The party ate beef and mutton and spent the night on couches of heather. But, as for the expedition, the lairds went through all the woods but saw nothing of the Ghillie Dhu.
I imagine the creature went into hiding though some recounts say it and its ilk moved with the French trappers into Canada and the states. Not too far of a stretch if you consider that Sir Alexander Mackenzie, born in 1764 and died in 1820 was a fur trader and one of Canada’s greatest explorers. I believe he was kin from the same Mackenzie hunting party and a contemporary.
As for the Ghille Dhu’s origins, some tales say the Ghillie Dhu started off as a human boy befriended by fairies and raised in the fairy lands only to be exiled by the Queen of the Fairies.
From “Wonder Tales from Scottish Myth and Legend,” by Donald Alexander Mackenzie in 1917
The Fairy Queen banishes from Fairyland any fairy who disobeys her orders. Then the exile wanders about alone through the land in search of companions. As the queen’s subjects shun the banished fairy man or woman, he or she must needs make friends with human beings.
After Jessie Macrae is lost and a voice asks her why she is crying, this Mackenzie goes on to describe the Gille Dhu, whose name means dark servant because of his dark hair as follows:
Jessie looked round and saw the Gillie Dhu. He had hair black as the wing of a raven, eyes brown as hazel-nuts in September, and his mouth was large; he had a hundred teeth, which were as small as herring bones. The Gillie Dhu was smiling: his cream-yellow cheeks had merry dimples, and his eyes were soft and kindly. Had Jessie seen him at a distance, with his clothing of moss and leaves, she would have run away in terror, but as he seemed so kindly and friendly she did not feel the least afraid.
A strange tales indeed but do you know there is another story that puts magic—specifically invisible gold— in the same swatch of woods following the 1745 Battle of Culloden.
Dixon’s “Gairloch In North-West Ross-Shire,” (mentioned earlier in this article) said not only did this wood hold the Ghille Dhu but Duncan MacRae, a bard, hid a keg of gold which he had been entrusted to convey for Prince Charlie’s use from the courts of France.
This Duncan had been with the prince during his victorious days in Edinburgh, had composed a song entitled “Oran na Feannaige,” which translate to “Song of the Hoodie Crow,” and had the ability of the “sian,” or in other words, the ability to make something invisible.
So, after a quest to get the keg of gold to the prince had failed, Duncan supposedly hid it with his “sian” powers and it remains to this day… invisible save for a few moments every seven yeas. Did the ghille dhu know about this?
Hard to say but it’s interesting that Jessie and Duncan’s last names are fairly similar.
So exiting this little little rabbit hole… When is there not conflicting testimony, particularly with tales about fairies?
Case in point…Some tales claim the Ghillie Dhu to be an aggressive being who will wrap his long arms around you and drag you deep underground to feed the trees should he encounter you.
A rather horrifying thought. Reminds me of a tree near my house, over the railroad crossing and up the lane from my childhood home, where a sinisterly tree grew and I would keep my distance. I was positive when I was a a child that it would grab me, if it could. Of course, from an adult perspective, a half-dead straggly tree would look spooky. And it certainly couldn’t clothe a fairy in leaves and moss.
One last version… The Gillie Dhu has also been portrayed as a tooth fairy. Seems reasonable when you figure he lived in woods with a lot of birch and birch twigs make good pre-industrial “toothbrushes.”
There are many other rabbit holes I could go down and there’s certainly plenty of story fodder but instead I’ll share some neat finds I discovered while researching our Scottish friend.
For a video story of the Ghille Dhu: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l00-QJ2tCic
https://discover.hubpages.com/education/Ghillie-Dhu-part-of-Scottish-folklore
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9To4aCNbfg
And just neat: