It was reported over the weekend that a 3 metres (10 feet) tall statue, depicting a bunch of opium poppies, is to be put up at Lews Castle. This to signify the Castle's historical link to the 19th century opium trade, through which its builder, Sir James Matheson, made his fortune. I find the idea faintly odious, because the opium trade that Matheson worked was actually designed to get the Chinese people hooked on the addictive substance that opium is. Made from the sap of Papaver somniferum, opium contains nearly two dozen different substances, all related to morphine - which is highly addictive. When the Chinese government tried to ban the import of opium from India (on British ships), Matheson got the British government to wage a war on China to counteract their prohibition.
This Sunday, I visited Sandwick Cemetery, about a mile east of Stornoway, to photograph a tombstone. One of the names on it was Capt D Mcdonald, who was lost in the China Sea. Upon adding the picture to the Findagrave website, I noticed a copy of a 19th century newspaper clipping. It told the story of the opium clipper Sylph which had disappeared on passage from China to India, never arriving in Singapore during the year 1849. It seems they were entered by pirates, who sailed the ship to Hainan Island (off the Chinese south coast) and where it was set on fire. The fate of the crew is not known, but the worst may be assumed.
Upon further research, I came across an old book on Google Books entitled the Opium Clippers. A simple browser search yielded a lot of stories about the Sylph and Captain Macdonald.
The last captain of the famous Sylph , Captain Donald MacDonald, was twice married. By his first wife he had three daughters, of whom the youngest Jemima alone reached maturity. She married Captain John Ryrie, the eldest of the three Ryrie brothers.
Although not present in the Old Sandwick Cemetery, there is a enclosed gravesite dedicated to the Ryrie family, of whom Phineas Ryrie was master of a tea clipper.
Still on the subject of the Sylph, it is noted in the article referred to above that she was not likely to be carrying opium as she was headed for India, not China...
