Campbell and Margaret moved to Canna in 1938 after spending three years living on Barra.
John Lorne Campbell and Margaret Fay Shaw had already spent years recording Gaelic songs, stories and traditions when they made the remote Isle of Canna their home in 1938. Campbell was born in Argyll on October 1, 1906, according to the Trust. His first published book, Highland Songs of the Forty-Five, appeared in 1933. He arrived on Barra on August 4, 1933, to study crofting conditions and colloquial Gaelic. He found that Gaelic oral traditions were still alive after more than 100 years of separation from Scotland. In 1937, while in Nova Scotia, he also recorded the history and traditions of the Micmac Indians, the Indigenous people of the Maritime Provinces. Campbell’s life took another major turn in 1938 when he bought the islands of Canna and Sanday. Campbell had met Margaret Fay Shaw in South Uist in 1934, where she was collecting traditional Gaelic songs. The couple lived at Canna House, which had been built around 1863 by Donald Macneil, who owned the island at the time. The house and island were later sold to Greenock shipowner Robert Thom in 1881. His family remained there until his death in 1911, after which the island was eventually bought by Campbell. In 1981, Campbell presented Canna to the National Trust for Scotland. The archives also preserve Margaret’s photographic collection of more than 6,000 images from the early 20th century in the Hebrides. Campbell’s work includes 1,700 sound recordings, his Hebridean Lepidoptera collection and the research writings collected by the couple over about 60 years. Campbell died suddenly on April 25, 1996, while on holiday at Villa San Girolamo in Fiesole, Italy. In 2006, his remains were reinterred on Canna, in the bluebell woods he had planted as a young man. Margaret died in 2004. She had first come to Canna from the Basque Country in 1960, aged 11, with her sister and father. After Campbell died, Magda lived with Margaret at Canna House and continued cataloguing and documenting his archive of papers and books until she retired in 2015.
The National Trust for Scotland says the collection inside Canna House is of international importance. The Scottish folklorists continued that work from the island for more than four decades before Campbell gifted Canna, their home, library, archives and sound recordings to the National Trust for Scotland. The eldest son of Colonel Duncan Campbell of Inverneill and his American wife, Ethel Waterbury of New Jersey, he was educated at Cargilfield School in Edinburgh and Rugby. He later studied Rural Economy at St John’s College, Oxford, as well as Celtic under Professor John Fraser of Jesus College. His interest in Gaelic had started in childhood and grew during his time at Oxford. With the help of Fraser, who became his mentor, Campbell began working on a Gaelic anthology. That same year, his work took him to the Outer Hebrides. The visit became the beginning of a long effort to collect and preserve Gaelic songs, stories and linguistic records. On Barra, Campbell became involved with local people and explored the Gaelic traditions of the Hebrides. He started with an Ediphone Recorder using wax cylinders and later moved to a Presto Disc Recorder. He obtained both in New York and used equipment that was considered state-of-the-art at the time. Campbell also travelled to eastern Canada, particularly Cape Breton, to study Gaelic traditions among the descendants of 18th- and 19th-century emigrants. He described Cape Breton as ‘a Highland Community where there are no lairds’. Canna House sits in a walled garden that slopes towards the south. He and Margaret moved to Canna after spending three years living on Barra. Margaret’s musical talents and Campbell’s knowledge of words and language, built what became a major collection of Gaelic cultural material. Canna House became both their home and a place where they continued their research. Campbell spent long hours in its library transcribing and archiving his Gaelic recordings and writing academic works. Margaret continued her own work through photography and film. The gift included Canna House, the island, his library, archives and sound recordings. Campbell and Margaret continued living there and devoted their time to cataloguing and publishing their research. It includes material covering Gaelic folk songs and tales, Celtic and Norse studies, philology, music, literature and Scottish history. The house also retains their furnishings, artworks and personal belongings, giving a record of the life they built around their research. The house also shows how closely their work was tied to their everyday lives. He had asked to be buried where he died, and he was initially interred there. Their work, however, remained connected to Canna House through the collections they had built and preserved there. Magda Sagarzazu, who had known the Campbells closely, continued Campbell’s work after his death. She spent much of her childhood on the island and developed a close bond with the Campbells, particularly John. Poll How important is the collection at Canna House for Scottish history? Visitors can see rooms including the library, where Campbell worked, and Margaret Fay Shaw’s study, which contains examples of her work in photography and film. Her Graflex camera is also displayed there, while a projector shows film footage of everyday life on Canna and South Uist. Catch the latest World News and Live updates. Download the TOI app.
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