18224: Colin Maclean

Colin (1829-1908) was a son of Malcolm Maclean and Christina Macaulay, 12 Crowlista. 

He was the skipper of the Express, perhaps owned by his father, which sailed between Loch Roag and the Baltic. It was on the Express that Malcolm Macaulay (Calum Sgaire) composed his famous song.

Oral tradition maintains that Colin left Uig with the Darrochs, who had had Baile na Cille Manse as a shooting lodge in the mid 1800s, to skipper their yacht. Afterwards he was an officer on a clipper ship and was many times in Shanghai on the tea runs. He also visited Australia.

In 1856, Colin married Janet Macaulay, a sister of Calum Sgaire and they had six children. They moved to Shieldaig, Wester Ross, after 1871, and are still there at the time of Colin’s death in 1908.