SCATTERING of snow on the tops, central heating on, gloves and scarves standing by, clocks going back next week - yes, autumn (or is it winter?) is here. Lots of people are away for the school holidays but there are still quite a number of visitors around. Ullapool museum was fairly busy when I dropped in there earlier this week. It is open until the end of the month so if you've been too busy in the summer to go and have a look round why not do so over the next week or so.
Curator Jim Inglis and his team of volunteers will only be too happy to help you. And if they can't answer your questions they will know someone who can.
They have a large catalogued collection of over 1,200 photographs that you can view.
There are some wonderful photos there - a few even from before 1900. But there are more recent ones so see if you can spot yourself in any of them.
Jim told me that he has just been sent a pack of letters, invoices etc from the late 1700s and early 1800s. Some of them relate to the debts of Robert Melville who I mentioned last week.
One account he showed me was dated 1780 and was to a John Mackenzie, merchant at Ullapool. I think this may well be Sergeant John Mackenzie formerly of Loudon's Regiment who was one of the twelve soldiers who were settled on Ullapool farm on returning from the Seven Years War.
He eventually took up residence on Isle Martin until 1776 when John Woodhouse was given the lease of Isle Martin to set up a fishing station. John Mackenzie was then granted the lease of much of Ullapool farm but twelve years later he was asked to give it up when in 1788 The British Fisheries Society wanted to site a new fishing village at Ullapool.
He was reluctant to do so and wanted a King's Letter but the Society's surveyors didn't see a problem as they reckoned he wasn't long for this world.
They reported, "John Mackenzie is a man upwards of 60 years of age (and) has within these two months past married a young girl of 18, and it is presumed the duration of the letter cannot be long."
How wrong they were - he lived for another 28 years. He and his wife are buried at Ullapool's Mill Street burial ground.
