Watten, Bower [Grant,
John King] STRATHARRAN: OR THE CROFTER'S REVOLT [HISTORICAL CROFTING NOVEL]
Edinburgh, Oliphant,
Anderson & Ferrier, 1887
1st Edition, 8vo
(18cm), 190pp, [2] ads, 16pp (illustrated book catalogue for young people),
frontispiece illustration and chapter vignettes, publishers cloth with gilt
titles to spine and front board, along with an images of a dapper school-boy
cricketer (one asks why?). Sunday school prize inscription to front endpaper,
dated 1916. Excellent
condition. Binding sound. Very little wear. Slight browning to endpapers. Very
clean throughout. A few smudges only.
A curious historical
novel, set in the fictional district of ‘Stratharran’, and modelled on the
Scottish crofters’ campaigns of the early 1880s. The author’s pseudonym ties the book firmly
to Caithness: ‘Bower’ and ‘Watten’ being
villages in that county. John King Grant
(1832-1907) was born in Mortlach, Banff and - as a career journalist - held
various editorial posts including at the ‘John O’Groat Journal’ the ‘Birmingham
Daily Post’ and ‘The Northern Ensign’.
He held the latter post until the year of his death and he is buried in
Wick. The jolly, off-the-peg, cover
Illustration chosen by the publisher’s binders could not be further removed
from the struggles of the Caithness Highland agricultural community, upon which
the novel is based. (see Mowat, John: A Bibliography of Caithness, Wick, 1909
p. 65)
[ref:1492]£55