St Mary’s Loch

St Mary’s Loch and the wider Yarrow and Ettrick Valleys were once the stomping ground of one of Scotland’s most famous literary sons

The largest natural loch in the Scottish Borders, St Mary’s Loch and its smaller neighbour, Loch of the Lowes, are a magnet for sailing and paddlesports enthusiasts. But the area also has strong literary connections, especially with James Hogg (1770-1835) – known as the Ettrick Shepherd. 

As a young man, Hogg worked as a farm hand and shepherd and was largely self-educated through his own reading. In many ways an unlikely literary figure – Hogg continued to farm for the majority of his life – he became a well-known poet, novelist and singer of traditional ballads, and a darling of the Edinburgh literary scene, writing in both Scots and English. 

Hogg became a friend of many of the great writers of the day, Sir Walter Scott included, whom he assisted with research for The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border. Later, Hogg began a literary magazine, The Spy, and was invited by publishing giant William Blackwood to write for the Edinburgh Magazine. By contrast, Hogg also wrote a practical and well-regarded handbook on sheep diseases. 

Having written a series of successful novels, he was best known for what was considered his masterpiece, Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, published in 1824. At the time of his death, Hogg was as famous as Robert Burns, although he is less widely read today. 

Unveiled in 1860, the imposing James Hogg Monument overlooks the two lochs and his favourite watering hole, Tibbie Shiels Inn – once run by the irrepressible Tibbie Shiels, a local woman who had worked on the Ettrick sheep farm of James’s father, Robert Hogg. 

The wife of a molecatcher, Tibbie became an innkeeper on her husband’s death. Located close to the old coach road between Selkirk and Moffat, the inn proved hugely popular with travellers, and is known to have also hosted other literary luminaries from Sir Walter Scott and publisher Robert Chambers to William Wordsworth and the Scottish essayist and philosopher, Thomas Carlyle. By all accounts, Tibbie told it how it was. A close friend of Hogg’s, she once said of him “he wrote a deal of trash but was a sensible man”. High praise indeed.

Contemporary writing

A direct descendant of James Hogg, Canadian writer, Alice Munro, penned a collection of historical and autobiographical short stories in 2006 featuring the lives of the Laidlaw family from the Ettrick Valley. Hogg’s cousin, James Laidlaw, is one of the real-life characters featured in Munro’s The View from Castle Rock, with the title story depicting his migration to North America at the grand age of 60. Alice Munro won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013.

Further info

Like Tibbie Shiels, Hogg is buried in the old kirkyard at Ettrick, close to where he was born. In addition to the memorial statue overlooking St Mary’s Loch and Loch of the Lowes, there is also a permanent exhibition celebrating his life at Aikwood Tower, near Selkirk.

Image credits: Ian Linton