This lovely story comes from Mairead Ramsay who kindly contributed it, please see Mairead's own web site at http://www.nocandhu.com............
In the 1800 my great, great grandfather MacBain lived on the croft at Feabuie on Culloden Moor.
He made whisky in a hide out on the Red Burn (called this when it ran red for 3 days after the Battle of Culloden!).
He excavated a wee cave into a sandy bank of trees near the stream at the back of the croft. It was propped up with poles.
That was where he made illicit whisky. He used a copper pot with a copper wire with 7 turns in it.
With a peat fire under the pot of mash it was just like boiling soup. The wire tube ran through a barrel of cold water to help the distillation. The whisky ran out into an earthenware flask.
Old MacBain got caught by the excise men three times in his long career of making, transporting and selling whisky.
What happened the first time is lost to memory, but my father can tell you about the other two: MacBain was taking the garrans (horses) through Drumochter down to Alloa and took whisky with him to sell.
In the lowlands they used a faster method to make grain whisky and his old-fashioned slow type commanded a good price.
However, MacBain got caught by the excise men the day after he got to Alloa, and they seized a flask of whisky as evidence. He was brought up before the Sherrif the following day.
The Sherrif asked the excise men for their evidence, and they produced the flask.
However, he said "Is that all? Anybody is allowed by law to carry a flask of whisky. Do you not have any barrels or kegs?"
When the excise men said no, MacBain got off scot free. MacBain had gone and sold the kegs and barrels of whisky to that same Sherrif as soon as he'd arrived in Alloa.
The last time Old MacBain smuggled whisky was the time he got caught and beaten-up by the excise men at the Dalcross shabeen (illegal drinking house) only a few miles from his own croft.
He was an old man by that time and the threat of further beatings if he got raided and caught scared him.
He went out and pulled the roof down on his wee cave and the bank of soil above covered it over. It still had earthenware jars of whisky in it.
When I was 7 or 8 years old (about 1932) I was at the croft with my Mum and Dad for Christmas. Granny and Granda (MacBains daughter) came in and put a very muddy earthenware jar with a wicker basket round it on the table. "This is the last one." They said. They had dug up the last of Old MacBains whisky.
(copyright M Ramsay, not to be reproduced without permission)
NOTE Distilling has had a chequered history in the area and although very near to Glen Ord, Tomatin and especially Speyside there are no operating distilleries in Inverness or its immediate environs… although it makes a good centre for those interested in touring around distilleries.
Two distilleries in the town, Glen Mhor and Glen Albyn were demolished to make way for retail development in the 1980's, and at Millburn most of the buildings remain but have been converted.
Although we have found no evidence it was said that most of the farm houses used their barley and the local burns running down to the shore to make their own whisky.