Wick sculptures saved from destruction in damp, dark cellar at Carnegie building
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
A series of sculptures of local Caithness dignitaries has been saved for future generations to enjoy after being rescued from a damp cellar at the Carnegie building in Wick.
The five sculptures and three wooden plinths have been placed in the reference room of the former library after Wick man Roy Mackenzie located them in the cellar and arranged an uplift with a specialist team.
"A few weeks ago I got clearance from Ruan Peat, librarian and High Life Highland responsible person for Carnegie library, after a risk assessment," Roy said.
"The entry was aimed at planning the safe removal of the contents and this was undertaken with professional support of Rolls-Royce Vulcan riggers. The actual sculpture removal event was carried out last Thursday.
"The plan was safely executed and many thanks to Rolls-Royce Vulcan for their excellent professional support to allow this to happen."
The five sculptures uplifted from the cellar are:
- Herbert Sinclair, author of well-known local history books Caithness 1925, Caithness Your Home and Over the Ord.
- Renwick JG Millar, editor of the John O'Groat Journal in the late 19th century and close friend of Pastor John Horne.
- Col Ian McHardy, director of education, commander of the local Home Guard in World War II, banker and commissioner of the Boy Scouts.
- Pastor John Horne, poet, author, antiquarian and historian, who left a monumental legacy to Caithness.
- James Traill Calder, schoolteacher and renowned local historian. Due to the fragile nature of this statue it has been left inside its transport box for support.
The Calder statue appears to be a maquette (scale model) for the existing statue at Wick riverside and was created by Nybster sculptor, artist and amateur archaeologist John Nicolson. This maquette was sent to Italy for professional sculptors to work from and create the commanding statue that now stands behind the police station in Wick.
It is said that Nicolson did not have a full portrait of Calder to work from and created the model from various pieces of information gleaned from his relatives about what his chin, forehead, nose and mouth were like. The finished work was said to bear a striking resemblance to the late writer after being unveiled in 1900.
Roy opened a hatch to reveal the dark, small cellar area where the sculptures had lain for several decades. He believes that some of the statues may have been deliberately vandalised when they were erected in the grounds of the library and that some others may have been damaged as they were moved into the cellar via an external chute.
Horne, Millar and Calder have had their noses broken off at some point and McHardy appears very brittle with fragments falling away. All the sculptures seem to have been affected by being in a damp atmosphere for many years.
Roy said: "The next stage will be the assessment of these artefacts by John Hood and Sons, sculptors, to advise if they can repaired and at what cost. Hopefully, this will happen in the near future. Ownership issues will need to be discussed with High Life Highland and Highland Council.
"The five sculptures will be recorded in the database managed by the Royal Burgh of Wick Community Council secretary as part of managing the Common Good Fund."
Roy has been tirelessly working over the last few years to locate artefacts relating to the former museum at the Carnegie library, some of which were deposited into the archives of the Wick Society. He also recovered an early land charter dating from 1476 which had been mislaid and is now with the Caithness Archives at Nucleus in Wick.
"Over the Covid lockdown period I reviewed my Carnegie library museum donation records to identify these sculptures. Along with the cellar contents, I found about a dozen pieces of artwork that were in an upstairs store in the library. They are now temporarily stored in Thurso library."
One of the statues recovered is of Pastor John Horne who wrote the poem Div Ye Mind and donated a comprehensive collection of documents, manuscripts, artefacts and curios to the Carnegie library museum in 1902, making it “the best provincial museum in the kingdom”.
He also raised money for various memorials around Wick including the Veterans’ Memorial at the North Head, the Altimarlach Cross and the Distinguished Visitors to the Royal Burgh of Wick Plaque in Station Road. It is hoped that his bust's broken nose can eventually be repaired.
"Pastor Horne, James Traill Calder and the late Iain Sutherland are, in my view, the three most important historians in the county," Roy added. "I've been working since 2019 on tracing lost artefacts which includes a valuable large painting and a stag's head that was in the old library. These are important parts of our local history and should be preserved."
