We're keeping his name alive: Wick plaque commemorates sculptor Scott Sutherland
A plaque has been installed in Wick in honour of sculptor Scott Sutherland as part of a project aimed at "keeping his name alive".
Born in the town in 1910, Sutherland is best known for the Commando Memorial at Spean Bridge but he also created many other renowned monuments.
Members of the Commando Association and the Royal Marines Association were present on Friday morning to see the circular plaque being unveiled and dedicated outside Wick Heritage Museum.
It is part of the Scott Sutherland Project's Commando Memorial Heritage Trail, which will see plaques installed at various places associated with the sculptor who died in 1984.
The Commando Memorial overlooks the training grounds of the commando training centre established in 1942 at Achnacarry Castle in Lochaber. It was unveiled by the Queen Mother in 1952.
Sutherland had served alongside commandos during his time in the Royal Artillery in World War II.
A group of about 30 – including representatives of the Wick, Canisbay and Latheron branch of the Royal British Legion Scotland, Wick's provost Jan McEwan and members of the Wick Society – gathered on the icy pavement outside the museum in Bank Row as Steve Nicoll, from the project committee, talked about Sutherland's life and work and the reasons for providing the plaque.
“Wick gave the world a great man,” Mr Nicoll added.
Last September saw the 70th anniversary of the unveiling of the Commando Memorial by the Queen Mother. In 1949 Sutherland had won a national competition to create the monument.
Speaking after the Wick ceremony, Paul Wilson, chairman of the Highland branch of the Royal Marines Association and a member of the Scott Sutherland Project, said: "Scott Sutherland, at the unveiling of the plaque in 1952, was very quiet and very reticent about being thanked for it. The Queen Mother had to bring him forward and explain it.
"As commandos we are very proud of the monument he has built to us down at Achnacarry – so proud, in fact, that we find it quite alarming that some people aren't even aware of his history and his background.
“We started researching it and the more we looked into it, the more we realised that he had done not just the Commando Memorial but several others. So we started a project firstly just to commemorate him and make him as famous as he should have been in his lifetime.
“Like all these projects, the more we looked into it, the more we found. We've traced his family and his history and where he worked.
“It's about keeping his name alive. We're delighted that there is so much history behind it and that we're bringing it back to Wick.
“The family live down in England now. They are over the moon and delighted that this plaque is in his birthplace, where he grew up and got married."
Inverness-based Mr Wilson, a former Royal Marine, described the Commando Memorial as one of the most recognisable monuments anywhere.
"There's a footfall of over 200,000 and yet a lot of people don't know much about the sculptor," he said. "Any other monument of that significance, the sculptor would probably be more famous than the monument itself."
Attached to the wall directly underneath the plaque is a QR code linked to the Commando Memorial Heritage Trail website.
Councillor McEwan said: “It was an honour to be invited to the dedication of the Scott Sutherland Commando Memorial Heritage Trail plaque and it was my pleasure to meet representatives from the Highland branch of the Royal Marines Association and others who had travelled from as far as Arbroath, as well as representatives from our local Legion Scotland branch and members of the public.
"There was a bust of Scott Sutherland on show and it will eventually come back to the Royal Burgh of Wick when the memorial trail is complete.”
Friday's event was supported by local Freemasons as well as the Legion branch and the Wick Society. A "meet and greet" took place in the Masonic Hall in Breadalbane Crescent prior to the unveiling and a small reception was held there afterwards.
After leaving school in Wick, Sutherland – who was known as Scotty to colleagues and friends – trained in art in Aberdeen before studying sculpture in Edinburgh.
He was awarded a scholarship to study in Paris and also travelled to Egypt, Greece and Italy.
After his war service, Sutherland taught sculpture at art colleges in Belfast and Dundee.
Sutherland was a keen boxer and a talented violinist. According to the Royal Scottish Academy's website, he described himself modestly as a "Caithness fiddler".
The project committee says that relatively little has been written about Sutherland "despite his considerable achievements as an artist and his arguably greater influence as a teacher".
