The grandson of a First World War admiral has been given his family’s memorial stone thanks to the detective work of a couple of geneological sleuths.
Sir Edwyn Alexander-Sinclair famously fired the first shots in the Battle of Jutland.
A 5ft high sculpture was commissioned by his wife Julia, and it is engraved with 15 of the admiral’s forebears dating back to 1674.
At the time of his Navy service, Sir Edwyn’s family had Freswick Castle, near John O’Groats.
The memorial was carved in the 1930s by Auckengill farmer John Nicholson, a prominent amateur archaeologist and historian.
His grandson, Alastair Sutherland, recently discovered the memorial in the grounds of his house – prompting him to embark on a mission to find Sir Edwyn’s family and return it to them.
Mr Sutherland, 90, of Auckengill, enlisted the help of Chris Aitken for the project.
Memorial keeps legacy alive
Mr Aitken, 38, of Canisbay, said: “I am good friends with Alastair and we have been working on his grandfather’s legacy.
“We saw this old stone in the yard and soon realised it was massive. We managed to pull it out and then cleaned it up.”
After tracking down Mrs Alexander-Sinclair’s grave in Berriedale, the pair then sought to trace the admiral’s surviving relatives and eventually tracked down his grandson, Ian, in Norwich.
He had no idea the memorial existed, and was delighted when Mr Sutherland offered to ship it to time to keep in his family.
Mr Aitken, a computer science teacher at Wick High, said: “It’s a piece of Caithness history but there was no real point in keeping it here as the Alexander-Sinclair family over the centuries have been based all over the world.”
Mr Alexander-Sinclair, 75, and his wife Patricia are delighted to have the family memorial, which sits on a plinth in their garden.
He said: “I have been up to Caithness three or four times. I would have gone to see it had I known.
“The first I knew about it was when I had the phone call from Chris.”