Tribute to Great War soldier
Tree stands tall on the Abercairney Estate
Two families came together this week to remember a Crieff soldier who gave his life 100 years ago in the Great War.
David McCabe was a stone mason to trade. He emigrated to Canada a few years before war broke out and was enlisted with the 5th Battalion Canadian Light Infantry and soon found himself on the front line.
Two families came together this week to remember a Crieff soldier who gave his life 100 years ago in the Great War.
David McCabe was a stone mason to trade. He emigrated to Canada a few years before war broke out and was enlisted with the 5th Battalion Canadian Light Infantry and soon found himself fighting on the front line.
In June 1916, shortly after his promotion to lieutenant, he was wounded on the battlefield and as he lay injured saw five saplings before him, which he grabbed on to.
He was rescued and sent home to Crieff to recuperate. The saplings also found their way back to the Strath capital and one at least was auctioned off to help with the war effort.
James McCabe, David’s great nephew began to research the story with his wife Isobel after seeing an appeal in the Herald for memorabilia for the Crieff Remembers exhibition. Going back through old editions of the paper and from information in the book ‘Crieff in the Great War’, they discovered that one of the saplings had been bought by Captain William Drummond Moray of Abercairney Estate, who had bid £5 for the young tree, a huge sum of money in those days.
Crieff Remembers organisers approached Anna and Daniel Parker Moray of Abercairney Estate and they invited the McCabe family to go and see the now magnificent tree .
On Tuesday, Jim, Isobel and Eric McCabe were delighted to find out what had become of the sapling plucked from the battlefield by their ancestor.
Captain William Drummond Moray had had the foresight to put up a plaque when he planted it. It reads: “Spruce seedling pulled up on Hill 60, May 1916 by Lieutenant D McCabe, 5th Canadians. Sent home to his father Martin McCabe, gardener, Ardvrecvk, Crieff.”
Eric, who is David McCabe’s nephew said: “It’s some size. I didn’t know if the tree would still be standing.”
James added: “It’s marvellous to see. I never thought it would be so tall. Wednesday would be the 100th anniversary of David’s death. He sent back five saplings. One was planted at Barnock in Milnab Street but was cut down. We suspect another may have ended up at Ardvreck but we don’t know what happened to the other two.”
Daniel Moray Parker said: “It’s moving to be here today. How amazing that the very sapling David sent home to his father in Crieff is now this magnificent tree.”
Bill Drummond Moray, grandson of Captain William Drummond Moray said it was marvellous. “The poor boy had a vision to bring it back; someone planted it and here we are today. It’s a lovely story. As long as that tree is here that boy will never be forgotten.”
Jean Ann Scott Miller of Festivals Crieff, which is organising the Crieff Remembers commemorations, said:
“What a privilege to be here with the two families commemorating David’s death 100 years ago, and marvelling in his tree and its survival, and the fact that both he and it are remembered.”
In July, as part of the nation’s WW1 commemorations, a group of cyclists drawn from the Edinburgh University OTC, 7 Scots Highland Reserve battalion and the Black Watch, will leave Crieff and cycle to Passchendaele. En route they will lay a wreath made from the foliage and cones of the Abercairney Spruce on David McCabe’s grave.
The Crieff soldier returned to the Front but this time would not recover from wounds received at the Battle of Vimy Ridge in France on April 12, 1917. He died aged 32.