The Tragic Story of Yellow Fever at Lenniemore

The Forgotten Church and Its Grounds

Lenniemore Cemetery lies far from any village or settlement, tucked away at the end of a minor road. It is a place of silence, sea air, and stories buried under lichen-covered stones. The church that once stood beside the burial ground was demolished in the 1960s. The former manse, once used as a hotel, is now privately owned.

A Crew Lost to Yellow Fever

According to a local plaque, the cemetery is believed to be the final resting place of an entire ship’s crew who succumbed to yellow fever while anchored just offshore. They were brought to land and buried immediately—far from inhabited areas to prevent the spread of infection. The event is thought to have taken place during the era of long sea voyages and global expeditions.

Echoes of Empire

This history places Lenniemore among the many sites in the Hebrides that echo the maritime past: a time when seafarers crossed oceans in pursuit of trade, conquest, and discovery. But the age of exploration was not one of innocent adventure. It also brought colonisation, destruction, and exploitation. While the exploits of figures like Francis Drake and James Cook are often told with admiration, their voyages left behind deep scars—communities lost, cultures erased, lives uprooted.

The Minister and the Sabbath

The cemetery also recounts a more recent episode: A minister once lost his post after arriving by boat to conduct a Sunday service during a flood. This occurred in the 20th century. According to the strict rules of the Free Church, travelling—or working—on the Sabbath was considered a breach of divine order. The story serves as a striking reminder of how deeply rooted religious tradition was, and in some places still is, within the island communities.

A Place of Quiet Resistance

The site itself is quiet and exposed to the coastal elements. Many gravestones are eroded beyond legibility. Only faint carvings remain, etched by wind and rain. It is a place where history lies not just beneath the ground, but in the atmosphere itself.

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📖 Interested in more stories where history refuses to stay buried?

Das Grab am Meer (The Grave by the Sea) is the fourth volume in the Highland Crime series. Set on the Isle of Arran, the novel interweaves a historical murder case from 1889—the unsolved Goatfell killing—with the fictional disappearance of a girl thirty years ago. When DI Robert Campbell arrives on the island to revisit the Goatfell case for a documentary, he finds far more than he expected: lost truths, old betrayals, and a haunting past.

➡ Available as paperback and eBook on Amazon.