History of Bamff & the Ramsays of Bamff

Neish Ramsay, possibly a younger son of one of the Ramsays of Dalhousie was physician to King Alexander II of Scotland and was given the lands of Bamff, Fyall, Ardormie and Kinkeadly on October 8th in the year 1232. This is recorded in the first Bamff Charter. The family’s origin myth tells a longer story, in which Neish, having studied medicine under a wizard, came into possession of a magic potion made from the distillation of a white snake, which he had captured by moonlight from the cave behind the Reekie Linn waterfall in nearby Kilry. This potion gave him the power of X Ray vision, which enabled him to see a hairball lodged inside the king’s stomach. This he removed in a successful operation and was given the land for his "bairns and his bairns bairns until the end of time", as a reward.

A version of this story by Louise Ramsay appears in "If Stones could Speak" by Nethergate Writers - see  http://nethergatewriters.webplus.net

Other prominent Ramsays include Alexander, a younger brother of a later laird who was also a king’s doctor. His patients were James V1 and 1 and Charles 1. He was said to have missed King James’ beheading because he was looking after the poor Queen. His portrait hangs in the present library at Bamff.

In 1667 James Ramsay of Bamff fought bravely for the king at the battle of Rullion Green and won a baronetcy for his father, Gilbert. The title survived until the last laird, Sir Neis Ramsay.

On Wednesday 14th April 1790 James McRae, a notorious duellist, who is described in Kay’s Edinburgh portraits, killed Sir George Ramsay of Bamff in a duel on Musselburgh links. Macrae had manufactured a quarrel outside an Edinburgh theatre over a sedan chair. He was prosecuted for murder but ran away to France.

In the 19th century two members of the family (William Ramsay and George Gilbert Ramsay) were Professors of Humanities at Glasgow University.

Katherine Ramsay, a daughter of the house, having married the Marquis of Tullibardine, ran for parliament in 1923 and became Scotland’s first female MP. She became known (erroneously) by the Beaverbrook press as the Red Duchess, for her courageous support of the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War. Later she resigned her seat over Neville Chamberlain’s policy of appeasement.

The present building began as a tower house built by 1595s. Sir James Ramsay, who collected and edited the charters, states that it must have been built between 1580 and 1595. The charter installs George 11 in the "Manes of Bamff, tour, fortalis, ortcheardes". This will have replaced an earlier tower, the exact whereabouts of which are not known for sure.

The house was altered and extended in the 18th Century. The vaulted ceiling of the original kitchen was cut and the present library was made out of the space above. In 1820 the present dining room was added, as a drawing room, and in 1843 the architect Robert Burn remodelled the house. The area in front of the house was lowered at that time to raise the height of the basement floor and create the present hall. This also involved removing a double external staircase, which had given direct access to the first floor. Elaborate ceilings were added to three of the rooms at that time along with the present main staircase. The spiral staircases at the back, various other offices were added, along and the present kitchen began life as the dining room. At this time most of the Old Brewhouse was built, incorporating part of an older building. It was used as scullery, larders, brewhouse, dairy and washroom in the days when the estate was partially self sufficient and made its own beer, butter and cheese. Paul's mother remembers her mother's claim that the butter at Craighall was never as good as Bella's butter at Bamff. (Bella was the dairymaid, of course).

Things were changed around quite a bit in the late 1920s: marble fireplaces (probably dating from the Burn alterations) were removed and replaced. Four rooms were added for staff on the east side.

The contents of the house have been accumulated by the family over the last 250 years.

The designed landscape in the parkland partially follows a Thomas White plan.

During the second world war Bamff House was used by the Women’s Land Army as accommodation for a task force of young women, known as lumberjills,  who worked as foresters in the surrounding woodland producing timber for the war effort.  One of these women, in her eighties, came to visit the house a few years ago. She told me that she had been a secretary in Perth when the war broke out, aged around 22. She had joined the women’s land army and been posted to Bamff where she and the other young women started work in the woods at 7.30 am and worked a ten hour day, cutting down trees without chainsaws and extracting them from  woods with ponies.  At the end of this long day they would run down to Alyth (3 miles), twice a week, to the dance, with their dancing shoes in a bag, and then change back into gymshoes and run back up in time to get into the house before the curfew at midnight.*

According to Leanore Ramsay the house was so cold during this phase that snow built up to the second floor in a little courtyard at the back. This was possibly one of the causes of the severe dry rot from which the present owners had to rescue the house in the 1980s.   Two  rooms were demolished to open up the courtyard and allow air to circulate around the walls and parapet gutters were replaced with external rones. The repairs and alterations were done under the direction of James Simpson of Simpson & Brown of Edinburgh. They have also made three letting flats out of parts of the house they were not using: two for longer lets and one for holidays.

Over the last 30 years Paul Ramsay of Bamff, an environmentalist, has planted many acres of woodland, mostly of native species, and recreated many acres of wetland by the re-introduction of some European beavers, which are now breeding successfully in large enclosures. This project was the first of its kind in the UK. The beavers are helping to fulfil Thomas White’s intention to create a ribbon lake along the ditch that drains the flat ground around the house. Paul also keeps a herd of wild boars in the woods.

The environmental policy is being gradually applied to the houses on the estate in an effort to reduce Bamff’s carbon footprint.  All the houses have been insulated to current standards.  The big house now has a woodchip boiler, run off chips made from thinnings from the Bamff woods.  This provides heat and hot water for the house and flats.  Many of the estate cottages are wholly or partially heated by wood from wood burning stoves.