This Murderous Business

Life in old Argyll was never quite as peaceful as the picturesque hills and glens seem to make us think.

Despite the efforts of respectable parish and police constables, the magistrates and court officials in their fine new jail and the Industrial Revolution on the horizon, this dip into Argyll's history tells how crime in the county was just as bloody and violent as in former eras.

Here are tales of murder on the shores of Seil or Islay, a gentleman's scrap in a Tobermory inn and a gun-toting Oban doctor, a battle for illicit whisky at Kilchrenan, a bloody end to a Kintyre shinty match, women peddling fake coins (and something even more doubtful!) with an exciting chase on the Crinan canal, and a final story of a violent death, a bloody razor and the tragic end of a Lochgilphead school-teacher.

The blood still runs in old Argyll.