Christian Watt Papers

Caught between these covers is the authentic, forthright voice of Christian Watt, servant girl, lady’s maid and fishwife. Born in 1833, her working life began in domestic service before the age of nine and ended with her selling her husband’s catch from door to door. The tragic death of most of her close male family – her husband, four brothers and her favorite child – drowned by a sudden squall that sunk their boat, robbed her of her sanity. But cared for in the remarkable Cornhill Asylum in Aberdeen, a kindly doctor encouraged her to write her memoirs in pencil. In 1983 this bundle of papers, which included other family documents, was turned into a book by the historian David Fraser, and has been saluted as the Montaillou of Scotland.