The Colony was a

squatter Squatting is the action of occupying an abandoned or unoccupied area of land or a building (usually residential) that the squatter does not Land ownership and tenure, own, rent or otherwise have lawful permission to use. The United Nations estima ...

s' community on "commonty", or

common land Common land is collective land (sometimes only open to those whose nation governs the land) in which all persons have certain common rights, such as to allow their livestock to graze upon it, to collect wood, or to cut turf for fuel. A person ...

, on one side of

Bennachie Bennachie ( ; Scottish Gaelic: ''Beinn na Cìche'') is a range of hills in Aberdeenshire, Scotland.Whiteley, A.W.M. (Ed.) (1976). ''The Book of Bennachie''. The Bailies of Bennachie. . Mostly anecdotes and verse about the mountain and its surro ...

, a range of hills near

Aberdeen Aberdeen ( ; ; ) is a port city in North East Scotland, and is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, third most populous Cities of Scotland, Scottish city. Historically, Aberdeen was within the historic county of Aberdeensh ...

, in Scotland. From the beginning of the nineteenth century common land in the parishes of

Chapel of Garioch Chapel of Garioch is a hamlet in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, located 4 miles (6 km) west of Inverurie. The Balquhain stone circle is nearby. The church, St Mary's Chapel, shares a parish with Blairdaff. It was formerly under the patronage ...

and

Oyne Oyne is a small village in rural Aberdeenshire at the bottom of Bennachie in Scotland. Locality The village has limited local resources. It once had a railway station which closed 6 May 1968, and now has a daily bus service to Inverurie away ...

on the east side of Bennachie became home to a community of squatters. This settlement was known locally as the Colony. Various estimates have been made of when the colony began with some citing 1825 but according to Fagen the first documentary evidence is from 1831. A small number of families led a crofting life supplementing it by doing skilled work, such as dyking, quarrying and knitting. Two stones were landmarks within the colony: the Boddach Stone and the Gouk Stone. Only the latter remains. The size of the colony varied over time. The following table summarises census data extracted from Fagen's text. In 1859, eight neighbouring landlords took possession of sections of Bennachie as part of their estates. This action, recognised in law from 5 March 1859, has become known as the Division of the Commonty. As a result, the population on the side of the hill began to decline. Most of the crofts were built on land claimed by Col. Charles Leslie of Balquhain and Fetternear. His son, Charles Stephen Leslie, was responsible for evicting some of the residents in 1878. The last of the colonists, George Esson, lived on the hill until his death in May 1939. Esson was a drystone dyker. While working on the Dunecht Estate, repairing old dykes and creating new ones, he would lodge with a Mrs Cooper at Dunecht, then walk the twenty miles back to the colony at weekends. Visitors to Bennachie can explore the Colony, including the remains of a croft which was excavated as part of the Fetternear Research Project in 1999.Bogdan, N Q, Dransart, P Z, Upson-Smith, T and Trigg, J 2000 ''Bennachie Colony House Excavation 1999 An Extended Interim Report'', Lampeter: SEPP

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Colony, Bennachie Former populated places in Scotland Squats in the United Kingdom Squatting in Scotland Aberdeenshire 1939 disestablishments in Scotland