Laurence Williamson

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Laurence Williamson, 'of Gardie', as he is sometimes known, was born on the 11th of March, 1855, the oldest child of two born to James Williamson (b. 17.8.1800, Rusetter, Fetlar) and his wife Mary Gardner (b. 7.2.1819, Gossabrough, East Yell). His father had apparently previously lived in Lerwick, being recorded in the 1841 census at Trance Close there, but he married his much younger Yell bride on the 21st of December, 1854 at Linkshouse, Mid Yell, where he worked as a merchant and postmaster, and where Laurence was born.

Laurence was a prodigious student as a boy, but appears to have been a bit out of step with society and rather 'kept down upon' by his father, with the result that he retreated into his studies. His primary companion was his younger sister May (b. 27.4.1859). After his father's death on the 16th of December 1872, he succeeded him as postmaster. At this time, Mid Yell was a major centre for herring fishery and the telegraph a necessary means of communication, but a life of commerce was not much to his liking and he gave up the job in 1884. Nor was he much of a crofter, by all accounts. His later life, shared with his beloved sister, was devoted to his scholarly pursuits and marked by penury. Although he wrote extensively, he rarely published. He often wrote in a minuscule, rather neurotic script, and on occasion corresponded with his sister in code. He was the compiler of a manuscript Old verses from Fetlar and Yell, Shetland.

Williamson revered the Scandinavian North, and was critical of southern influences, a scholar of all Shetlandic antiquities. He became one of Jakob Jakobsen's key sources in Shetland. He left behind him a large quantity of material, which formed the basis for his friend Laurence G. Johnson's memoir, Laurence Williamson of Mid Yell, published by the Shetland Times in 1971. His papers are now in the Shetland Archives, where the archivist Brian Smith has done much to advance popular awareness of this strange 19th C. genius of Yell, even entering him in the Dictionary of National Biography.

May Williamson died in January 1934, and Laurence followed her on the 10th of April 1936. They are both buried in Fetlar.

See Also

Robert L. Johnson: A Shetland Country Merchant: being an account of the life and times of James Williamson of Mid Yell, 1800-1872, Shetland Publishing Company, 1979.