Isles to Be - Little Colonsay - and Mars?

I have been posting on islands that I have not yet been able to visit. While deciding which island to write about next, I noticed, on my blog statistics page, that a post I did on Little Colonsay last year, an island I've never been to, had a large number of hits in the past week. I had to scratch my head; why the sudden interest in Little Colonsay?

Little Colonsay

An internet search on "Little Colonsay" answered the question. It was a surprising answer: Mars. It seems the Mars Rover has come across a strange, shiny rock of some sort, possibly a meteorite.

"Little Colonsay" - photo NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL

Why the mysterious rock was named "Little Colonsay" is not mentioned in any of the news stories on the find. The rock is certainly not shaped like the island. I can only guess the name came from a scientist who likes obscure Hebridean islands. (My kind of scientist!)

Little Colonsay is one of my Isles to Be. I have seen it from afar on multiple occasions, but have never set foot on it. Here is what Hamish Haswell-Smith's has to say about the island in his book The Scottish Islands:

This is a nice little island in a stunning setting...on a calm sunny day it is easy to be enthralled until you remember that the southwest is entirely exposed to the Atlantic with no sheltering landmass between Little Colonsay and the shores of America.

Little Colonsay seen from Ulva

Prior to the clearances the population peaked at 16 in 1841. An old map show a small cluster of ruined houses, but these days there is only one intact home on the island; a Victorian mansion that has been extensively remodeled. As I said in my post last year, someday I hope to set foot on Little Colonsay. I would climb to the summit of Torr Mor to enjoy the view over the amazing constellation of historic islands that dot the sea between Ulva and Iona.

Mansion on Little Colonsay

Mysterious Little Colonsay

Over the years I've sailed past mysterious Little Colonsay a dozen times, but I've yet to get ashore. The closest I've been to it was on a walk to see the ruins of Kilvickeon, which lies a half-mile from Little Colonsay on the south coast of Ulva (see the March 9, 2015 post). From that vantage point the island looked like a giant submarine on the prowl (see the first photo). Based on this excerpt from Hamish Haswell-Smith's The Scottish Islands, it's an island I'd like to see firsthand:

This is a nice little island in a stunning setting...on a calm sunny day it is easy to be enthralled until you remember that the southwest is entirely exposed to the Atlantic with no sheltering landmass between Little Colonsay and the shores of America.

Little Colonsay seen from Ulva - Staffa in the distance (right)

Little Colonsay seen from the sea - Dutchman's Cap to the left

I'd also like to see it because it is a mysterious island; mysterious in the sense that, aside from Haswell-Smith's brief mention, Little Colonsay is conspicuously absent in Hebridean literature. The only historical information I've come across is the description of how the island was cleared of its people around 1850 by the Clarks, who also owned nearby Ulva and Gometra. 

Prior to the clearances the population peaked at 16 in 1841. An old map show a small cluster of ruined houses, but these days there is only one intact home on the island; a Victorian mansion that has been extensively remodeled. I've been unable to find any history on the mansion. It is not even mentioned in Frank Walker's excellent architectural guide book Argyll and the Islands; a book that covers most every structure of interest in the area.

Little Colonsay seen from Ulva - the house is just visible (left of centre)

Adding to the mystery, the author Thomas Hannan, who wrote extensively about the islands in this area in The Beautiful Island of Mull (1926), and Iona: And Some Satellites (1931), never mentions Little Colonsay. It is also unusual there are no (known) early Christian ruins on the island. No matter how small, most every island in this area seems to have them. 

Someday I hope to set foot on mysterious Little Colonsay. I would climb to the summit of Torr Mor to enjoy the view over the amazing constellation of historic isles that dot the sea between Ulva and Iona.

The mansion on Little Colonsay - the island's highest point (Torr Mor) to the left