Dad was indeed apprenticed to McPhersons in Scotland. The company was commissioned to make a set of pipes for Prince Charles in the 1950s. Dad was the chosen person. When I find the newspaper cutting relating this story I will send a copy to you. To complete this story I am also going to write to Clarence House to enquire about the fate of the pipes.
My older brother Jim (1951) and I (1954) were born in Scotland. Our younger brother Andrew was born in 1967 in Adelaide, South Australia. He is the one with the pipes at the moment. None of us learned to play the pipes because we could not come up to Dad’s expected standard.
We migrated to Australia in April 1959 and initially lived in a town called Hamilton in Victoria. Dad became very active in the piping world. Being an exceptional piper he was made Pipe Major of and also tutored the local pipe band to become the national winners of several major piping competitions. His reputation was established quickly and he was sought after by many. We moved to Launceston in Tasmania where Dad achieved the same outstanding result with one of the bands there. His success meant he became a man in high demand so we moved back to Victoria where he became involved with the Colac City Pipe Band. But once again he was coaxed back to Tasmania to work with bands in Launceston again. In 1963 Dad was in Adelaide in South Australia on a piping event. In addition to his skill as a piper, Dad was considered a very proficient judge of competitions and was therefore very involved in the national piping competitions and circuits. A large portion of our lives was spent around highland gatherings or piping events. As a family we moved to Adelaide in 1963. Dad became involved in the John McDowell Stuart Pipe Band and the Caledonian Society Pipe Band.
He always had itchy feet so around 1982 he moved to Ballarat in Victoria (which is where he made the set of pipes you already have) before eventually moving to Melbourne. Whilst there he was featured in a television documentary produced by the Leyland Brothers, but I have not as yet been able to track the footage or story down because my attempts to contact the now defunct company have proven to be more difficult than I anticipated.
Eventually he came back to Adelaide where he became involved with the University Pipe Band and the Band of the South Australian Police. He continued has association with both those bands until he became too ill. At his funeral one of the members of the police band piped his coffin out from the church into the hearse and then stopped the traffic on the main road to allow the hearse to exit the grounds unimpeded. But in addition to that he held the traffic at bay until the hearse was about a kilometer up the road. Such was the esteem that he was held in by these musicians.
I have enclosed pictures of Dad’s personal bagpipe. The wood is either ebony or African blackwood. We believe they are ebony. The mounts are ivory and the tuning slides are silver. When he made pipes, Dad turned all the wood and ivory by hand on a heavy duty lathe using a number of custom made tools. He used kangaroo skin for the bag and hand cut and loose stitched each one before completing the task.. The reason for using kangaroo skin is that it is non porous compared to other leather plus it is a very soft leather. He would then cut a thin strip that he would fold over double to cover the seam and make it airtight. He used multi strand hemp which he waxed and using a saddlers clamp he manually punched holes using an awl then threaded the stitches from both sides, about 5 stitches per inch, pulling them tightly as he went. He had a number of templates that he would use to produce different size bags and modifications as required. Once the bag was sewn he would tie the stocks in by hand also using waxed hemp, then inflate the bag to maximum capacity to ensure there were no air leaks.
I have attached a photo of Dad playing this set circa 1983.
Don Oswald”
