The black rainfalls of Slains are among the first ‘damned data’ Fort chronicles in The Book of the Damned: a series of strangely localised inky rains in a small coastal parish in Scotland, intermittently coinciding with vast quantities of pumice stone or ‘slag’ washing ashore. Drawing from Rev. James Rust’s The Scottish Black Rain Showers and Pumicestone Shoals of the Year 1862 and 1863 (published in 1864) and a later summary in French scientific journal La Science Pour Tous, Fort describes a total of seven showers (plus one in Carluke, 140 miles/225km distant from Slains), and two pumice stone shoals between 1862 and 1866. Fort laments: “If you don’t think that such occurrences are damned by Science, read Scottish Showers and see how impossible it was for the author to have this matter taken up by the scientific world.” 1
But a fuller picture can be drawn from Rust’s correspondence with local newspapers, begun in 1862 following the first of the falls and continuing until close to his death in 1874, throughout which time he dutifully reported and responded to commentary on these strange happenings. From these writings, and other connected texts, it can be gathered that Rust did indeed attract some measure of interest and support from the scientific establishment; and, even more curiously, that there were not merely seven falls of black rain at Slains – in fact, Rust recorded at least 20 of them.
THE FIRST RAIN
Slains is a coastal parish in Aberdeenshire spanning some 14 square miles (36km2), a largely rural area incorporating the small former fishing village of Collieston. Slains Church and the nearby Manse sit immediately adjacent to the village, and it is Collieston’s coast and residents that form the backdrop to these events.
By the time of the first fall in 1862, Rev. James Rust MA – then 49 years old and 22 years into his role as minister of Slains parish – already had some experience as an investigator of local esoterica. In 1855 he led an effort to dredge nearby St Catherine’s Dub, seeking confirmation of a long-standing legend that a ship of the Spanish Armada (the) had been wrecked there in 1588. Sure enough, a 7ft (2m) long iron cannon and accompanying cannon ball were recovered from the pool, and for several years sat on display in Rust’s garden at Slains Manse.
