One of Scotland’s most controversial ministers has died.
The Reverend Angus Smith famously lay down in front of traffic to stop Sunday ferry sailings to the Isle of Skye.
Mr Smith was opposed to ferries operating between Skye and the mainland on the Sabbath – as well as between Lewis and Ullapool.
He and fellow protesters lay down on the pier at Kyleakin, Skye, in protest against the first sailings of the service in June 1965.
Mr Smith was born in Govan in Glasgow to parents from the Isle of Lewis.
He was a minister of Skye’s Snizort Free Church and later Cross Free Church in Lewis.
Mr Smith campaigned for the traditionalist wing of the Free Church, before leaving to join the Free Presbyterian Church in 1999.
The father-of-four and grandfather was 90 when he died last night at the Bethesda Hospice in Stornoway.
His funeral service is provisionally earmarked for Friday at the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland in Stornoway.
It will be conducted by the Rev. James Tallach, who said today:”He was a very remarkable man – mentally and physically.
“Mr Smith was not ashamed of his Lord, or his cause, the Word or the Christ he preached. Some of his views made him a controversial figure but he served the church faithfully.
“He was very willing – you only had to ask him to do something and he would be half way out the door before you finished. He was certainly very well loved and will be greatly missed.”
Mr Smith was concerned about the decline of the Sabbath on Lewis.
The former moderator of the Free Church of Scotland, in 2006 blamed the royal family and a ‘Blackpool culture’ of incomers.
“Part of the problem is people coming from the mainland with a Blackpool culture. At first they say they love it here and would not want it to change. But that soon changes and then they want it just like the mainland,” he said then.
“The royal family are part of the problem, as are politicians and tv soaps which portray an immoral culture involving drink and drugs.”
He also protested against the first Sunday flights.
