Bram Stoker and the Bleedy Burn.

“Bram Stoker walked along Cruden Bay beach agonising over the next chapter of his book. His hands behind his back, and head stooped in thought, he stepped over the shallow stream called the Bleedy Burn. Viking hordes had long ago fought the Scots on the sandhills behind the beach, and when the crimson sun went down that evening, the stream, gashing deep as it exited the dunes to the sea, disgorged blood across the flesh-coloured sand. Cruden Bay is a place stained forever by the horror of that moment: the name Cruden, it’s said, means slaughter of the Danes.”

These are the opening lines of my new book: When Brave Men Shudder: the Scottish origins of Dracula. It’s the true story about how Bram Stoker discovered Cruden Bay in Scotland and returned there year after year to write his books.

The Bleedy Burn is a small stream that crosses Cruden Bay beach and the local residents have probably been calling it that for over a thousand years ever since the Scots fought the Vikings in the 1012 Battle of Cruden Bay. It’s said that the stream ran red with blood for three days afterwards.

Not a great deal is known about the Battle of Cruden Bay. Monks wrote about it five centuries later, describing how the Vikings landed with a large army to be met by the Scots under King Malcolm II. The battle was bitterly fought and raged over several miles of foreshore. The Scots eventually won, making a deal that they would bury the dead in return for a pact whereby the Vikings would not invade Scotland again.  Legend has it that the Viking overlord was the young King Canute and he turned his attentions to England thereafter. A church was built dedicated to St Olaf, the patron saint  of Norway, although nothing remains of the building.

Bram Stoker would probably have known about the Bleedy Burn, although surprisingly he doesn’t mention it in his two books set in Cruden Bay. The idea of blood streaming across the flesh-coloured sand of the beach would have reminded his readers about Dracula!

Bram walked across the beach every morning before breakfast while he was on his monthly holiday. The two-mile stretch of beach bracketed by rocky promontories at either end reminded him of a mouth with teeth. And some of the rocks, he wrote, resembled fangs rising from deep water – a knowing reference to Dracula, much of which had been written In Cruden Bay.