Thanks for posting this, Melvyn
As we have discussed, this is a very interesting find as it adds information to the architectural evolution of Dornoch which was certainly not known of at the time the club history was written (1999). Essentially, the article says that John Sutherland began tinkering with Old Tom Morris' routing far earlier than had otherwise been thought. The club history assumes that the 1892 map of the course was what Old Tom had left behind, but this article says otherwise. It's not completely clear exactly what happened, but in looking at that 1892 map in the context of the article it seems to imply that in 1891 there were three short holes north of the burn, between the current 1st hole on the Struie course (which was the 13th on the Championship course until 1946) and the current 18th on the Struie (17th on the old Championship course). The two new holes built over them and land south of the burn are todays 4th and 17th on the Struie Course, both of which would have been very strong holes for that time, and are still challenging and fun.
There could be, however, another interpretation of the pre-1891 changes course, i.e. that there were only 2 short holes north of the burn at the south end of the course and one at the far north north end of the course played over the land between the current 4th green and 12th fairway (the course had not yet been extended to include today's 5th hole). This would account for the reference to the "Embo" hole, as that is the name of the village north of Dornoch (and visible today from the 8th tee of the Championship course). Hopefully the club will get back to you Melvyn. If not, I'll probably be up there in late October, and will try to see what they know. A couple of other interesting implications of the revelations in this article:
--regardless of which of my two interpretations above is correct, the course as laid out by Old Tom would have had three or four consecutive par 3s (assuming that the old 18th, at 210 yards up hill was a par 4 in those days).
--in the 1999 history there was some research done by the author (John McLeod) on trying to determine whether Old Tom had just added 9 holes to the existing course (as had been assumed for 50+ years) or effectively designed the entire 18 (over the land of the existing course). This article seems to confirm the John's contention that it was the latter.
Cheers
Rich