Glenmoriston

• Glenmoriston
• • Recollections
  • • Pat The Pier
    • • Achnaconeran
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      • Linne Fichead
      • New Bridge
      • Old Bridge
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      • Timber Haulage
    • Eoghann Grant
    • Jimmy Warren
    • Karen MacLeod
    • Keith Aitchison
    • Peter Struy
    • Rena MacKenzie
    • Ted Murdoch
    • Willack And Jeanack
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Old Bridge

This was a Telford bridge. It was the main road bridge on the road from Inverness to Fort William. It was built about 1820 and in a big flood about 1950, the water flooded right up, filled the arches, over here and washed the parapets away. The new bridge had been built in 1936. At the time of the flood I was delivering mail up Glenmoriston. I was marooned up there, I couldn't get down the Glen because the road was washed away in more than one place. I was quite fortunate, my vehicle broke down owing to water getting into the electrics. I stayed the night in Glenmoriston and I had to walk down the glen because the road was washed away.

This was the smithy workshop here, where they shoed horses and mended agricultural implements. But at the time of the big flood, there was 3 feet of water in the actual building.

The smiddy was working until.... was it not working in your day?.... About 1970 maybe. Willack the blacksmith, he was the last smith here. Willie MacDonald. His brother was the labourer, the hammerman, and he had two sisters (One of them named Jeanag). None of them married. That white building was their smithy house up there. They lived there.

After it closed as a smiddy it became a pottery. Alan Nairn ran it as a pottery. And now his wife runs it as a knitwear studio.

This was used for making cart wheels. The wooden wheel was put on here and the iron rim was heated in the forge and carried out in front onto the wooden wheel there.