Building record MHG32701 - Boathouse, Achranich

Built in 1852-3 (dated stone 1853 in south gable), this boathouse post-dates the barn at Achranich (1851) but predates Ardtornish Tower (1856-9, 1864-6). Like the barn the boathouse has gothic lancets, and is built of ashlar masonry. Architecturally it is more complex than at first appears, and it is possible that it incorporates part of an earlier building.

The survey has identified at least three phases. The first may have been a boathouse like the others in this survey, whose north wall (and possibly other elements) was incorporated into the 1853 building. The second phase is the 1853 gothic boathouse. Thirdly, at some later date the large opening at the rear has had its lower half filled in, and a wooden loft built inside with its floor at the level of the top of the blocking wall. The rear opening appears to have been heightened, and a steel beam replaces the earlier arch or wooden beam, with different stonework above it. A large opening in the north wall may also have been blocked at this time, as a main beam of the loft was inserted into the blocking stones.

As well as these three definable phases, however, there are other features which cannot be assigned to any particular phase. The west front is not bonded to the adjacent side walls, which may be due to the re-use of an earlier north wall, or may represent a later repair (perhaps incorporating a smaller entrance). Whatever its date, the masonry is of finer ashlar, yellower with hints of pink, and the closest parallel on the estate is the clock tower which is all that survives of Octavius Smith’s Ardtornish Tower of 1856-66. In 2001 the building had to have metal ties inserted.

As well as the large rear entrance, later partially blocked, there is a door at the back of the boathouse. Inside, there were two steps down. At this point one could go up two steps and through a door in a wooden partition into the south wing, or down more stone steps into the main boathouse. Inside the south wing, the central lancet window in the south wall appears to have had a wooden frame, and presumably was originally glazed. All the other windows in the boathouse have been blocked, or are thin slits (as in Highland barns). A narrow shelf at sitting height runs around three outer walls of the south room, which may have been some sort of changing room or summer house. It has a recess in the north west corner which, together with a low blocked doorway in the west wall possibly for a small wooden lean-to extension, might indicate the presence of a dry closet.

Large stone steps lead down from the rear door to the floor of the boathouse, which slopes upwards, and is well below ground level at its inner end, where bedrock is exposed. The stumps of wooden posts run along the north wall, and there are sockets (in positions which suggest they are not part of the original design), at the level of the current loft, extending along the full length of the west wall.

Situated near the head of Loch Aline, a sea loch, this is the only example in our survey built with its arched doorway below the high tide mark, like a boathouse on a river or inland loch. Gaskell claims it was soon superseded ‘as it could not be used for any but the smallest boats except at high tide’. There is a channel outside the boathouse, close to where the river Rannoch runs into the loch, where a boat could sit however low the tide, though it could not get across the shallows to the loch itself. Landing could be made not far away, however, and this boathouse would not have functioned very differently from any of the others when the tide was out, and does not appear to have been replaced until the 1890s.

Immediately to the north is a quay built of large boulders at two levels, possibly earlier than the boathouse, and presumably serving the farm of Achranich, or possibly the quarry immediately inland, marked on the first edition Ordnance Survey 6” map of 1872. The road from Achranich to Old Ardtornish, built in 1853-5, runs immediately to landward of the boathouse.
Information supplied by Sound of Mull Survey - P Martin.

(KC 12/03)