Maritime record MHG47402 - Bell Rock: Skerra Bay, Pentland Firth

NMRS Report: (14/01/2005)
NC86NE 8009 c. 870 661
N58 34.1 W3 56.6

NLO: Portskerra [name: NC 877 657]
Pentland Firth [name centred ND 35 81].

24 December 1883, BELL ROCK, 16 yrs old, not registered, wooden lugger, unknown tonnage say 4, 6 crew, Master and Owner W. Mackay, Wick, departed Portskerra, Sutherlandshire, for fishing, in ballast, 1 life lost, wind WSW2, stranded, partial loss, Skerra Bay, Sutherlandshire.
Source: PP Abstracts Returns of Wrecks and Casualties on Coasts of the UK 1883-84 (1884-85 [C.4493] LXX.421).
NMRS, MS/829/69 (no. 3502).

Skerra Bay is not noted as such on the 1999 edition of the OS 1:50,000 map; the name presumably applies to the bay in front of Portskerra village. A location at NC c. 870 661 may be tentatively assigned to this record.
The loss of this vessel is not cited by I G Whittaker (1998), presumably on grounds of her successful recovery.
Information from RCAHMS (RJCM), 14 July 2004.