Light railway linking forests at Femnock to sawmill at Beauly
The image and detailed research is by Alasdair Cameron, Black Isle, who with the help of many other people has pieced together old images, written reports and some modern photographs to tell some of the story of the World War I prisoner of war camps, forestry operations and of the light railways on Lovat Estates that carried the timber to the sawmills at Beauly and Bunchrew Station.
The Lovat Estate centred on Beauly already had an extensive forestry division before WW1 came along. The owner, Simon Joseph Fraser, 14th Lord Lovat, was an enthusiastic advocate of forestry that was reinforced by his wartime experiences. It was no surprise that he became the first chairman of the Forestry Commission and hosted the first Forestry School on his estate.
The Estate was the base for over two hundred German prisoners of war who were divided into two camps. One camp was reputed to be near Bruaich Farm a short distance from Femnock the forest areas that were connected to the sawmill at Beauly Station by the two foot railway in the picture. The petrol locomotive, shown above, was driven by Peter Stewart. The operations and camp were under the control of Major Dewar who went on to be the estate factor.
The three and a half miles of railway construction on the general route shown involved extensive earthworks, a large wooden bridge across the River Beauly (see image in PDF), and four uncontrolled level crossings. The railway was in use until 1922 and some of the rails were later used for constructing cattle grids on the estate (see Image in PDF).
The second camp was high on Newtonhill at Altnacardich under the control of Captain MacLennan of the Highland Light Infantry.
The PDF shows several images the first of which is the map showing the general route of the narrow gauge railway in bright red plotted by Alasdair from Femnock to Beauly sawmill. The second image shows the lone remnants of the wooden rail bridge that was constructed to carry the light railway across the Beauly River. A substantial undertaking in its own right! The third image is a fairly recent one of a cattle grid constructed from the disused rails of the former light railway.
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Groups: Canadian and Newfoundland sawmillers in Scotland, Forestry Areas, Forestry in Action, Other Vehicles and Machines