Life on Hynish station

The building of Skerryvore Lighthouse was a massive and technically demanding project. The engineer Alan Stevenson went to Aberdeen, the ‘Granite City’, to recruit the best stonemasons. At its peak, there were 70 masons on the project, both at the works in Hynish and on the Skerryvore rock itself.

The 1841 Census counted 113 people living in the ‘Barracks’ accommodation block, the large multistorey building ahead of you. In addition to the 45 stonemasons present at the time, there were four joiners and a draughtsman making the wooden moulds to guide the shaping of the rocks; two blacksmiths to sharpen the chisels; a seaman; a lightkeeper to tend the beacons around the Hynish harbour; and a surgeon.

In addition to the works, the Northern Lighthouse Board rented thirty acres to provide grazing for the three large draught horses needed to pull materials around the site. The census counted two agricultural labourers.

Some of the men brought their families. With servants to cook the food and work in the washhouse, there were 17 women and 30 children and babies, some as young as a month old. To supply everyone, there was a single water pump, probably the first on the island. And there was a another first: a toilet, divided to allow for men and women, housed in the smaller building to the left of the barracks. Each section had two seats side by side. Because of the rocky nature of the ground, the septic tank had to be built above ground and covered with wooden doors.

Contributed by Dr John Holliday on behalf of the Hynish Trust

Image: Plan from Alan Stevenson 'Account of the Skerryvore Lighthouse', 1848