Photographic copy of plan showing lighthouse keeper's dwelling houses. Northern Lights, sheet No. IV

Description Photographic copy of plan showing lighthouse keeper's dwelling houses. Northern Lights, sheet No. IV

Date 8/1/1853

Collection Records of the Northern Lighthouse Board, Edinburgh, Scotland

Catalogue Number E 25794 CN

Category Photographs and Off-line Digital Images

Copy of DC 9224

Copies SC 781556

Scope and Content Photographic copy of plan of main block, Lighthouse keepers' Houses, Grunay, Out Skerries, Shetland Islands This shows the main single-storeyed, flat-roofed accommodation block (centre), which was built of harled brick with sandstone dressings. The L-plan flanking blocks were used as coal stores and workshops. The main building includes bed and living rooms for the keepers and their families, and includes a bedroom for the use of visiting officers. Keepers spent a proportion of their time on rock lighthouses (sometimes up to six weeks), and then four weeks with their families in accommodation provided by the Northern Lighthouse Board. The houses were solidly built, but included (in the case of Grunay) such refinements as plaster cornices, panelled doors and shutters, cast iron fireplaces and ranges, and even a walled garden and sundial. A temporary light was established on Grunay island in 1854 by request of Her Majesty's Navy to protect the Northern Squadron during the Russian War (1853-6). The island was used to house off-duty keepers in accommodation designed by engineers David (1815-86) and Thomas Stevenson (1818-87) and built 1857-8, after a permanent lighthouse was built on Bound Skerry Island in 1858. The building now stands derelict, the lighthouse being automated in 1972. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Medium colour negative

External Reference C/82/20

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/744015