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North Uist, Vallay, Vallay House
Country House (20th Century)
Site Name North Uist, Vallay, Vallay House
Classification Country House (20th Century)
Canmore ID 10047
Site Number NF77NE 28
NGR NF 77360 75908
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/10047
- Council Western Isles
- Parish North Uist
- Former Region Western Isles Islands Area
- Former District Western Isles
- Former County Inverness-shire
Vallay House, c.1902 Lichened wreck of the crowstepped Edwardian mansion built on a windswept terrace for the island's then owner, the author and archaeologist/naturalist Erskine Beveridge. The cement-harled brick building was equipped with all the fashionable mod cons of its day, and had water piped over from a reservoir on North Uist. Beveridge's son was drowned crossing the strand in 1944 , and it was not long before the house was abandoned for good. The older buildings of Vallay, lime-mortared and gilded with lichen, vary in date and are mostly roofless now. Among these:
Taken from "Western Seaboard: An Illustrated Architectural Guide", by Mary Miers, 2008. Published by the Rutland Press http://www.rias.org.uk
Baronial style mansion with a cement rendered exterior on a terrace, built for the naturalist/ archaeologist Erskine Beveridge. (Miers) Erskine Beveridge inherited and expanded a successful linen works in Dunfermline and was a keen amateur photographer, a number of which were taken in the Hebrides and the Highlands of Scotland. Vallay is a tidal islean with no fresh water supply, Beveridge had water piped across the strand. Following the construction of the house, Beveridge spent may summers on the island before his death in 1920, leaving the property to his son, who moved to nearby North Uist until his death in 1944. (West Highland Free Press)
