Camas Chonalain, Loch Hourn

Corran

An excellent survival of a small fishing village beside the alder-fringed mouth of the Arnisdale, Corran is shown as a settlement on Roy's map of 1750. By 1836, a population of some 600 fishing folk was recorded, but the fishing was in decline and emigration had already begun. In his Survey and Report of 1803, Telford suggested that government sponsored fishing villages should take as their model the principles laid down and practised so successfully here, and in 1887 Alexander Ross praised Hugh Stevenson of the Oban family of masons/entrepreneurial building contractors (working in Oban in the 1780s-90s) for having 'established and practised so successfully a fishing settlement at Arnisdale'. This probably referred to Corran, whose principal feature today is a trio of thick-walled singlestorey whitewashed terraces (some cottages later heightened), laid out in linear plan above the tidal river estuary. They replaced the row along the shoreline shown in the photograph below of c.1890. A row of 13 (originally more) partly derelict cattle byres with shared cobbled lane and drainage ditch runs up the slope at right angles. Slightly angled along the beach is a matching row of 11 drystone sheds/fishing stores, their thatched roofs now replaced with tin. Improvements in the 1890s by Robert Birkbeck (owner of Arnisdale and Kinlochhourn from 1890) probably included re-roofing the cottages in slate. The former post office survives from the original village layout.

Taken from "Western Seaboard: An Illustrated Architectural Guide", by Mary Miers, 2008. Published by the Rutland Press http://www.rias.org.uk

NG80NE 25 85371 07661

Sites identified during an archaeological survey by NOSAS in 2006.

NG 85371 07661 Clearance cairn - A linear pile of stones, measuring c10m in length by 2m in width.

NG 85395 07672 Wall - A ruined stone wall, possibly a boundary. A short section is visible on the west side of the stream, it then crosses the stream and heads for c30m NE upslope beside the stream. It re-crosses onto the west side of the burn, from where it continues to run parallel to it.

NG 85395 07672 Rock shelter - A rock shelter, measuring c1.5m x 1m, fronted by a well-made drystone wall, through which is a c0.6m wide entrance with a slabbed threshold, located towards the north end of the wall.

NOSAS, 2007.