Graigmillan

ND34NW 34 34307 45405

A farmstead comprising one unroofed and two roofed buildings, one of which is a long building and has an attached enclosure, and a short length of field wall is depicted on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Caithness 1877, sheet xxix). An L-shaped roofed building and an enclosure are shown on the current edition of the OS 1:10000 map (1975).

Information from RCAHMS (SAH) 26 January 1996.

This farmstead is situated on a low rise within an area of improved fields 130m SW of the Thrumster Transmitting Station. L-shaped on plan with a courtyard that is open to the E and S, the farmstead contains a long range on the N and two conjoined cottages on the W. The range (YARROWS04 185), which is terraced into the rising ground, measures 25.3m from ENE to WSW by 3.3m transversely within clay-bonded rubble walls 0.6m in thickness and up to 1.7m in height, and contains two compartments. The W one was probably a dwelling and has a central doorway in its SSE side, while the E one was a byre, with a series of stalls divided by five upright flagstones still visible along the inner face of its N wall.

Together, the conjoined cottages (YARROWS04 186) measure 16.3m from NNW to SSE by 5.4m transversely within lime mortared rubble walls 0.6m in thickness and up to 2.3m in height at the wall-head. The end-gables and the single mid-gable survive, but chimney-stacks are only visible in the former. Fragments of turf, which are supported on a surviving pair of rafters at the SSE end of the cottages and are visible elsewhere at several locations about the wall-head, indicate how the building was last roofed. The S cottage, which is fronted by a flagstone path, comprises a single compartment with an entrance and a window in its ENE side. Internal features include a fireplace in the centre of its SSE gable that is flanked by a window to its E and a tall cupboard to its W. The N cottage has a central entrance flanked by a pair of windows in the ENE side. The interior, which retains much of its original internal timber fittings, contained two rooms separated by a narrow hall lit by a small window in the WSW wall. The S room contains a fireplace in the mid-gable flanked by the remains of a press to its E and a tall cupboard to its W. The N room, which has a fireplace in the end-gable, still contains a table, a dresser and a cupboard.

The farmstead is depicted roofed on the 1st edition of the OS 6-inch map (Caithness 1877, sheet xxix), but at that time it comprised only the N range and a smaller, apparently unroofed structure immediately to the S, of which nothing is now visible. At that time the range stood on the S side of two enclosures and was served by tracks that approached from several directions. The 2nd edition of the map (1907, sheet xxix) shows that by 1907 the conjoined cottages had been built, with a small enclosure, which is no longer visible, attached to their E sides. By this time, the enclosures shown on the earlier map immediately N of the N range had been removed.

A grass-grown quarry (YARROWS04 187) is situated immediately W of the steading. Irregular on plan, it measures 15m from N to S by 6m transversely and up to 1.2m in depth. What is probably the S end of the quarry is shown on the 1st edition of the map.

(YARROWS04 185-7)

Visited by RCAHMS (ATW) 29 July 2004