How the arrival of the railway impacted the north

When a two-carriage train passes beside our Land Rover, guests are often surprised to find a railway squeezed between the road and the beach. I tell them it offers a gentle, beautiful journey through the North Highlands, although the bus gets me from home to Inverness faster, but given the choice I would take the train every time. Their surprise brings to mind a man walking between Durness and Rhiconich in the nineteenth century, eager to see the “devil’s horse”, a locomotive engine. For us, the train is another way to reach Inverness, but for him the engine itself is something worth seeing.

Inverness gets its first railway in 1855, and as construction advances through Ross-shire and Sutherland, people can see their surroundings changing before a train arrives. The men digging cuttings, building bridges and laying track need feeding and clothing, bringing customers to traders at Conon Bridge and Maryburgh. Once the construction gangs move on, driving engines, handling goods and maintaining the line continue to provide work. By the time the railway reaches Wick and Thurso in 1874, its presence can mean wages coming into a household as well as a means of sending northern produce towards distant buyers.

At Alness, a train leaves for Aberdeen with twenty-four wagons loaded entirely with whisky, while pork pies and sausages travel from Leicester to a café in Thurso. I rather enjoy the thought of the north supplying somebody else’s drinks while Leicester takes care of lunch in Caithness. But ready-made shoes and clothes arrive just as conveniently, reducing demand for the work of local craftsmen. The choice welcomed by northern households threatens the orders supporting tailors and shoemakers, giving them good reason to feel less enthusiastic about what comes off the train.

That uncertainty belongs alongside the excitement, because the railway changes what people can expect from living here, whether they earn wages on the line, find distant customers or face unfamiliar competition. Its promise remains powerful enough for news of funding towards a proposed Forsinard–Portskerra branch in 1897 to bring Gaelic singing and guns fired in celebration. That is rather more enthusiasm than we normally show when two carriages pass our Land Rover, and a reminder of how much hope people place in getting their own connection. In the audio blogcast, we return to Portskerra and discover why no train ever follows those celebrations.

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