Braeroy

The track along the River Roy which we followed on Saturday passes through this stand of trees which hides the main buildings of the Braeroy Estate which, these days, offers hunting, shooting and fishing in this....

 forbidding landscape.

The building which particularly interested us is at left in the above photo, quite separate from the main buildings of the estate. There is a footbridge nearby so it is accessible from both sides of the River Roy.

On three sides it has no windows or doors and on the fourth, which faces southeast, there are two small skylights, a window and a door. Within....

....the building is these days used for storage.

We were told that it was a school house. At first I struggled to believe this thinking that, in this wild place, there would hardly have been the pupils to justify it. However, there were times when the population of the estate would have been far larger, when the 'big house', its farm, and the sporting opportunities would have offered plenty of employment - so the children of these workers would need education.

Then there were....

....the many small tenanted farmers who would also have had children needing education. In any case, the education authority was obliged to offer a place to every pupil in its area, although some pupils had to walk many miles each day to reach their school..

We have seen similar school buildings before - a good example is the school at Achosnich on Ardnamurchan, which also served Sanna and Achnaha. However, it had a facility which many remote schools had and which this one seems to lack and which was 'normal' across most of the highlands - a school house for the teacher.

I am intrigued by other questions: why are there so few windows? One would have though that, in this dark place, the pupils would have benefited from as much natural light as possible. But.... perhaps windows are cold, and perhaps the children brought a candle with them to school each day. And that teacher's house - where did the teacher stay?