Location | |
---|---|
OS grid reference | NT138795 |
Coordinates | 56°02′N3°14′W / 56.03°N 3.23°W |
Physical geography | |
Island group | Firth of Forth |
Area | 0.83 hectares (89,340 sq ft) |
Highest elevation | 19 metres (62 ft) |
Administration | |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Country | Scotland |
Council area | City of Edinburgh |
Inchgarvie or Inch Garvie [1] is a small, uninhabited island in the Firth of Forth. On the rocks around the island sit four caissons that make up the foundations of the Forth Bridge.
Inchgarvie's fortifications pre-date the modern period. In the days when boats were the only way to cross the Firth of Forth, the island was on the main route between North Queensferry in Fife and South Queensferry in Lothian. This made it strategically important. Although now uninhabited, Inchgarvie has been inhabited throughout various periods of history. The first recorded time was in the late 15th century.
Like nearby Inchmickery, its profile and colour makes it look like a small warship from a distance. It was armed with coast defence guns from 1901 until 1906, and again from 1908 until the 1930s.
Inchgarvie's name is Gaelic in origin and means either "rough island" (from innis garbh) [2] or "island of the rough place" (from innis gharbhaidh). [3] An older theory links it to the Scots word "garvie", which refers to the sprat. [4] [5] [6] A commercial sprat fishery took place in the inner Forth until it was prohibited in 1983. [7]
Records of Danish attacks on nearby islands, particularly Inchcolm as well as Fife and Lothian may mean that it was used in some capacity by them.[ citation needed ]
The island was licensed by King James IV to John Dundas of Dundas [note 1] with the power to build a fort on 20 March 1491. [10] [11] John Dundas did not build the castle, and James IV himself ordered a strong tower to be built in 1513. [11]
On 8 March 1514 Margaret, the widow of William Dundas of Dundas, undertook to manage the completion of the fortress that James IV and her father-in-law had begun building on her island. [12] From 23 December 1514, Charles Dennison, Captain of Inchgarvie managed and fed a large royal construction team. The master mason was John of Cumbernauld, with his "servitor" John Strathauchin, who directed eight other masons and ten labourers. Margaret, Lady of Dundas gave them two boats. Two 'serpentine' guns and guns from Colstone were placed on the island after a visit by artillery experts in July 1515, and the island was equipped with a "blawing horne." There was also a chapel. [13] The Laird of Dundas was paid £33 for repairing the fortress in March 1533. [14]
The fort was captured by Richard Brooke in the Galley Subtile on 6 May 1544 during an attack on Edinburgh and demolished a week later. [15] The English commander Lord Hertford wrote that it would have been useful to garrison Inchgarvie, but his orders from Henry VIII would not allow it. [16] In 1547, after the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh, Inchcolm and Inchkeith were fortified by the English, and held for two years; it is possible that Inchgarvie was fortified at this period too.
Between 1519 and 1671, the castle was used as a prison, and in 1580 Inchkeith and Inchgarvie were made a place of exile for the plague-stricken by order of the Privy Council. [17] On 6 September 1627, the Laird of Dundas was invited to meet the Privy Council at South Queensferry and discuss building a modern fort on the island. [18] Like Inchkeith, Inchgarvie had a quarantine hospital, and a prison. Oliver Cromwell had this demolished.
During the reign of Charles II as King of Scots, the island was subject to continued maintenance for defensive purposes. The island was inspected by Charles in 1651 before falling into disrepair after his army was defeated by Oliver Cromwell at the Battle of Worcester.
In 1707 the island is known to have been rented to Archibald Primrose, 1st Earl of Rosebery. In 1779, however, the island's fortifications were renewed once more, in response to the threat posed by John Paul Jones, American Naval Commander, who harassed British ships from a base in the Forth. [19] These fortifications were never used in anger.
During the Napoleonic period, the threat from the sea meant gun batteries were created in 1806. [20]
In 1878 the foundations for Thomas Bouch's Forth Bridge were laid on Inchgarvie (and their bricks remain), but after the Tay Bridge Disaster, these plans were abandoned, and the island languished until the west end of the island was extended with a pier, and used as the foundation for one of the Forth Bridge's cantilevers. The island, due to its proximity to the bridge, was also used as a construction office for the bridge, as well as accommodation for its workers within the re-roofed castle buildings. Some of the stone from the former castle was used to help build the caissons of the Forth Bridge.
The island became of renewed importance to the security of the Firth of Forth at the beginning of the 20th century. It was armed with two 12-pdr guns in 1901, in conjunction with gun emplacements on the mainland to the north (at North Queensferry) and to the south (at Dalmeny). Although the island's guns were removed from the approved armament in 1906, they were re-instated in 1908. The number of guns was increased to four in the early months of the First World War. The island's guns were removed from the approved armament of the Forth in the early 1930s.
The guns may have survived for drill and practice until the beginning of the Second World War, during which the island was armed only with machine guns. The island's defences were intended (until 1905) to cover the controlled minefield laid across the river and later to tackle fast-moving torpedo boats attempting to enter the naval anchorage above the Forth Bridge or to damage the lock gates of the Rosyth Dockyard.
Inchgarvie is of igneous origin, and partly made up of picrite. Studies of the landscape beneath the waters of the firth have revealed that the visible surface of Inchgarvie is only the top of a larger crag and tail structure similar in structure to Edinburgh Castle and the Royal Mile created by glacial action. [21] [22] [23]
Aberdour is a scenic and historic village on the south coast of Fife, Scotland. It is on the north shore of the Firth of Forth, looking south to the island of Inchcolm and its Abbey, and to Leith and Edinburgh beyond. According to the 2011 census, the village has a population of 1,633.
Fife is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire. By custom it is widely held to have been one of the major Pictish kingdoms, known as Fib, and is still commonly known as the Kingdom of Fife within Scotland. A person from Fife is known as a Fifer. In older documents the county was very occasionally known by the anglicisation Fifeshire.
Firth is a word in the English and Scots languages used to denote various coastal waters in the United Kingdom, predominantly within Scotland. In the Northern Isles, it more often refers to a smaller inlet. It is linguistically cognate to fjord, which has a more constrained sense in English. Bodies of water named "firths" tend to be more common on the Scottish east coast, or in the southwest of the country, although the Firth of Clyde is an exception to this. The Highland coast contains numerous estuaries, straits, and inlets of a similar kind, but not called "firth" ; instead, these are often called sea lochs. Before about 1850, the spelling "Frith" was more common.
The Firth of Forth is the estuary, or firth, of several Scottish rivers including the River Forth. It meets the North Sea with Fife on the north coast and Lothian on the south.
Inchcolm Abbey is a medieval abbey located on the island of Inchcolm in the Firth of Forth in Scotland. The Abbey, which is located at the centre of the island, was founded in the 12th century during the episcopate of Gregoir, Bishop of Dunkeld. Later tradition placed it even earlier, in the reign of King Alexander I of Scotland (1107–24), who had taken shelter on Incholm when his ship was forced ashore during a storm in 1123. It is said he resided there for three days with the Hermit of Incholm.
North Queensferry is a village in Fife, Scotland, situated on the Firth of Forth where the Forth Bridge, the Forth Road Bridge, and the Queensferry Crossing all meet the Fife coast, some 10 miles from the centre of Edinburgh. It is the southernmost settlement in Fife. The prefix North serves to distinguish it from South Queensferry, on the opposite shore of the Forth. Both towns derive their name from the ferry service established by Queen Margaret in the 11th century, which continued to operate at the town until 1964, when the Road Bridge was opened.
Queensferry, also called South Queensferry or simply "The Ferry", is a town to the west of Edinburgh, Scotland. Traditionally a royal burgh of West Lothian, it is now administered by the City of Edinburgh Council. It lies ten miles to the north-west of Edinburgh city centre, on the shore of the Firth of Forth between the Forth Bridge, Forth Road Bridge and the Queensferry Crossing. The prefix South serves to distinguish it from North Queensferry, on the opposite shore of the Forth. Both towns derive their name from the ferry service established by Queen Margaret in the 11th century, which continued to operate at the town until 1964, when the Road Bridge was opened.
Inchcolm is an island in the Firth of Forth in Scotland. It was repeatedly attacked by English raiders during the Wars of Scottish Independence, and was fortified during both World Wars to defend nearby Edinburgh. Inchcolm now attracts visitors to its former Augustine Abbey.
Inchkeith is an island in the Firth of Forth, Scotland, administratively part of the Fife council area.
Inchmickery is a small island in the Firth of Forth in Scotland. It is about two miles (3.2 km) north of Edinburgh.
Cramond Island is one of several islands in the Firth of Forth in eastern Scotland, near Edinburgh. It lies off the foreshore at Cramond. It is 1⁄3 mile (0.54 km) long and covers 19.03 acres (7.70 ha). The island is part of the Dalmeny Estate, owned by the Rosebery Estates Partnership, and is let to Cramond Boat Club.
The Forth Estuary Transport Authority (FETA) was the authority responsible for the maintenance of the Forth Road Bridge over the Firth of Forth in eastern central Scotland. FETA was created in 2001 by the Transport (Scotland) Act 2001 - to replace the Forth Road Bridge Joint Board.
The Islands of the Forth are a group of small islands located in the Firth of Forth and in the estuary of the River Forth on the east coast of Scotland. Most of the group lie in the open waters of the firth, between the Lothians and Fife, with the majority to the east of the city of Edinburgh. Two islands lie further west in the river estuary.
The Forth Bridge is a cantilever railway bridge across the Firth of Forth in the east of Scotland, 9 miles west of central Edinburgh. Completed in 1890, it is considered a symbol of Scotland, and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It was designed by English engineers Sir John Fowler and Sir Benjamin Baker. It is sometimes referred to as the Forth Rail Bridge, although this is not its official name.
The Firth of Forth was historically crossed by ferry until the opening of the Forth Road Bridge in 1964.
The Dunfermline and Queensferry Railway was a railway company founded to form part of a rail and ferry route between Dunfermline and Edinburgh, in Scotland. It was authorised in 1873 and its promoters had obtained informal promises from the larger North British Railway that the NBR would provide financial help, and also operate the ferry and the necessary railway on the southern side of the Firth of Forth.
The Loony Dook is an annual event held on New Year's Day in which people dive into the freezing waters of the Firth of Forth at South Queensferry, often in fancy dress.
The Braefoot Battery was a World War I coastal defence gun battery defending the Firth of Forth. The battery was constructed in 1915 at Braefoot Point, then part of the Earl of Moray's Donibristle Estate. The site is situated between the new town of Dalgety Bay and Aberdour in Fife.
The Downing Point Battery was a World War I coastal gun battery defending the Firth of Forth. The battery was constructed in 1914 at Downing Point, then part of the Earl of Moray's Donibristle Estate. The site is now situated within the new town of Dalgety Bay in Fife.
Coastal fortifications in Scotland, played a vital role during the World Wars, protecting shipping as they mustered to convoy. New fortifications were built and old defences were also rebuilt or strengthened around the Scottish coast in case of invasion. New technologies like Radar were also deployed.
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