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Portgower, Sutherland

Portgower

The A9 runs north through Portgower  - a small crofting and fishing village although there is no fishing now or for many decades.  Portgower was built in the nineteenth century as clearance village by the Duke of Sutherland who employed a French factor.  It was his idea to have Portgower as compact village on a grid system similar to the villages he was used to in France.  that is why the houses are numbered not logically like a street in most places but with each house bearing the number of the croft land.  Unfortunately this set up which might have assisted community spirit meant that most of the crofters had to walk some distance to their land to work on it unlike most crofts in the Highlands where the house is situated on the land being worked.


Picture Gallery 14 August 2003

 

Pictures - Bill Fernie - 20 June 2001