Ross & Cromarty
Our latest book - on the Hospitals of Ross and Cromarty - has at last been published. We are most grateful to the Guthrie Trust who have generously funded our printing costs. This means we do not have to recoup these costs and can keep the price low. Therefore, the price we charge, if you order it from us, is £4.00 which covers our distribution costs only (postage etc.).
However, the book is also available from Nairn Bookshop (which stocks all of our books) and the Museums at Dingwall, Gairloch, Invergordon and Tain.
Ross and Cromarty has a rich history with many people working on uncovering its past and we anticipate (and hope) that this book may encourage others to add more information on the history of its hospitals. We will place any updates on this page and aleady have one from Gairloch (below)!
Cottage Hospital in Strath – Drumandarroch
We are most grateful to Dorothy Malone, a volunteer researcher with Gairloch Museum, who adds significantly to our knowledge of Strath Hospital. She writes :-
'From a death certificate, the Cottage Hospital was in operation on July 1877 as on the 20th at 9am a Roderick Mackenzie died there from paralysis and his death was certified by Dr Charles Robertson (the first appointed doctor in the area although he was also a farmer). A Jessie McLeod was recorded as the matron.'
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County Hospital Invergordon
We have had a request from Australia for information on the County Hospital Invergordon. Mr Pepper writes:-
In the last month's of WWII, an RAF aircraft crewed by Australians crashed into the Dornoch Firth. Seriously injured crew were taken to "RNA Hospital Invergordon". The story is told on this website W6009 – In Memoriam. Around 19 people will travel to Tain/Invergordon/Alness in August for the dedication service for the Memorial recently installed on the Dornoch Firth shore. I'd like to be able to put on the website details about the place where the seriously injured were taken.'
We are very pleased to be able to place our account of the history of the County Hospital on this website which can be viewed here. documents/county-hospital-invergordon19jul24_1.pdf and wish the party well for a successfu trip.
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Ross-shire Hospitals
Given that we had already placed the history of Invergordon Hospital on this website we thought there was no reason why the history of the other Ross-shire hospitals should not be available here. You can access each one by selecting the hyperlinks below.
Ross and Cromarty is an immense county straddling Scotland and was even larger before 1974 when it included the Island of Lewis now part of the Western Isles. It is a county of contrasts. Easter Ross very much resembles the rest of Lowland Scotland with rich agricultural land and easy communications. Wester Ross has some of the most spectacular and inaccessible landscape in the Highlands and the difficulties in road communication are further compounded by the deep indentations of the western fiord coastline. More details about the county can be found here.
It was no accident, then, that the main care establishments were formed in the east of the county. The Easter Ross Combination Poorhouse was opened in 1850 and ten years later the Black Isle Combination Poorhouse. The Ross Memorial Hospital opened in 1872 but it was not the first general hospital because the Mackenzies of Gairloch had opened the short lived Gairloch Hospital in the 1870s. It was followed by the Cromarty Hospital in 1894.
There were several small infectious diseases hospitals but the first main county one was the County Hospital at Invergordon, purchased from the Admiralty and opened in 1921. It specialised in treating TB but the smaller Seaforth Sanatorium had already been established in 1907 to perform this function. Another specialist hospital was the Nicholson Mackenzie Hospital in Strathpeffer which treated rheumatology and skin diseases using the healing waters of the Strathpeffer Spa.
Like hospitals elsewhere special provision had to be made during wartime which saw hospitals moderate their function and large private homes loaned as temporary hospitals.
Finally, an interesting development in Mid Ross was the building of the Nurses Home at Conon Bridge in memory of Sir Kenneth Mackenzie.
