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Grant ow n?s First House
In the far off days of the
mid-eighteenth century,
when George III and Pitt
the Elder were engaged
in the Seven Years war
and the loss of the
American Colonies,
when Clive was in India
and Captain Cook was
rediscovering Australia,
when Mozart was
writing his first opera
and Voltaire was
inventing the electric
battery, when ladies of
fashion were inventing
towering hairstyles, and
when Adam-designed,
elegant Georgian
mansions were being
furnished with
Hepplewhite and
Sheraton pieces ? John
Grant, a humble weaver
in remote Strathspey,
was moving house.
This was in fact the
first house to be built
in New Grant Town or
Grantown on Spey as
we know it today. It
marked a quiet
revolution and a
turning point in the
history of the modern
Highlands. It was a
solid, though rather
plain, slate roofed, stone
and lime building of two
storeys and in total
contrast to the low turf
roofed dwellings of the
weaver?s fellow
countrymen. It marked
a start to urbanisation in
Strathspey and
Badenoch and a move
from traditional small
scattered townships to
planned settlements.
This alone gives
Grantown a special
place in history. More
than that, however,
marks Grantown out as
special. The town is
described by Professor
Smout as one of ?the
best preserved and most
interesting? of all the
Scottish 500 or so
planned settlements and
is certainly one of the
best documented.
Records detail, uniquely,
the exact location of the
building and the very
day on which the first
stone was laid. Not even
Edinburgh New Town
can boast such a claim.
That first stone was laid
on Friday June 28th
1765 by William
Anderson, a master
mason from Portsoy,
who had been engaged
to build the
house-cum-manufactory
for John Grant, who was
a weaver from
Rothiemurchus, at a cost
of £40 sterling. The
building was to be 58
feet long and 20 feet
wide, with 9 foot walls
at one end to
accommodate two
storeys where the
weaving shop was to be
SUMMER 2017 EDITION
situated. There was a
small cellar under the
kitchen with its ?hinging
lum?, a stair and a
principal room at one
end, and garrets for
sleeping
accommodation along
the full length of the
building. All five
windows were fitted
with wooden shutters.
Builders included Archie
Haston, whose house
still stands on the other
side of the Square, and
Thomas Gordon the
smith. Two other John
Grants were involved in
the operation, Allan
Grant who carried over
stones and John Nairn
from Gaich who helped
with the foundations.
Stone for the walls came
largely from boulders
lying about on the site ?
and indeed
neighbouring future
plots which was of
course a point of
grievance with others
later. Other supplies
came from the nearby
brae face. Timber came
from the forests of
Abernethy and
Rothiemurchus and was
floated down the Spey
to the mouth of the
Kylintra Burn before
being carted to the
Square by Patrick
McDonald. For this
cartering he was paid
seven shillings. Some of
the spars where floated
by John McBain of
Craggan, whilst
twenty-one dozen 8 ft
and 10ft floorboards
came from Gregor Grant,
THE GRANTOWN TIMES - Grant own on Spey Vicinit y Newslet t er