Fort Augustus is a settlement in the parish of Boleskine and Abertarff, at the south-west end of Loch Ness, Scottish Highlands. The village has a population of around 646 (2001).[3] Its economy is heavily reliant on tourism.
History
Section of dismantled railway south of Fort Augustus
Some historians like G. Mcdonalds -after the finding of a roman coins hoard in 1767 near the city's ancient benedictine abbey- wrote about the possibility that Fort Augustus was built on a roman small fortification built under Diocletian rule[4]
The Gaelic name for the modern village is Cille Chuimein ([ˈkʲiʎəˈxumɛɲ]) and until the early 18th century the settlement was called Kiliwhimin. It was renamed Fort Augustus after the Jacobite rising of 1715. The accepted etymology is that the settlement was originally named after Saint Cummein of Iona who built a church there.[5] Other suggestions are that it was originally called Ku Chuimein after one of two abbots of Iona of the Comyn clan, whose badge Lus mhic Chuimein refers to the cumin plant,[6] or that it was called Cill a' Chuimein ("Comyn's Burialplace") after the last Comyn in Lochaber.[7]
In the aftermath of the Jacobite rising in 1715, General Wade built a fort (taking from 1729 until 1742) which was named after Prince William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland. Wade had planned to build a town around the new barracks and call it Wadesburgh.[8] The settlement grew, and eventually took the name of this fort. The fort was captured by the Jacobites in March 1746, just before the Battle of Culloden.
A hoard of Roman coins was unearthed in 1767 near the ancient Benedictine abbey that are thought to be from Roman to Late Iron Age - 79 AD to 560 AD.[9]
In 1867, the fort was sold to the Lovat family, and in 1876 they passed the site and land to the Benedictine order. The monks established Fort Augustus Abbey and later a school. The school operated until 1993 when it closed owing to changing educational patterns in Scotland causing a decline in enrollment. The monks employed Tony Harmsworth[10] to devise a rescue package which saw the site converted into the largest private heritage centre in Scotland which operated between 1994 and 1998;[11] however, the heritage centre failed to generate sufficient profit to maintain the buildings. In 1998 the monks abandoned the site, and it reverted to the Lovat family which in turn sold it to Terry Nutkins. He also owned The Lovat Hotel[12] that stands on the site of the old Kilwhimen Barracks, one of four built in 1718. This site houses the west curtain wall of the old Fort, intact with gun embrasures. The Lovat was originally built as the local Station Hotel.
The village is served by the Cill Chuimein Medical Centre.[13]
The village has both a primary school and a secondary school – Kilchuimen Primary School and Kilchuimen Academy – which share a campus.
Climate
As with most of the British Isles and Scotland, Fort Augustus has an oceanic climate (Köppen: Cfb) with cool summers and mild winters. Like a lot of the surrounding area, sunshine levels are low at around 1,000 hours per annum and temperatures are unpredictable – Fort Augustus holds the UK's joint lowest May temperature record of −9.4 °C (15.1 °F).[14] This is the latest point in the run-up to summer that such a low temperature has been recorded, suggesting it can become a frost trap on calm clear nights due to its valley location. That same low-lying topography can also give rise to some high temperatures on occasion – Fort Augustus held the UK daily high temperature record for 16 December for almost 80 years.[15]
Climate data for Fort Augustus (23 m or 75 ft asl, averages 1991–2020)
^"A letter from an officer at Perth, dated May 2, 1767 says: "Last week I was out with a command to Fort Augustus, where some part of the fortifications are repairing. Whilst there, some labourers in digging a trench, found an earthen urn, of a blue colour, with about 300 pieces of coin, of mixed metal, some a little larger than our halfpence, and the others the size of farthings. They appear to me to be all of the Emperor Dioclesian" ([1])
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