The property has had some legendary house owners down the years.
Enterprise roughly 18 miles west of Pitlochry in Perthshire this summer season, and also you may come upon a sight that’s each extraordinary and deeply affecting. Standing stark towards the panorama are the skeletal remnants of what was as soon as a powerful mansion, Dunalastair Home.
From a distance, it retains a semblance of its former imposing construction, however a more in-depth method reveals nothing however a grand smash, a haunting shell of stone and reminiscence.
The positioning, whereas haunting, has not too long ago develop into a focal point for explorers. It’s maybe shocking to study that lower than 100 years in the past, this now derelict constructing served a major function, working as a faculty for Polish kids.
The historical past of the Dunalastair Property stretches again centuries, originating with the possession by Clan Donnachaidh, also called Clan Robertson. The Robertson household held management of the property in and across the space.
A outstanding determine linked to the positioning was the good poet chieftain, Alexander Robertson of Struan, a staunch Jacobite.
He’s believed to have resided in a home often known as the Hermitage, thought to have been positioned on or shut to the current Dunalastair web site.
This earlier construction was destroyed by hearth following the 1745 Jacobite rebellion. Subsequently, round 1800, a double tower home, often known as Mount Alexander, was constructed on the positioning.
The Robertson clan’s direct management continued till 1853. In that yr, George Duncan Robertson, the 18th Chief, offered the property to Normal Sir John Macdonald of Dalchosnie.
Based on the Dunalastair Property web site, Normal Sir John Macdonald selected to demolish the constructing then on the positioning and constructed his personal residence, the construction whose stays are seen at the moment.
A number of a long time later, the property was offered once more by Alastair Macdonald, son of Sir John, to Hugh Tennent. Hugh was the good nice grandson of the founding father of the Wellpark Brewery, now often known as Tennent’s brewery.
Hugh would revolutionise the favored beer after being impressed by journeys to Bavaria in Germany, the primary of which he made in 1881, the identical yr he purchased Dunalastair Home.
Tennent’s Lager, as we all know it at the moment, was first brewed at Wellpark in 1885. Regardless of his success, Hugh died aged 27 in 1890, having owned Dunalastair for simply 9 years.
The next yr, in 1891, the home and property have been acquired by James Clark Bunten, who was the Chairman of the Caledonian Railway Firm and is the good grandfather of the present proprietor. Nevertheless, from this era, Dunalastair started to expertise a decline.
This was significantly noticeable after the onset of World Conflict One, when the big employees required to take care of such a property turned more and more scarce.
In the course of the Second World Conflict, the property discovered a brief new function as a faculty for the kids of Polish refugees. Regardless of this, its decline continued into the Fifties, exacerbated by a hearth round this time.
Within the Fifties, the home’s contents and furnishings have been offered off. Its situation worsened significantly within the Nineteen Sixties following vital vandalism and the theft of lead from the roof, resulting in its present state of full disrepair.
At the moment, though varied proposals have been made for the restoration of the home, the excessive prices concerned have to this point prevented any such tasks from continuing.
Further data is out there on the Dunalastair Property web site.
