Loch Lomond Steamboats in Mid-Victorian Years

on Jun 1, 2023

A previous article details the development of the Lochlomond Steam-boat Company to 1855. At that time, the Company had two steamers, Prince Albert, built in 1850, with a flush deck, and Queen Victoria, built in 1852 to incorporate the engines of the old Waterwitch. She had a raised quarter-deck that gave her better saloon accommodation. On the Loch itself, there were piers at all the calling places. The route ran from Balloch to the Inverarnan Canal, where connections with coaches to Perthshire and the north were made. At Tarbert, there were coach connections to Inveraray, Oban and the west, and to Arrochar where the Dumbarton steamers called to provide a circular tour from Glasgow. At Inversnaid, there were connections with the Trossachs tour and Loch Katrine. That year, a consortium of interested hotel proprietors and the Lochlomond Company shared the cost of a new steamer, Rob Roy,...

Loch Lomond Frozen—1895

on Apr 22, 2021

In the first week of January 1895, the West of Scotland experienced a severe frost and the southern reaches of Loch Lomond began to freeze. This phenomenon was not unknown or particularly unusual. It had last frozen over in the winter of 1880-81 and indeed the year before that, on both occasions bearing the weight of a person for several weeks. It is the broad, shallower, southern stretch of the loch that is susceptible to freezing, the narrow, fijord-like northern arm is too deep. Freezing as far as Luss was not considered possible, but the frost of January and February 1895 proved this wrong. “King frost on his throne.—(from our Glasgow Correspondent) Glasgow, Wednesday Forenoon. The frost in Glasgow and the West of Scotland to-day is the greatest for years and Loch Lomond is frozen for the first time for twelve years. There is still no communication between Glaagow and the West...