Kinloch Rannoch
The small village of Kinloch Rannoch lies at the eastern end of Loch Rannoch amid some of the most beautiful scenery to be found in Highland Perthshire. The River Tummel runs through the village on it's path to Loch Tummel and the magnificent Queen's View.
Beyond the village to the west is Rannoch Station which is literally the end of the road. Beyond this is the rugged Rannoch Moor with it's superb views of Schiehallion and beyond that the foreboding Glencoe. The village is a popular base for backpackers and walkers.
The area was already well settled in the mid AD500s when St Blane arrived here from Iona and began the conversion of the resident Celts to Christianity. He was followed by other early missionaries, and their memory remains in the naming of burial grounds in the area.
In medieval times this route across Scotland was never dominated by any particular clan, and as a result no fewer than seven different clans have links with the area, including the Robertsons, Camerons, MacDougalls and Menzies. Perhaps best known, for the worst of reasons, were the MacGregors, who played an especially enthusiastic role in several centuries of sporadic clan warfare usually caused by disputes about ownership of land or cattle.
To the south-east of Kinloch Rannoch, is Dalchosnie, where English invaders are said to have fought Robert the Bruce in 1306. Rannoch's clans played a full part in the Jacobite uprisings, and in the aftermath of the Battle of Culloden the area suffered badly at the hands of soldiers based at Rannoch Barracks at the head of the loch. Rannoch was devastated by government troops after the 1745 rebellion. The Atholl Brigade, the fighting men from Tummelside suffered the greatest number of casualties at Culloden. The government knew that the Jacobite flame burned fiercely in this area, and they intended to put it out for good. The fugitive Jacobites hiding in the hills and forests could only watch from the crags above as their homes were destroyed.
One oddity about Kinloch Rannoch is its name, which already applied to the hamlet James Small found in 1754. "Kinloch" really ought to apply to a village at the head of the loch rather than its foot: but it stuck nonetheless.
In and Around Aberfeldy
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