22829: Ullapool, Ross & Cromarty

Ullapool is a small village on the shores of Loch Broom in Ross-shire, and the port for the Stornoway ferry.

Though the area around Loch Broom had been occupied for centuries, the town of Ullapool was founded in 1788 as a fishing port by the British Fisheries Society. It was designed by Thomas Telford and grew up around the herring industry. Fishing fortunes waxes and waned; in the 1970s the ‘klondykers’ or factory ships from Eastern Europe filled the loch. The fishing hasdeclined but a few boats are still fishing from the village pier, mostly for prawns.

As in other parts of the Highlands, landless families from around the area struggled to exist in the midst of ‘improving’ landlords who cleared the land of tenants. In 1773 the ship Hector sailed from Ullapool across the Atlantic to Pictou, Nova Scotia, with 189 passengers seeking a new life.