Old Photograph Post Office Lochans Scotland

Old photograph of the Post Office in Lochans, a small village around 2.5 miles South of Stranraer, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. Armstrongs, Bells, Moffats, Maxwells, Crichtons, Irvings and Johnstones; were just some of the clan families in the Dumfries and Galloway part of the world; who regularly rode across the divide between Scotland and England, wearing steel bonnets and bearing long lances, to wreak havoc on the other side. The Armstrongs, in particular, were a fearsome lot, at the height of their powers, they could put 3,000 fighting men in the saddle. There was the legendary feud between the Maxwells and the Johnstones. The two families fought each other over the years, ending in a bloodbath at the Battle of Dryfe Sands in Lockerbie. It was the last great border battle and one where 11 year old boys were put into the saddle to fight. When the freedom fighter William Wallace wanted help, he went to Dumfries and Galloway to raise a small army. Robert the Bruce had his castle in Lochmaben and in 1306, he killed his rival for the Scottish throne, John Comyn, on the altar of Dumfries’ Greyfriar’s Church.



Tour Scotland video of old photographs of Stranraer, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. Around 1600, Stranraer had become the market town for western Wigtownshire. At about this time, Stranraer was reached by a military road built from Dumfries to allow easier access to Portpatrick for transportation of people to Ireland for the Plantation of Ulster. Stranraer became a royal burgh in 1617. The first harbour in Stranraer was built in the middle of the 18th century, with further port development in the 1820s. The arrival of the railway from Dumfries in 1861, which closed in 1965), which gave the shortest journey to/from London, England, established Stranraer as the area's main port. In 1862, the line was extended to serve the harbour directly, and a link to Portpatrick was also opened. In 1877, a rail connection north to Girvan and Glasgow was also established. Stranraer remained the main Scottish port for the Irish ferries for the next 150 years or so.



All photographs are copyright of Sandy Stevenson, Tour Scotland, and may not be used without permission.

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