Crimonmogate

Crimonmogate takes its name from a combination of  Gaelic and  Old Norse words which mean ' road through the pasture by the peat moss' said to refer to an ancient track across the estate which originally formed part of the vast lands owned by the Earl of Erroll.

 Crimonmogate is a good example of a classical Regency mansion set in extensive policies. The house, designed by Archibald Simpson,  was commissioned in 1820 by Patrick Milne, a highly successful businessman, who became enormously wealthy as  a result of enterprises in the West Indies, India and China. Milne died before the completion of the house in 1825  and it passed firstly to his relation Sir Charles Bannerman then to  the Carnegie family who lived there until the mid 1900s.

The mansard roof and round headed dormer windows which detract from the lines of the original classical design were added in around 1860

A modern  aerial sculpture representing a trapeze artist balances on  a line between trees in front of the house.

 Beech hedges and mature woodland screen the house from outwith the grounds. During the season shooting parties  heading for Crimonmogate  regularly arrived by train at Lonmay station where  there is a large turning area to accommodate  horse drawn carriages and coaches. Only the trees can be seen from the Line.

 The round sundial, positioned  in front of the house, is dated 1780 , the capital is decorated with Prince of Wales feathers.

This obelisk, dated 1821 was erected by Charles Bannerman in memory of Patrick Milne

During WW2 the head office staff of the Consolidated Pneumatic Tool company were evacuated from London to Fraserburgh and were billeted at Crimonmogate and nearby Cairness. Sasha Carnegie's book 'Pigs I Have known', describes a post war pig keeping venture at Crimonmogate. Christopher Monckton, a cousin to the Carnegies adviser to Margaret Thatcher and  inventor of the board game Eternity lived here  from 1996 - 2000. Monckton offered  a prize of 1million pounds for what he thought was his virtually insoluble board game Eternity. Alas the game was solved within  a period of months forcing the sale of the house.

The yurt in the grounds is used for weddings and other events, it is also popular with  swallows

 In 2001 Crimonmogate was purchased by William and Candida, Viscount and Viscountess Petersham who carried out extensive restoration and now run a successful wedding and corporate events business from the property.

The former Old Deer Fever Hospital

A short walk from Pitfour along the Line from Taitswell towards Deer Abbey in search of the old fever hospital led to an interesting digression, the discovery of  a badger sett and a circular walk through Pitfour to our starting point. There are several possible circular routes in this area involving attractive walks along the Line and digressions through Aden Park, Old Deer or Pitfour Estate. All are worth exploring, especially by those who dislike 'there and back'  walks for which the Line is often criticised by the unobservant who do not notice how different the coutryside looks when heading in the opposite direction. 

Hawthorn on the embankment close to the bridge carrying the B9030 (Stuartfield) road over the Line. There is a path leading to Aden Park, and Old Deer adjacent  to  the bridge. Crossing the Line the path leads up to the South Lodge of Pitfour and continues within the estate.

Fox-and-cubs or Orange Hawkweed, (Hieracium aurantiacum) grows on the drier section of the permanent way beyond the bridge. Other less striking yellow hawkweeds, flowers of mid summer are also starting to flower. 

A short distance to the west of the bridge in a damp meadow between the the Line and the A950 is this cottage, now enlarged but originally a small 'fever hospital' serving Old Deer.

For a brief period between 1884 and 1906 the small cottage, since extended, operated as a tiny fever hospital. The hospital which only had a handful of beds was situated here to be outside the village but conveniently close to Mavisbank, at that period the home of the Old Deer doctor. Most patients admitted to the hospital would have been suffering from scarlet fever or typhoid fever. The hospital was far too small to handle the number of patients needing to be isolated if there was a major outbreak of an infection and thus closed in 1906, by which time a larger isolation hospital had been opened in Strichen.

South Lodge Pitfour from the Line. The pillar to the right of the Lodge is one of  a pair flanking the main entrance to the estate which form part of a memorial to William Pitt the Younger and Henry Dundas, Viscount Melville.

The former isolation hospital, now modernised and extended.

A network of meandering footpaths has been constructed leading from Old Deer along the bank of  the Ugie, crossing the Line then wandering round the damp, low-lying,  meadow on the north side of the Line. The path eventually leads to Saplinbrae and the Pitfour Estate. The bank just visible in the trees on the far side of the meadow which is home to badgers. The burn which flows through the area carries the outflow from the artificial lake of Pitfour down to the Ugie.

Entrance to a badger sett in the embankment

Looking across the field with the footpaths towards  the old fever hospital  in the middle distance and beyond it the South Lodge. The field has large quantities of damp loving plants such as fragrant meadowsweet, spearwort, pink spikes of  bistort and pale mauve cuckoo flower.

Royal Saloon at Rathen Station

This photograph was taken at Rathen station on 14th July 1955 and shows the former GNSR Royal Saloon which, having come down in the world, is doing duty as an inspection carriage. It is being hauled by 'Bantam Cock' one of the few steam engines on the Line to have been given a name.(David Toulmin writes of engines 'Lord Saltoun' and 'Earl Marishal' but there is no documentary evidence of their having actually existed.)

Can any one explain?

The Royal Saloon was built at Inverurie in 1898 and was known as First Class Saloon Number 1. It was initially destined to be used for private hire by well heeled travellers. Between  1902 and 1910 the carriage was used by Edward V11, Queen Alexandra and the Prince of Wales, making  its longest journey in September 1903 when it carried the King from Ballater to London. The carriage was saved from scrapyard in 1964 and has been  restored by the Scottish Railway Preservation Society

Rathen Station as it is now, there are the slowly disintegrating remains of a station barrow and weighing machine on the platform 
 

Station lamp bracket

Shiny crane's-bill (Geranium lucidium) on the platform at Rathen

The patch of cowslips on the embankment near the Invernorth Road crossing is an annual delight. These are later to flower than those growing near Deer Abbey where it is more sheltered.

So many violets along the way at present, this seems to be a particularly good year for them.

As we walked the Line between Philorth Halt and Rathen Station we were accompanied by busy, low flying swallows making great arcs over the Line and damp fields, hunting insects and collecting mud for their nests. The sunshine had brought out many small tortoiseshell butterflies which basked on the dandelions.  

Maud Underpass

The underpass at Maud carries the railway line over a footpath linking Station Road and Deer Road East.

It is flanked by two WW2 pill boxes, one of which can be seen on the right in the picture above. The flaking paint work covering the metal structure has recently been found to contain low levels of potentially toxic lead so the underpass is to be closed to allow for repainting.

Arnage

On Good Friday  morning the station at Arnage appeared to be reverting back to nature, gradually being cloaked in new verdant growth and is being prettily colonised by all manner of green things.

A muddle over the use of the passing loop at Arnage and misdirected signalling there caused the first head on collision on a single line section of the GNSR, just south of the station at Gallowhill on 12th March 1874. This collision between a light engine running south  and a mixed train heading for Peterhead, both of which were running late,  resulted in the deaths of three footplate staff and the severe injury of  a fourth. 

 South Lodge, Arnage Castle
The rather grand entrance and the South Lodge of the Castle are situated a few yards to the east of the remains of the bridge which carried the line over the minor road from New Deer. The castle drive runs northwards parallel to the Line for several hundred yards, gradually ascending before curving off to the right. The castle is hidden from the Line by trees.

Arnage Castle was built about 1650, and started as  a z plan castle,  by Thomas Leiper, local master mason, probably on the site of an earlier building. It was much  altered in the Victorian period by Aberdeen architect James Matthews who enlarged the first floor windows and added an imposing baronial entrance, the original having been blocked up. The castle was paid rather a back handed compliment  by Pratt in 1858 as 'a castellated rather than a Gothic building, and, with a few judicious alterations in harmony with its original style would hold a prominent place among the houses of distinction in the neighbourhood'. For much of its history the castle was in the possession of the Ross family,  Provost John Ross of Aberdeen bought Arnage in 1702 (he of the Town House in Aberdeen) and it remained with his family until 1937 when the estate was sold by the  7th and last of the Leith-Ross lairds of Arnage, Lt. Col. William Leith-Ross. For 40 years until his death in 1976,  the castle was owned by the wealthy housebuilder Donald Charles Stewart (D.C. Stewart). Stewart was a Rolls Royce owning philanthropist with an interest in antiques and in lavish parties at which international screen and stage stars were regularly entertained.

A Linesman's hut doing duty as a garden shed, part of a loading bank to the right

The station platforms are gradually reverting to wildness, in addition to the invading trees they are carpeted with  celandines, and primroses, swathed in periwinkle and honeysuckle whilst  daffodils are gradually spreading from the  Arnage Castle driveway on to the up platform. .

Primroses flowering on the platform edge

Lesser periwinkle cascades over the edge of the platform

The down platform,  looking south.

Heading north towards Auchnagatt 

Primroses on the permanent way by mile post 23 and  a quarter just North of Arnage Station, the wooded policies of Arnage Castle are on the right. A confident and aristocratic cock pheasant, splendid in his breeding plumage crossed the track heading for the castle policies just as this picture was taken.

Aden Park to Deer Abbey, the Garden of Buchan

The district containing the estates of Pitfour and Aden, both of which were extensively developed in the 18th and 19th centuries by their wealthy 'improving' lairds, the Russells of Aden and Ferguson's of Pitfour is sometimes referred to as 'The Garden of Buchan'. Walking along the section  Line which runs between the estates,  through the verdant countryside of the Ugie valley, it is easy to see how this epithet was earned. Particularly in Spring the rich and varied flora, hedgerows and numerous trees of the sheltered Ugie valley are very different from  the barer, bleak and windswept plain  nearer the coast where the lineside flora is not yet as lush.

The embankments by the bridge carrying the Fetterangus to Old Deer road over the Line are covered in Few-flowered Leek (aka Few-flowered Garlic) Allium paradoxum . 

The delicate, snow white flowers of Few-flowered Leek (aka Few-flowered Garlic) Allium paradoxum.This uncommon plant, which can become invasive, as it clearly has in the Aden area where it crowds many verges, is an introduction from the Caucasus. As the name would suggest the plant smells of garlic.

Lesser celandines under the remains of the bridge which before realignment of the road, carried the busy A950 over the Line close to Pitfour and Aden Park. It is necessary to cross the road to continue towards  Deer Abbey and Maud. Proceed with caution!

Path leading from the Line by the road crossing to Aden Country Park. 

The well managed and attractive country park covers  230 acres of the once extensive Aden Estate. The park contains several visitor facilities, including Aberdeenshire's Farming Museum, camping and caravan sites, a lake, Victorian arboretum and a sensory garden. There are extensive waymarked walks  throughout the park. The unique semi-circular farm steading, dating from around 1800, and the slightly later coach house have been restored and house the museum, a cafe and  a gift shop.

The Aden Estate was bought by Alexander Russell of Montcoffer in 1758 from James Ferguson of Kinmundy whose own estates included adjacent Pitfour on the opposite bank of the Ugie. The estate included the village of Old Deer and extensive farmland which Russell,  an enthusiastic agricultural improver, set about developing. His improvements included planting  wooded areas originally intended to provide shelter throughout the estate and now a very attractive feature of the area.

Further improvements involved enlarging the mansion, building the unique semi-circular steading, coach house and gate lodges.   Kininmonth and Ludquharn were added to the estate which at its most extensive covered 31 square miles.

The decline of the estate set in after World War 1 when maintenance costs rose and farm income declined. About 75% of the estate was gradually sold off but it proved impossible to make ends meet. So  in 1937  Sidney Russell, the last Laird, was forced to sell the Aden House and its policies, the remaining 52 farms and much of Old Deer. Sadly the estate, which was then used for shooting rapidly fell into disrepair and the mansion became derelict.

1975 Banff and Buchan Council aquired Aden and began to restore the buildings and grounds  and established Aden Country Park and Heritage Centre.The remaining outside walls  of the Russell's mansion have been consolidated and stabilised,  an indication of the lifestyle of the lairds is given by the size of the ruins and the nearby  laundry, icehouse and gasworks.

Delicate Blackthorn blossom.

There are primroses along the verge near Deer Abbey

Also by Deer Abbey we found the first pale violets of the year

Pink Purslane (Montana  sibirica) occurs in damp, shady places and is particularly suited to the coditions under some bridges.

Deer Abbey with the daffodils of Deaconess Anna Ritchie's former home Newlands flowering in the the background. Under the Abbey wall there are the large leaves of butterwort

Pollen rich willow catkins

Saplinbrae

Saplinbrae on the Pitfour Estate, was built in 1756. Its first use was probably as a coaching inn for travellers on  the  Banff to Peterhead, road but by 1760 it became the manse for the minister of the Qualified Episcopalian Chapel which  Lord Pitfour had built on the opposite (Abbey) side of  the road. When Admiral Ferguson's  widowed mother-in-law, Lady Langford, moved north in the 1850's the house was altered to become the  Dower House using stones plundered from Deer Abbey. As the Pitfour fortunes began to fail it was leased out and has had various uses, currently as a country house hotel.

The aniseed scented leaves and frothy white flowers of Sweet Cicely in the shelter of the bridge carrying the Line over the Ugie

Bridgend Farmhouse with Aikey Brae in the background.

Not the best of photographs but it was such an unexpected pleasure to spot this clump of cowslips  under the tree in an inaccessible place near Bridgend Farm

Newly emerging hawthorn leaves and flower buds

Unfurling Rowan a leaves and flower buds (below) catching the morning sunlight