Our visit to Old Inverlochy Castle was part of our Grand Tour of Scotland, a fantastic experience if the weather is good. The castle is an unmodified 13th century building, relying on towers and thick walls for defence. It is best appreciated from the air or with drone photography as the trees and lack of an overlook viewpoint obscure the simple grace of the fortifications.
Visiting Old Inverlochy Castle
The castle is just off the main A82 to Fort William and is well signposted with a small area for parking. There are no facilities but it is free to enter. You can cross the small bridge to view the castle from the other side of River Lochy.
My Experience
On our visit to Old Inverlochy Castle we parked just outside the castle and read the information board. In its heyday the castle must have been quite a magnificent sight, with the river on one side and a moat on the other three. Sadly now there isn’t much left of that grandeur.
We walked around the outside and then did a circuit of the inside. You can climb on the walls or enter any towers so it is really just an outer wall. It is quite sad for a castle that was the site of a couple of pivotal battles and home of a clan that were rivals to Robert the Bruce for kingship, until he murdered the clan chief and defeated the clan in battle.
Photo Gallery of Old Inverlochy Castle
History
Inverlochy Castle was built circa 1270–1280 by John “the Black” Comyn, Lord of Badenoch and Lochaber, and chief of the Clan Comyn. It may have been built on the site of an earlier Pictish fortification and settlement, which the historian Hector Boece (1465–1536) records as a “city” that was destroyed by Vikings.[1] When Robert the Bruce succeeded to the Scottish throne in 1306, the Comyns, his rivals for the crown, were dispossessed, and the castle was unoccupied for a time.[1] In 1431, clansmen of Alexander MacDonald, Lord of the Isles, defeated King James I’s larger army in the first Battle of Inverlochy, fought close by the castle. It came under control of the Clan Cameron until 1501.
In 1505, the partially ruined castle was granted to Alexander Gordon, 3rd Earl of Huntly, who was charged by King James IV with repairing the castle for use as a Royal garrison.[1] His brother William Gordon, Laird of Gight, became master of Inverlochy, and was slain commanding the Camerons at Flodden. In 1645, the castle served as a stopping-off point for the royalist army of James Graham, 1st Marquess of Montrose during his campaign against the Covenanter forces of the Marquess of Argyll. This culminated in a victory for the royalists in the second Battle of Inverlochy, on 2 February 1645. In the 19th century, the estate was bought by James Scarlett, 1st Baron Abinger, who built a Scottish baronial style mansion to the north-west, which is now the Inverlochy Castle Hotel. Minor enhancements, including the restoration of loops and battlements, were carried out by Lord Abinger in advance of the visit of Queen Victoria in 1873.
References
An excellent resource for this castle is the official website here
The history above is copied from the Wiki page here