Stirling to Pitlochry Great British Railway Journeys

For Victorian Britons, George Bradshaw was a household name.

At a time when railways were new, Bradshaw's guidebook inspired them

to take to the tracks.

I'm using a Bradshaw's guide to understand

how trains transformed Britain - its landscape, its industries,

society and leisure time.

As I crisscross the country 150 years later,

it helps me to discover the Britain of today.

I'm continuing my journey across southern Scotland,

now moving away from the Central Belt towards hillier country.

At the time of my Bradshaw's guide,

Queen Victoria had bought Balmoral Castle

and highland dress had become highly fashionable.

But being sentimental about tartans and kilts

was no disguise for the fact that the English and the Scots

had fought bitter battles over many centuries.

This week, I've been making my way across Scotland from west to east.

My journey began at the Firth of Clyde

and continued through the Scottish lowlands to Glasgow.

Now I'm heading north to Stirling and Perth -

gateways to the Highlands.

I'll then travel east to Fife

and the famous university town of St Andrews.

Finally, I'll turn south to Scotland's capital.

On today's leg, I begin in Scotland's ancient stronghold

before travelling north to the head of the Earn Valley.

Then on to the city with royal connections.

And my journey will end in the beautiful Highlands.

'I visit the scene of a bloody battle.'

And eventually the English are forced back to a position

where they are in complete chaos.

'Enjoy a lesson in the skills of an ancient craft.'

It doesn't sound like it sounded with you.

-You need more porridge.

-More porridge!

'And treat my traveller's taste buds.'

Mm, I'm slipping into ecstasy.

Very, very fruity.

I shall be leaving the train at Stirling to visit the rivulet

called Bannockburn which, according to Bradshaw's, "runs through a glen.

"The inhabitants carry on a considerable trade in tartan

"and woollen cloth in general.

"Here the celebrated battle was fought between Robert The Bruce,

"King of Scotland and Edward of England, in 1314."

And doesn't a spider's web come in to it somewhere

or have I got my stories tangled?

Stirling dates back to the 12th century and its striking monuments

and battlefields are testament to its strategic place in history.

In 1297, William Wallace defeated the English

at the battle of Stirling Bridge.

And in 1314, another Scottish hero fought to remove the English

from Caledonian soil.

I'm meeting historian Fiona Watson at Bannockburn.

So here is Robert the Bruce who actually defeated the English.

He certainly did, right here,

and he's looking that way - towards England, actually.

We're quite a long way from England, what were the English doing here?

Well, it's a long story but in essence, the English King Edward I

was doing what medieval kings did, expanding.

He saw an opportunity when the Scottish King Alexander III died.

But he basically invaded in 1296 and took Scotland for his own.

Stirling Castle was occupied by the English and besieged by the Scots.

At stake was not just a castle,

but Scotland's independence from England.

Edward II comes in person?

He does, which is very unusual, by this period,

for kings to actually fight their battles.

So we have the Scottish king, we have the English king head-to-head.

-Crown to crown.

-Absolutely.

-And how does the battle go, then?

Very badly for the English, it must be said. Bruce has a plan.

He's trained his men, his spearmen,

normally the Scottish spearmen are static, defensive,

but he's trained them to be offensive, to move in formation

and then get down when they're charged.

Edward doesn't have a plan, he just thinks he's going to turn up,

bigger, greater, mightier army and the English will win.

At the start of the battle, nobleman Sir Henry de Bohun challenged Bruce

to single combat and was swiftly dispatched by the king's axe.

There's divisions among his commanders, cos he's set them up

inadvertently between fighting each other.

So Bruce just has to exert the discipline

and the genius of his own military abilities.

He moves forward against the English,

they're hemmed in by the terrain, they can't fan out

and eventually the English are forced back to a position

where they are in complete chaos.

SHOUTING

Their situation wasn't helped by the boggy battlefield conditions

on the flood plain of the River Forth.

The King is led off the field

because the English nobles realise that he is about to be captured

-and that would be a really, really terrible thing.

-Checkmate.

Absolutely. And the minute the king's standard is seen departing,

of course, that means it's every man for himself

and the English start to flee.

Only one sizeable group of English foot soldiers managed to escape.

No-one knows for sure how many English infantrymen were killed

but it was certainly thousands.

Now I remember a story about Robert the Bruce and a spider,

something about trying and trying again.

So is there any truth in this at all?

Well, the wonderful story, it's a wonderful story about the spider

and it really does capture Robert the Bruce at the beginning of his reign,

where many Scots - as well as, of course, the English -

were against him,

because he had killed a man to become King, it was a dreadful story.

And he went into exile, and we can imagine him in a cave

somewhere off the west coast of Scotland, thinking it's all over.

His brothers, many of them had been killed,

his wife, his daughter had all been captured.

Yeah, why would you go on? And the spider teaches him that.

But unfortunately, the original story was actually about his friend

and commander James Douglas,

but I think everyone realised how much that encapsulates

those dreadful days at the beginning of his reign, so I like it.

Victorians would have enjoyed that romantic legend as they came here

hunting souvenirs.

Fiona, Bradshaw's says,

"Upon the top of an eminence

"is a large limestone on which the Scottish King

"planted his standard. So highly is this stone valued

"that fragments of it are frequently cut off and set in rings

"and worn as a memorial

"of one of the proudest days in the annals of Scotland."

-Was that stone here?

-Yes, this was the site of the Borestone,

the stone referred to there,

it's like a millstone with a wee hole in it,

and that's supposedly where Robert Bruce planted his standard

and this would have been the Scottish camp.

What happened to it?

Well, Burns came, Robert Burns came here in the 18th century,

and he wrote his great poem Scots Wha Hae.

But in the 19th century, when the railways arrive,

bringing lots and lots more tourists,

it seems to have been the thing where they really did take bits of it away

and they only have a tiny bit left in the visitors' centre.

So mixed blessing, the railways, I think for Bannockburn.

To celebrate the 700th anniversary of the battle,

there's a new addition to the Borestone.

And it's an offering of which I'm sure

Robert Burns would have approved.

"Here lies our land: every airt

"Beneath swift clouds, glad glints of sun,

"Belonging to none but itself.

"We are mere transients, who sing

"Its westlin' winds and fernie braes,

"'Come all ye', the country says,

"'You win me, who take me most to heart.'"

That was beautiful.

-I feel my Scottish blood surging from my heart.

-Absolutely.

And I wonder what today's visitors make of the history?

What do you know about the battle?

Basically that we won!

THEY LAUGH

Do you think you get a feeling about the battle and Scottish history?

Well, you do have a feeling about the battle in Scottish history.

I mean, after all, Bruce finished the job that Wallace started.

At this ancient battlefield, I am conscious of centuries of struggle

between the Scots and the English.

Fortunately, nowadays, their relationship is settled

in the ballot box rather than by the sword.

'I've headed back to Stirling station,

'to travel north towards Perthshire

'and the hills that so captivated Bradshaw's tourists.'

My next stop will be Crieff,

a village where I've had a strong family connection

and which I know well.

A late edition of Bradshaw's tells me that, "There are mineral springs,

"pronounced by high authority, to possess strong purgative qualities."

I don't think I do wish to be purged particularly,

but the Victorians believed that hydropathic therapy was good

for any number of ailments. So I'm willing to take the plunge.

This part of Scotland has many memories for me.

I've often visited Crieff to see relatives

and the town's Hydro hotel was a favourite place for family holidays.

TRAIN ANNOUNCER: This service will shortly be calling at Perth.

I must alight at the ancient city of Perth, gateway to the Highlands.

In Victorian times, Perth station was a hub for holidaymakers

arriving to enjoy the great outdoors or to take the waters at Crieff.

But the Crieff Junction Railway that opened in 1856 is now just a memory,

having fallen victim to the Beeching closures in the 1960s.

'And we find that wherever there is little passenger traffic

'then there's very little freight either.'

And, of course, this is ominous from the point of view of the future

of those lines.

Amongst the crowds in the heyday of Crieff Junction

would have been the spa tourists heading for the Hydro,

which opened its doors in 1868.

Its success derived simply from pure water and mountain air.

I'm meeting the fifth generation of the Meikle family to run it.

It is the most stunning countryside that you have here.

What a place to build a hotel. What is a hydro?

Hydropathic, Greek word for water.

So originating with its first water supply, 150 years ago,

so people came from the cities

having drunk water that wasn't so clear and so good for them

and drunk water here and felt better miraculously.

And so even in those days, it was a family hotel.

Yes, for leisure, yes. 100 bedrooms, quite small then,

and within ten years realised that this can be a lot, lot bigger.

So it grew, doubled in size within 30 years of first being built.

And it was your family that started all of this.

My great-great grand uncle, a doctor from Aberdeen chose Crieff,

its climate, its scenery, the views, the location,

the ease of which you can get to Crieff by train

from Glasgow and Edinburgh.

And, of course, finally and perhaps most importantly today,

the water supply.

Meikle used the pure water for the Hydro's swimming pool,

douches and steam baths,

treatments made popular by, amongst others, Captain Richard Claridge.

Claridge had been cured of rheumatism at an Austrian spa

and wrote a best-seller to promote the cold water cure.

And the hydrotherapy, did it consist of drinking the waters

or bathing in the waters?

Bathing, yes. Our swimming pool's built in 1900.

-No.

-There was no heating, there was no way of cleaning the water,

so, of course, you were diving into this manky, murky, muddy pool.

There was talk of salmon being in the swimming pool at the time.

Talk of the swimming pool attendants carrying fishing rods,

but what's your choice? In order to feel better,

having done your burpees and your lunges

up in the upstairs public rooms, to go downstairs

and have a very, very cold swim.

They cleaned the pool by emptying it out twice a week,

and filling it back up with cold, murky water.

And here we are, you know, near the top of a hill

and yet people were able to take the waters.

-How did you get water up here?

-Well, it used to be from the burns

and now, today, for the past 50 or 60 years,

we've drilled down an artesian well, drilled 150 metres down,

but then it was just from the streams.

In the mid-19th century,

people escaping the poor sanitation of Britain's larger towns

were attracted to spas.

They'd been fashionable amongst the quality since Georgian times

and with the coming of the railways,

resorts opened their doors to the middle classes.

For me, it's nice to be immersed again at the Crieff Hydro.

I'm swimming over Victorian tiles

but the warmth and the cleanliness are 21st century.

I've headed back to Perth, on the banks of the noble River Tay.

The city's been a royal burgh since the 13th century

and was a royal residence throughout the Middle Ages.

The ancient capital of Scotland,

it was also one of its richest trading burghs.

"Perth", says Bradshaw's, "is the handsomest town of its size

"in Scotland. Its situation on the Tay is very, very beautiful.

"Some muslin, cotton and silk goods are manufactured here."

So I'm hoping that they may be able to kit me out

before I put a toe in the Highlands.

Kilts and sporrans may seem like a cliche on a Scottish tour today,

but in Victorian times, tartan evening wear was much in fashion.

I'm meeting Greg Whyte of Morrison Sporrans.

Well, this is our stockroom, if you like.

It's a selection of what we make as a standard.

-A selection?

-Yeah.

It's an incredible range of different sorts of sporran.

A lot of it is current dress.

We, as a company, have been running since 15... Well, for 15 years.

But we took over Nicoll Brothers, who had a history going back to 1840,

which would have taken them right through the Victorian period,

one of their largest customers being the military.

We still make a lot of military sporrans now.

The one on the left, Scots Guards.

One in the middle, Royal Regiment of Scotland, current issue.

And this rather flamboyant over here is the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards.

"Sporran" is a Gaelic word meaning purse or pouch.

Perhaps the most ornate were worn by the kilted Scottish regiments,

who developed their own individual style.

The whole product is made from horse tail hair.

It's also stitched in seven different layers.

Which is three layers in here and then another three or four

up under the cantle itself.

So it has to have a lot of hair in it and it's a fair weight.

It's quite a heavy item.

And this is what it's ostensibly all about,

you can put whatever you like in there.

That's the theory, yes, that's the idea.

I mean the military will not carry very much in it.

But we do make them to accommodate beer cans,

we make them to accommodate wallets, mobile phones, all sorts of things.

It looks like you can use almost anything to make a sporran.

Yes, roadkill particularly. These are literally roadkill,

they're not killed to make sporrans.

Normally sporrans are made from cowskin,

although some also make use of old fur coats.

I mean we quite often make them for weddings.

Granny's coat might get turned into a dozen sporrans for a wedding.

The craftsmanship and skills involved in making these beautiful

and practical pieces have been handed down the generations.

Many of the patterns and tools used are unchanged

since the mid-19th century.

OK, first job in the stage would be to cut the leather.

So if you just want to grab one sheet of leather there.

And just pop it up on the machine.

So if you just place your knife onto the leather.

You just want to keep it clear of any blemishes.

That's good, no wastage.

If you just want to pull the beam press across.

Now at this point everybody has to keep their hands well clear.

-Right.

-So grasp the handles, press both triggers.

-My goodness!

-Yep.

Swing the machine back.

-Lift it up and then pop the leather out.

-Whoa!

Just push it out from the back.

And that effectively is the back of your sporran.

Early sporrans were simple Rob Roy pouches,

usually gathered at the top with a basic drawstring.

As highland dress grew in popularity as evening wear,

sporrans became more elaborately embellished.

OK, so what we're doing now is

I'm going to show you how to do the front of the sporran.

We're basically turning the gusset, or the edge of it, over

and to keep it in place, we have to hammer it.

I'll give you a couple of strokes and then you can try it.

-OK.

-OK.

-So tugging at the leather here?

Tugging at the leather, pulling it in, give it a good bash.

Avoid the knuckles.

It doesn't sound like it sounded with you.

-You need more porridge.

-More porridge!

And what does this achieve?

It basically breaks the leather and it keeps it in place,

so it won't spring back.

I don't think you'll have any trouble out of that any more.

-Well, let's say it's dead, OK?

-Yeah!

Basically that's what you've done, you've formed the front now, OK?

Oh, isn't that nice?

This handmade quality makes them very collectable.

A 19th century silver engraved sporran with oak finials

recently sold at auction for over £2,000.

-Right, so there we have the finished product.

-Beautiful.

-One you can try on.

-Oh, thank you.

The only thing is not like that, you better get a kilt on.

All right, I'll do that. Let me have a look at it.

Oh! "Made in Scotland by Michael Portillo."

That's a big fib. "For Great British Railway Journeys."

And a lovely picture of a locomotive.

-I better go and get my kit on.

-You better.

So, Greg, only one thing needed to pass myself off as a Scotsman.

Indeed and here it is.

Right, that is you fit for the Highlands.

-That's where I'm headed!

-Very good.

Now properly attired, I'm heading back to Perth station

to catch the Highland Main Line.

In Victorian times, grand trains ran from London to Inverness

and Aberdeen, passing through these platforms here at Perth,

and I can imagine them teeming with people

headed to and from the Highlands,

responding to the fashion established by Queen Victoria.

But now the main services to Aberdeen from London

go across the Forth and Tay rivers

and these platforms have been turned into something ghostly.

I'll soon be arriving at the most northerly point of my journey -

Pitlochry, which Bradshaw's tells me

"is important as affording facilities

"to the tourist for visiting the beautiful pass of Killiecrankie.

"A deep ravine, clothed with the richest verdure,

"through which the Garry water flows."

It's at Pitlochry that there begins what Bradshaw calls

"the romantic scenery for which

"the Scottish mountains are justly celebrated."

-TRAIN ANNOUNCER:

-We'll shortly be arriving into Pitlochry.

Bye-bye.

In 1842, the 23-year-old Queen Victoria holidayed in the Highlands.

She viewed the scenery through eyes coloured by the romantic writing

of one of her favourite novelists, Sir Walter Scott.

And her visit made a lasting impression.

I'm meeting Pitlochry resident and former Blue Badge guide

Sally Spavern to discover more about this special relationship.

-Sally, how lovely to see you.

-Good evening, Michael.

A very historic station with royal connections.

Yes, absolutely.

Queen Victoria came to this area of Scotland, Highland Perthshire,

about six times. First on her honeymoon in 1842,

but she came on this particular line just six days after it opened

in 1863 on 9th September.

She was on her way to visit the Duke of Atholl,

the sixth Duke who was very, very ill at the time,

but after he died, her and the sixth Duchess remained great friends

and she made two further visits to here.

In 1848, the Queen and Prince Albert

acquired the lease of Balmoral Castle.

She became the first monarch since Charles I

to make a home in Scotland,

for which she retained a lifelong emotional attachment.

-And I assume that she loved it here.

-She absolutely loved it

and she recorded all of her visits here in her journal.

On her two final visits,

she was able to visit much more of the countryside

and toured around and visited quite a number of places with John Brown.

In her diary,

the Queen described Pitlochry as one of the finest resorts in Europe.

And this is why she fell in love with the Highlands.

Following the infamous Highland Clearances

during the 18th and 19th centuries,

when landowners evicted tenants to make room for sheep,

this area became one of the most sparsely populated in Europe.

But these rugged hills hid a thriving trade

in unlawful whisky making.

The drink's popularity had led the Government to impose a tax

on the distillers which left the industry unprofitable

and drove it underground.

By the 1820s, despite 14,000 illicit stills being confiscated every year,

more than half the whisky consumed in Scotland

was being enjoyed without payment of duty.

I've come to visit one of those original, but now completely legal,

whisky stills.

Andrew Symington from Edradour distillery knows its history.

-Michael, hi.

-How lovely to see you.

-Nice to meet you.

Looks like you've got a little welcome in store for me as well.

-I have indeed, yes.

-This distillery, tell me about it.

Well, legally it's the smallest in Scotland

because of the size of the stills, which you can see behind you there.

We have our own springs which we tap in together

and that's where we get our spring water from.

It's this spring water coupled with malted barley

that helps to make this spirit famous.

And tell me about your whiskies, what are the characteristics?

The characteristics of our two signature ones are sherry cask,

Spanish Oloroso sherry cask so it gives it a very nice dark colour,

a very rich flavour, fruity flavour, dried fruits,

-a bit like liquid Christmas cake.

-Sounds good!

After the Excise Act of 1823,

it became profitable again to make whisky legally,

although the industry was still tightly regulated.

Whenever the butts were opened or the whisky was being bottled,

an excise man had to be present.

The casks are filled in a special building,

sometimes known as the spirit store

but here called a duty free warehouse.

The door is fastened by two locks,

one controlled by the excise department,

the other by the distillery management.

Let's have a little go at that.

This is our signature ten-year-old malt.

It's 40% alcohol by volume so it's not too strong.

Mm, I'm slipping into ecstasy.

I find it quite palatable.

I'm reassured that traditional production on a small scale

survives in the industry today.

Since you were licensed in the year

that Queen Victoria came to the throne,

I thought I might venture off and appreciate a view that she had

-when she travelled to these parts.

-Excellent.

One for the track.

As I walk through the stunning scenery of Highland Perthshire,

I can see why this countryside made such an impression

on Queen Victoria.

This famous vantage point known as the Queen's View,

looks out over one of the most iconic panoramas in Scotland.

Queen Victoria thought that the view had been named after her.

In fact, it was after Robert the Bruce's wife Isabella.

The bitter enmity between Scotland and England,

fought out at battles like Bannockburn,

reached a curious outcome when a King of Scotland, James VI,

ascended the throne of England too.

Many frictions followed,

but in the 19th century, royalty made sporrans fashionable

and Queen Victoria could take the train north

and gaze out upon a United Kingdom.

Next time, I pay homage at the birthplace of golf.

Great shot, Michael.

Discover how a penniless Scot gave away a fortune.

He wrote The Gospel Of Wealth and in that he said,

"He who dies thus rich dies disgraced."

And tread the boards at the Edinburgh Fringe.

I demand to know where you deposited the handbag

that contained that infant.

-IN HIGH-PITCHED VOICE:

-I left it in the cloakroom

of one of the larger railway stations in London.

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