Balnagown Arms Hotel: The inn around which Ardgay village was built

Once described as one of the best known hotels of the Highlands “where royalty and statemen have frequently stayed”, the Balnagown Arms Hotel started off as a farm house converted into an inn in 1817 to serve people travelling along the new Telford road.

By Silvia Muras & Donald Brown

The 9th Report of the Parliamentary Commissioners for Roads and Bridges reported in 1821 that ‘a new inn affords good accommodation.’ The New Statistical Account in 1840 mentions the Balnagowan Arms Inn. Rev Hector Allan, minister, presbytery of Tain, wrote an article in August 1840 about the Parish of Kincardine and stated that “The only licensed inn in the parish is situated at Ardgay and is conducted in an exceedingly orderly and respectable manner.”


The inn belonged to Balnagown Estate. In 1865 was leased to Mr Colin Fraser from Invergordon. In August, Mr Fraser advertised the inn in the Inverness Advertiser and Ross-shire Chronicle: “superior” posting department and “carriages, dog-carts, gigs (...) with steady drivers to be had on the shortest notice.” He also issued tickets for angling in the River Carron. 


Up until 1871, Ardgay – then Bonar Bridge Station – was the end of the railway line. An 1870 article on the Saturday Inverness Advertiser describes “the scream of the steam whistle and the smoke from Mr Fraser’s admirable hostelry, the Balnagown Arms, give out frequently the only signs of life or animation of any kind.” The traffic in the station during the low season was described as a “beggarly account of empty benches”, but the author of the article was “hopeful of better days, when the line will be made to stretch further north.”


The hotel was advertised to let “from Whitsunday, 1871” in the Elgin Courant, and Morayshire Advertiser. Tenants were asked to apply to John Forsyth, factor of the Balnagown Estate. In 1875 the farm steading attached to the Balnagown Arms Inn was destroyed by fire, with an estimated damage of £700.