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Summary

Description

This is a mid-18^th century former change house or ferry house of traditional stone construction on the island of Kerrera, with some 19^th century alteration. It is located on the hillside above the pier for the Gallanach (Oban) to Kerrera ferry crossing.

The building is rectangular in plan and one and a half storeys, with two single-storey outhouses adjoining the north gable end. It is harled, with a slated roof and two gable-end chimney stacks. The front (east facing) elevation is three-bay, with an off-centre right door. Two outer (dormer) windows break the eaves line, while the small central window is set up against the eaves. The rear (west facing) elevation has small central windows to the ground and upper floor, and a larger window, left of centre.

The adjoining outbuildings are the former milk house (slate-roofed) and a possible former brewhouse, each with a doorway to the rear (west-facing) elevations.

The interior of the ferryhouse is plain, with low coombed ceilings to the upper floor.

Historical development:

Archival records suggest the building was purpose-built in 1748 as a ferry house to replace older, single-storey thatched buildings on or close to this site (Gillies 2023: 7).

It was owned by the MacDougalls of Dunollie and was tenanted as the ferry man's accommodation and an inn for passengers travelling between Kerrera and the mainland. In 1779, the building comprised a public house, kitchen, barn, byre and kiln (Gillies 2023: 8). Alterations, including the enlargement of two upper front windows, likely date to the 1840s and coincide with other improvement works on the Dunollie estate under Admiral John MacDougall (Gillies 2023: 8).

The building is shown on the 1870 Ordnance Survey map with a number of detached ancillaries (no longer present) and the associated road and pier or slipway. During the 20^th century, the building also served as a post-office. The ferry house remained in use as dedicated accommodation for a ferry man until 2022.

Statement of Special Interest

Kerrera Ferry House meets the criteria for listing for the following reasons:

• As a typical example of an 18^th-century ferry house that is little altered and which demonstrates similar design treatment to other estate buildings in the area.
• As a prominent building in its wider coastal setting, associated with a historic ferry route.
• For its social historic interest in understanding past communications between the islands and the mainland.

Kerrera Ferry House has special interest as a little-altered example of a change house or ferry house that retains its mid-18^th century character and setting. The materials and form are comparable to other estate buildings that were built and later improved by the MacDougalls of Dunollie in the 18^th and 19^th centuries. Located immediately above Kerrera pier and facing the mainland, it is prominent in views across the Sound of Kerrera and along the coast. While the setting has changed with the erection of new buildings in the immediate vicinity, and an extended and modernised pier, Kerrera Ferry House remains legible as a historic building associated with local transport to and from the island (2025).

Ferry houses that served as public inns and accommodation for a ferry man were an integral part of local communications in Scotland in the 18^th to 20^th centuries. Surviving examples can be fairly prominent buildings in rural coastal and estuary settings and often survive in association with outhouses and stone-built piers, jetties or other landing places. Those that survive intact and retain their plan-forms and traditional character are becoming less common as many have been altered and repurposed. Other former ferry houses associated with crossings to Kerrera include the 18^th-century, listed Grass Point Ferry House on Mull (LB17932), and Barnabuck (unlisted), on the west coast of Kerrera.

Kerrera Ferry House has interest as a largely intact example of a ferry house that enhances an understanding of how people, goods and livestock once moved between the Hebrides and Argyll. In the 18^th century, the island of Kerrera was an important 'stepping stone' to the mainland. It offered deepwater landfall for vessels above a certain size and a short-range crossing to the mainland and overland droving routes. Other ferry points on Kerrera were at Ardmore, Slaterich, and Barnabuck, with the system as a whole under the ownership and control of local lairds, the MacDougalls of Dunollie (Gillies 2023: 3–4). This localised network diminished in importance from the start of the 19^th century as the advent of steamships and the growth of Oban as a port town meant Kerrera could be bypassed. By the 1860s, the present route (2025) across the Sound of Kerrera between Kerrera Ferry House and Gallanach (Oban) was the only available crossing on or off the island.

Listed building record revised in 2025.

References

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