The following draft of an intended article was written by Ann Galliard, a local historian in Sandbank (a village by Holy Loch),
together with Iain MacKenzie, an electrical engineer manager with an interest in the subject.
Ann says: "Iain and I worked on several history projects and I have attached the draft which was largely Iain’s work."
Much of the content is derived from the WestHighland section of Atlantic-cable.com

Ann also says: "The line went from Blairmore to the head of the loch, near the Cot House. A branch from there went to an office in Sandbank and along to Dunoon."

Unfortunately, the untimely demise of Iain curtailed the work.

The Scheme Proposals and Construction

The first edition of the 6-inch Ordinance Survey map of the land around Kilmun (Argyllshire sheet CLXXIV), surveyed in 1865, shows a telegraph office at Blairmore, an electric telegraph line proceeding west from Blairmore across the hill behind Kilmun parish church, and a submarine telegraph cable proceeding east across Loch Long towards Cove, Dunbartonshire. The line was part of the West Highland telegraph. Lines ran from 11 St Vincent Place in Glasgow to Helensburgh, Roseneath, Cove, Blairmore and Cot House, near Benmore, where the route branched. One branch headed south to Dunoon, Inellan, Toward and then on to Rothesay. The other branch headed north for Creggans Point and across Loch Fyne to Creaggan, where it branched again. One branch continued north to Inveraray and Oban. The other branch headed south to Minard, Lochgilphead, Ardrishaig, Tarbert, Carradale, Campbeltown and the Mull of Kintyre lighthouse. The line was built in 1864 and 1865 for the Universal Private Telegraph Company (UPTC) by Reid Brothers of London, around the time the land was surveyed by Ordnance Survey. This partly explains why the telegraph lines are shown on some sheets of the first edition OS map and not on others. The public telegraph was formally opened on 4 September 1865 by an exchange of telegrams between John Cameron, chairman of UPTC in Glasgow and the Duke of Argyll in Campbeltown. The route was used by two separate systems. There was a private telegraph for the shipping industry, connecting the Glasgow office to the Mull of Kintyre lighthouse, and a public service serving the telegraph offices listed above.

The Universal Private Telegraph Company

The first patent to be granted in Britain for an electric telegraph was on 10 June 1837, to William Fothergill Cooke and Charles Wheatstone. These early instruments and subsequent developments were the foundation of public telegraphs in Britain for the next 20 years or so. One drawback was they required skilled personnel to operate them. The ability to convert the movements of needles into a coherent and accurate message was a skill comparable to reading and writing shorthand. Further, operators had to be able to replenish batteries. There were no public electricity supplies that could be used to recharge batteries, (a public electricity supply was not available in Blairmore until 65 years after the public telegraph arrived), so the acid in the batteries had to be replaced, and new electrodes had to be fitted. The operation was too dangerous to be left to unskilled people. In June 1858 Charles Wheatstone patented electric telegraph instruments that overcame both these problems. He called his invention the universal telegraph. After 1880, when patent ownership was transferred to the Post Office, the instruments were renamed the ABC telegraph. The instrument comprised two dials, the smaller one being the receiver and the larger one being part of the transmitter. The larger dial was surrounded by keys, one for each letter. There was a hand driven magneto which was used to generate the electrical code for the selected letter. Thus, if you could read you could send and receive messages, and there was no requirement to work with the dangerous batteries of the day. The Universal Private Telegraph Company was founded in June 1861 to work the patents for the Universal telegraph. The West Highland telegraph was a trading name of UPTC. The company was nationalised in 1870, when it was taken over by the Post Office.

The Private Telegraph

The proposed arrangements at the Mull of Kintyre end of the private telegraph were described thus by Mr. Nathaniel Holmes, chief engineer of UPTC: …….. it had also been contemplated to erect a signal post at Cantyre and another at Pladda, to be employed in the same way as the signal now erected at Roche’s Point, (which is at the entrance to Cork Harbour in Ireland) by which the Cunard steamers and other vessels were sighted. Of course the facilities that signal-post would give would be such that vessels could be communicated with after they had left Glasgow, and information connected with their cargoes and other matters could arrive in Glasgow many hours before information could otherwise be obtained. He further added: The Universal Private Telegraph Company would have their own station at Cantyre, ….. and in Glasgow the messages which would be private and confidential would be delivered to the parties for whom they were sent. Three sections of the Glasgow-based shipping interests supported the private telegraph system; the tugmasters, the shipowners and the underwriters.

The Tugmasters’ Interests

In an article Proposed Telegraph From Glasgow To The Pladda & Cantyre Lighthouses, printed in the Glasgow Herald on 17 February, 1864, the reporter describes the tugmasters’ interests thus: At present there are about 25 tugs engaged in the towing of vessels on the Clyde. Now, in consequence of there being no communication by telegraph to Cantyre and the entrance to the North Channel these tugs are at present obliged to keep knocking about day and night, and often for days together, without having anything to do. If this scheme is carried out, forming a connection as far down as the Cantyre light, it would be quite possible for those tugs to be lying in such places as Campbeltown Bay or Lamlash Bay, ready to go out when required. In this way the proprietors of those tugs would be much better enabled to control the management of them in sending them out in search of vessels, and he thought it would be a very simple matter indeed to show that even if the proprietors of those tugs were to come under a guarantee for the great bulk of the sum required in this case it would be a very great saving indeed. He thought it would be a very simple matter to show that in regard to tear and wear, consumption of fuel, and other things connected with the management of them, the telegraph would be of the utmost benefit to the proprietors of those tugs. Loss of life, ships and cargoes at this time was huge. On 25 February 1867 the Glasgow Herald reported The number of wrecks reported during the past week amounted to 41; making for the present year a total of 601. The National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck had been established in 1824 to establish lifeboats and crews, and lifeboat stations, where required, to reduce the loss of life. The name was changed to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution in 1854. It was the job of the tugmasters and their tugs to salvage the shipwrecks and their cargoes.

The Shipowners’ Interests

The shipowners saw the private telegraph as a means of reducing the cost of managing their operations. In 1864, Newcastle, London, Liverpool and Cork all had systems in place to give early information about incoming ships. Using their telegraph, the London shipowners were said to save £20 in the cost of receiving and turning round each ship. None of the the above systems required the use of submarine cables, but the Glasgow system would require four submarine cable sections; one across Gare Loch between Rhu and Rosneath, one across Loch Long between Cove and Blairmore, one across the Kyles of Bute between Ardyne Point and Ardbeg and one across Loch Fyne between Creggans Point and Creaggan. The shipping interests in Glasgow considered it was not until 1864 that submarine cables were sufficiently robust to provide a reliable system. Even so, the cables were liable to abuse by vandals and the anchors of fishing vessels, as described in a piece in the Glasgow Herald of 12 September 1867.

MALICIOUS DAMAGE TO THE WEST HIGHLAND TELEGRAPH WIRES.-

On Saturday last the wires of the West Highland Telegraph Company were maliciously cut in the neighbourhood of Blairmore. At the foot of Blairmore Hill an iron pipe secures the wires at the point where they enter underground previous to getting into the submarine portion of the line. This pipe was torn up, and the wires cut through as if with a knife. The work must been taken part in by several persons, as the pipe was of considerable weight. Who the malicious perpetrators are has not yet been been discovered, but suspicion attaches in some measure to a party of boys, numbering about 70, who visited Blairmore on Saturday, in connection with a Sabbath school excursion from Glasgow. The conduct of some of these youths is stated by the residents to have been of a very unruly and destructive character. The Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (Groome), in the paragraph describing Blairmore, reported: The telegraph cable communicating with the W. Highlands lies from it to Cove; was broken in Dec. 1870; and, ten days after being broken was successfully grappled and repaired. Thus, damage to submarine cables was a problem, but it was manageable.

The Underwriters’ Interests

According to John Kincaid, speaking of the underwriters’ interest at the meeting in Glasgow on February 16th, 1864 to promote the telegraph: In the previous ten years there had been several very considerable wrecks on the coast in question. The character of these wrecks was not known in Glasgow in some cases for two days after the event. Had the private telegraph been in place and working, tugs lying in Campbeltown Bay or at Lamlash could have been despatched in a couple of hours to assist the wrecked vessels. Much valuable property might have been saved, possibly sufficient to keep the telegraph going for a very long time.

The Public Telegraph Telegraph Offices in Dunoon and Kilmun Parish Blairmore Dunoon Toward Quay Nationalisation Developments Conversion to Telephone Working

The ending makes it clear what further sections were planned.
Ann has also provided the following Newspaper Clippings :

You will see several references to Lamlash Bay, that is on the lower east coast of the Isle of Arran, the large purple island on the map above.

PROPOSED TELEGRAPH FROM GLASGOW TO THE PLADDA & CANTYRE LIGHTHOUSES.
Glasgow Herald (Glasgow, Scotland), Wednesday, February 17, 1864; Issue 7522.





LINE OF TELEGRAPH FROM GLASGOW TO CAMPBELTOWN.
Glasgow Herald (Glasgow, Scotland), Wednesday, July 6, 1864; Issue 7642.


There is a reference above to Ardrishaig, that is about 3 miles from Lochgilphead.



TELEGRAPHIC POSTS on KILMUN SHORE (complaint)
September 5, 1864.

Last updated 7th March 2023