Taymouth Castle

Taymouth stands on the site of Balloch Castle, the tower house Sir Colin Campbell of Glenorchy — 'Grey Colin', for his white hair and long flowing beard — built in 1552 after evicting Clan Gregor from Balloch at the east end of Loch Tay. The Campbells had held Breadalbane since the 15th century, granted the lands by James III for an earlier Sir Colin's part in capturing Thomas Chalmer, one of the assassins of James I. Tradition holds a dream instructed Grey Colin to build where he first heard a blackbird sing on his way down the strath of the Tay.

The Campbell–Gregor feud made Balloch a place of execution. In 1569 Grey Colin captured the Gregor chief, Gregor Roy, and on 7 April 1570 — with the Regent Morton's consent and the Earl of Atholl in attendance — beheaded him personally at the castle. Gregor's wife Marion Campbell watched her husband die and wrote the lament 'Griogal Cridhe'.

Grey Colin's heir Sir Duncan Campbell — 'Black Duncan' — held Balloch from 1583 to 1631. Appointed by the king to keep the peace between the feuding clans of Argyll and Perthshire, he was said to use the post to enlarge his estate 'by fair means or foul'. After the Clan Gregor was outlawed in 1603 following the Battle of Glen Fruin, over 100 Gregors were slain within ten years and their lands passed to the Campbells; Sir Duncan was said to be instrumental in getting most of their leaders killed or hanged. He also planted Drummond Hill with oak, birch and pine — Scotland's first managed forest.

John Campbell, created 1st Earl of Breadalbane and Holland in 1681, was known as 'Slippery John'. In 1692 he played a key part in the Massacre of Glencoe, instructing his kinsman Robert Campbell of Glenlyon to carry it out: 38 McDonalds of Glencoe were killed by their own guests, and another 40 women and children died of exposure after their homes were burned. In 1715 he sent 500 men to join the Earl of Mar's Jacobite rising; a government agent described him as 'cunning as a fox, wise as a serpent', and 'slippery as an eel'.

The 4th Earl demolished the main block of the old castle and from 1806 raised a neo-Gothic house to the designs of James and Archibald Elliot, in blue-grey stone from the Bolfracks quarry — reputedly intending to overshadow the Duke of Argyll's castle at Inveraray. Francis Bernasconi, the greatest plasterwork designer of the era, created the central staircase rising through all four storeys of the central tower between 1809 and 1812.

The 2nd Marquess had James Gillespie Graham remodel the west wing with interiors by A. W. N. Pugin; its ceilings, painted over nearly ten years by an Italian artist lying on his back in rope slings, are described by Historic Scotland as the finest of their period in the UK. The work was complete by 1842, just in time for Queen Victoria and Prince Albert's first visit to Scotland. They stayed three days, received by a royal salute and over 200 traditionally armed Highlanders, and in the evening 50,000 lamps on the hillside spelled out 'Welcome Victoria and Albert'. The stay reportedly cost the Marquess £60,000 in a year when his rental income was said to be £45,000.

The first twelve owners of the Balloch and Taymouth estate, from 1550 to 1922, were all Campbells. The last, Sir Gavin Campbell, 1st Marquess of Breadalbane, inherited nearly half a million acres in 1871 and lost almost all of it — his debts blamed on extravagance, bad management and a gambling addiction. The castle and its remaining 60,000 acres were sold in 1921 for £20,000, and in March 1922 the Marquess and Marchioness left Taymouth forever. He died childless that October.

A hydropathic hotel opened in the castle on 30 June 1923. From 1940 Taymouth was the No. 1 Polish General Hospital, the chief Polish hospital in the country, with 1,200 beds and 200 staff at its height and its biggest influx of over 200 casualties after the battle of Cassino. From 1950 it housed a Civil Defence Corps training school with a mock 'blitzed village' for rescue practice, and from 1968 it was a designated site under PYTHON, the top-secret plan for continuity of government after a nuclear attack.

The castle stood empty from around 1982, with twelve of its buildings on the Buildings at Risk Register for Scotland. Discovery Land Company acquired the estate in 2019, and a restoration funded by American owners led by Michael Meldman was completed in November 2024, dividing the building into nine suites as a private members' clubhouse under a shared ownership plan.