Knapdale
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Knapdale (Scottish Gaelic: Cnapadal) forms a rural district of Argyll and Bute in the Scottish highlands, adjoining Kintyre to the south, and divided from the rest of Argyll to the north by the Crinan Canal.
Knapdale Forest, planted in the 1930s, covers much of the region. During the 1930s, the Ministry of Labour supplied the men from among the unemployed, many coming from the crisis-hit mining and heavy industry communities of the Central Belt. They were housed in one of a number of Instructional Centres created by the Ministry, most of them on Forestry Commission property; by 1938, the Ministry had 38 Instructional Centres across Britain. The camp was used to hold enemy prisoners during the Second World War. The hutted camp in Knapdale was located at Cairnbaan, just south of the Crinan Canal, and a surviving building remains in use as a Forestry Commission workshop.
Local attractions include the Chapel of Keills, A grave-slab in the chapel has a carving of a clarsach similar to the Queen Mary Harp currently at the museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, 0ne of only the three surviving medieval gaelic harps. West Highland grave slabs from the Argyll area, suggesting that Knapdale is where this harp originated. The village also has a thirteenth century Kilmory Chapel and the eleventh century Castle Sween.
There is a long running campaign to reintroduce the European Beaver to Knapdale, as a pilot scheme for Scotland. The Scottish Executive has recently announced that a re-introduction, involving the release of four beaver families, will go ahead in Spring 2009.[1]
Knapdale has a designation as a National Scenic Area.
Places in Knapdale include:
 View from Knapdale towards Jura |
 Loch Caolisport |
 Forest track in Knapdale |
[edit] References
- Field, J. Learning Through Labour: Training, unemployment and the state, 1890-1939, University of Leeds, 1992, ISBN 0-900-960-48-5
- Dwelly, E. Illustrated Gaelic-English Dictionary New Edition, Birlinn, 2001, ISBN 1841581097
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