Aberdeen City HER - NJ90NE0261 - TORRY BATTERY WATCH TOWER

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Main Details

Primary ReferenceNJ90NE0261
NameTORRY BATTERY WATCH TOWER
NRHE Card No. 
NRHE Numlink 80762
HES SM No. NULL
HES LB No. NULL
Site Form Documentary Record Only
Site Condition Destroyed
Details Site of a watch tower. This watch tower has an uncertain history. However the Council ordered that a watch tower be built at what we would call Torry Point on 12 May 1514, and was to be a manned warning beacon. In 1661 Parson Gordon described the watch tower/beacon thus: 'over against the Blockhouse, upon the other syde of the river Dee, ther was a lykewayes a little watch-tower builded upon the high ground, and a bell hangd up therein' (Parson Gordon, Description, p.12). It would allow the blockhouse, if manned, to set its artillery in a state of readiness, and give the militia time to be mustered. The beacon was used for several hundred years. In 1790 a report by the Harbour Committee noted that 'the stones about the foot of the Beacon appear to be deranged and the Beacon itself loosed, which should be immediately repaired' (Council Register Volume 66, f.87r, 14 June 1790). Chances are that there were several versions of the beacon over the course of several hundred years. It is also possible that different sites had been chosen for the different beacons/watch towers. The beacon is featured on a number of different plans and maps of the harbour area, sometimes shown as on the rocks at the foot of the cliffs at the Bay of Nigg.
Last Update14/01/2021
Updated Bycpalmer
CompilerACU
Date of Compilation13/09/2017

Google Map for NJ90NE0261

National Grid Reference: NJ 9659 0566



Event Details


Excavations and Surveys


Artefact and Ecofact

Ecofact

Samples
Palynology
Ecofact Notes

Monument Types

Monument Type 1Monument Type 2Monument Type 3OrderProbability
BEACONS SITE OFB100
WATCH-TOWERS SITE OFA100