292 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Inchkeith.
greatly enhanced the beauty and grandeur of this
interesting prospect by bringing the ships so much
nearer to this coast, and consequently so much
more within the immediate view of the metropolis
and its environs.?
From this it would appear that,prior to 1801,
all vessels leaving the Firth from Leith and above
it, must have taken the other channel, north of
Inchkeith.
With the exception of erecting the now almost
useless Martello tower, Government never made
any effort of consequence to defend Leith or any
other port in Scotland; thus it was said that Napoleon
I., aware of the open and helpless condition
of the entire Scottish coast, projected at one time
the landing of an invading army in Aberlady Bay ;
but in defiance of the recommendation and urgent
entreaty of many eminent engineers and military
officers, that Inchkeith, the natural bulwark of the
Forth, and more particularly of the port of Leith,
should be fortified, the British Government let a
hundred years, from the time of the pitiful Paul
Jones scare, elapse, ?? leaving,? as the Scofsman of
1878 has it, ?the safety of the only harbour of
refuge on the east coast, and the wealthiest and
most commanding cities and towns of Scotland ?to
the effectual fervent prayers ? of ?longshore parish
ministers.?
For five and twenty years the Corporations of
Edinburgh and Leith, the Merchant Company, the
Chambers of Commerce and other public bodies,
urged the necessary defence of Leith in vain.
Shortly before the Crimean war, the apathetic
authorities were temporarily roused by the number
of petitions that poured in upon them, and by
iiequent deputations from Fifeshire as well as
Midlothian, and slowly and unwillingly they
agreed to proceed with the fortification of Inchkeith.
Colonel John Yerbury Moggridge, of the Royal
Engineers in Scotland, was instructed to visit the
island and prepare plans, in 1878, based upon
sketches and suggestions, furnished some twenty
years before, and a commencement was made in
the summer of that year, the work being entrusted
to Messrs. Hill and Co., of Gosport, the contractors
who built most of the powerful fortifications at
Portsmouth and Spithead.
In shape Inchkeith may be described as an irregular
triangle, with its longest side parallel to the
shore at Leith. Three jutting promontories form
the angles-one looking up the Firth at the west
end is above a hundred feet in height; another
faces the direction of Kinghorn, and is fifty feet
less in altitude; the third, facing the south or Leith
(Herald and Chronicle.)
quarter, shows a more rounded outline than the
other two.
On these it was suggested the forts should be
built, and connected together by a military road a
mile and a half long.
The workmen, at first 120 in number, were
hutted on the island for the week, and only came
back to Leith on Saturday night to return to their
labour on the Monday morning. The August of
1878 saw Colonel Moggridge fairly at work, and
the little cove or landing-place at the south-west
quarter of the island, encumbered with piles of
rails, tools, tackling, and all the paraphernalia of
the contractor, while the operations for cutting the
military road, in face of the cliff, ninety feet high,
overhead, were at once proceeded with.
The huts of the workmen were double lined
wooden houses, covered with felt, like those in
Aldershot camp, and were situated in the hollow
between the lighthouse hill and the west promontory.
Around the interior of the huts were sleeping
bunks for the men, ranged in three tiers, and in the
centre were tables on each +de of a cooking stove.
No spirituous liquor was allowed to be landed.
The old wells were all cleaned out and deepened,
and as the work proceeded the aspect of the whole
western face of, the island changed rapidly.
The men worked from six in the morning till
eight in the evening, with two hours interval for
dinner and -tea, and were paid extra for the two
hours between six and eight o?clock in the
evening.
In the formation of the military road, two objects
had to be kept in view-easy gradients, and. as
much cover as possible from the long range guns of
an enemy coming up the Firth. Thus, the path
commences at the north emplacement, and bends
westward from the lighthouse hill, which completely
shelters it from the north and west. A short branch
diverges towards the western battery, but the main
road, eighteen feet wide, is carried under and partly
along the face of the cliffs, which overlook the
cove, where alone a landing could be effected by
an armed force ; and there, no doubt, it was that
Strozzi was slain, when the island was stormed by
the French.
Trending then southwards, the road passes along
a small plateau facing Leith; and beyond it, the
steep face of the hill has been cut into, and the
road built up, till it emerges on the comparatively
level southern point. The whinstone and conglomerate
blasted from the cuttings were utilised in
the formation of seaward parapets, and in making
the foundation of the road solid and dry to bear the
heaviest traffic,
