Great British Railway Journeys (2010–…): Season 4, Episode 13 - Dufftown to Aviemore - full transcript
In 1840, one man transformed travel
in the British Isles.
His name was George Bradshaw,
and his railway guides inspired
the Victorians to take to the tracks.
Stop by Stop
he told them where to travel,
what to see and where to stay.
Now, 170 years later,
I'm making a series of journeys across
the length and breadth of these isles
to see what of Bradshaws Britain
remains.
At the halfway point,
my Scottish journey has brought me
to the Highlands.
Here in the rural county of Moray,
small-scale industries based
on high-quality local resources
were transformed by the railways
and are now brand names sought out
by connoisseurs across the globe.
Today, I learn how Victorian
whisky trains were raided by robbers.
- You think anyone's spotted us?
- Don't think so. I'll keep an eye out.
I traverse one of Scotland's
most impressive viaducts.
It really is a spectacular piece
of architecture and engineering.
And I discover that life ism always
sweet on a shortbread production line.
Stop the conveyor belt!
I want to get off!
Using my 1880s "Bradshaw's",
this trip started in Stirling,
passed through Perthshire,
moved on to the granite city of Aberdeen
and is now taking me west to Banffshire,
thence to the classic lochs
of the Highlands,
to finish at John o'Groats.
Today's leg begins in Dufftown,
in northeastern Scotland,
indulges my sweet tooth in Aberlour,
samples some luxury in Elgin
and, via Inverness,
ends in mountainous Aviemore.
My Bradshaw's has guided me
onto these tracks
which are carrying me towards Dufftown,
of which my book says that,
"It is situated on the River Spey
at the foot of a range of hills,
the principal and centre of which
is Ben Rinnes."
"A little further south lies Glenlivet."
There's the clue.
I'm travelling on the most northerly
heritage railway in Britain,
the Keith and Dufftown,
also known as the Whisky Line.
Although its castle, Balvenie,
dates back to the 13th century,
Dufftown was founded only in 1817,
when James Duff, 4th Earl of Fife,
decided to create a new town,
where, following the Napoleonic wars,
local people could find work.
Dufftown attracted
a cluster of distilleries
for some of the most famous names
in Scotch whisky.
And I'm meeting senior guide,
Jennifer Proctor, atone of them,
Glenfiddich, to find out why.
- Jennifer, hello.
- Hello, nice to meet you.
Good to see you. What a stunning place.
Beautiful setting in the hills.
Why is it that great whisky
is made here?
Well, pretty much
from what you can see.
The surrounding countryside supplies us
with the barley we need for the malt.
It also gives us the water we need,
the vital ingredients for making whisky.
Originally, this area was perfect,
as well, because of the transport links,
so there's a great deal of railways
that could transport things
that we didn't have here onto the site,
but it also meant we could take
the finished product of whisky off
and eventually transport it
all around Scotland.
- You're still making it today.
- Yes, we are.
In 1886, founder William Grant
set out to fulfill a lifelong ambition
of creating the best dram in the valley.
With the help of his seven sons
and two daughters,
William built his distillery
in a single year.
Their hard work was rewarded
on Christmas Day 1887,
when the first drop
of spirit flowed.
William named his
distillery Glenfiddich,
Gaelic for "valley of the deer".
What actually is distilling?
Well, basically what we're trying to do
is refine a beer-like liquid
into a spirit that we can go on
to put through the maturation process
and eventually that will become whisky.
Matted barley, water and yeast
are the ingredients.
Scotch malt whisky is produced
from a natural chemical alteration
of wort,
a sugary liquid which is fermented
in vats, then distilled in copper stills
and finally matured in wooden casks.
Would this be recognisable
to a Victorian?
Yes. I mean, it's certainly larger
in terms of its scale,
but the process hasn't really changed
a great deal over the years.
The railways, then.
What difference did they make?
Essentially, all distilleries at that
time pretty much had their own sidings
and there were a lot more train lines,
railway lines, put in
specifically for transporting
goods like whisky.
So, really, it was fundamental
to the distilleries
that these lines were put in place.
(Michael) Was there any downside
to having the railways?
There were a few. The most noticeable
would have been the theft they found
that happened
from the trains themselves.
Distillers, they kind of accounted
for a certain amount of loss,
but the trains often were very slow
and they would take a day or two
to get from somewhere like Dufftown
down to Glasgow,
where the whisky
was actually going to be going to.
During that time, a lot of it
would be spent in very remote sidings,
so they were unprotected.
It was very easy for people
to go and siphon off a bit of whisky
and take it home.
I see. So they weren't taking
a whole barrel,
which would be quite challenging.
No, they were siphoning it off a cask,
usually only a small amount,
enough for themselves
or maybe them and a friend.
It wasn't huge quantities
people were taking.
I'm intrigued by these
Victorian whisky thefts
and wonder whether Ian MacDonald,
Glenfiddich's master cooper,
can show me how it was done.
- Ian.
- Hello, Michael. How are you doing?
- Very well.
- Nice to meet you.
I don't think I've ever met a cooper
before. That's what you are, isn't it?
Yes. I'm what they term a master cooper.
I served a five-year apprenticeship
to become a craftsman.
Ian, I'm thinking about my retirement,
and I was thinking of turning
to a little whisky theft in my old days,
and I've been hearing a bit about it.
How would I set about it, then?
We'll remove a hoop,
we'll bore a hole and remove a bung
and hopefully we can extract
some of the good old whisky that way.
Great. I can't wait. Right.
OK, so what we'll do is
just use a boring brace.
- Would you like to have a shot?
- Yes, let me have a shot.
Put a wee bit of pressure on
and twist it round at the same time.
That's it.
American oak is quite a hard oak,
so you do need a really sharp bit.
- You think anyone's spotted us yet?
- Don't think so. I'll keep an eye out.
I can see the shavings of wood
coming out.
Whoa, we're through.
This should create a vacuum.
Not too noisy.
(Michael) Whoa, there she flows!
- (Ian) Here we go! Tilt her back.
- (Michael) That is magnificent!
You're spilling a bit,
but it doesn't matter
as long as we get our bottleful.
Are you paying?
OK, up you go.
Right, what do we do now
to cover our crime?
Oh, no problem.
We'll just plug the hole
so it won't spoil.
Look at that.
So we'll just replace the hoop.
That's it back on. Never know.
It's as good as new, isn't it?
Just as well you work
for the forces of law and order!
- I'll just give you a wee souvenir.
- Thank you.
Tastes all the better
for being purloined.
Good.
Feeling both warm and mischievous,
I'm proceeding by road
to my next destination,
the Speyside village of Aberlour.
Thomas Telford, the renowned civil
engineer, designed Craigellachie Bridge,
spanning the River Spey
about two miles north.
But I'm in Aberlour
for a different reason.
Bradshaw's tells me
that at Craigellachie,
"The rail system divides into two,
one of which runs along Strathspey,
the valley which gives its name
to a highland dance,
passing in its route
the station of Aberlour."
Well, the station
no longer has any trains.
Nowadays, it's a café,
feeding hungry Strathspey tourists
taking a short break with shortbread.
In 1898, Joseph Walker,
a baker with a passion for shortbread,
borrowed £50 and opened a shop.
More than a century tater,
his shortbread,
a blend of flour, butter, sugar
and salt, is sold in 80 countries
and its factory produces
500 million shortbreads a year.
Joseph's grandson Jim
is a joint managing director.
Hello, Michael.
Welcome to Walker's, welcome.
Thank you very much.
The changing room second on your left
and we'll get togged up
to go into the factory.
Jim, Scotland really is enormously
associated with shortbread, isn't it?
Why do you think that is?
Shortbread is one of those foods
that is synonymous with Scotland.
Scots can readily claim
to have invented shortbread
and it's really always been pan
of Scotland, it's pan of the heritage.
The distances here are huge,
aren't they?
Yes, indeed. It seems a long way.
The ovens are 60 metres long.
(Michael) Does the heat vary
at different places in the oven?
Yes, indeed. The heat
varies right through the oven,
so we end up at the end
with a nice flash of hotter temperature
to make the shortbread
a nice golden brown,
because that's exactly how it should be.
- I'm going to introduce you to Pauline.
- Pauline, hello.
- Hello. Pleased to meet you.
- Michael Portillo.
May I have gloves
and then I can join in?
Indeed, yes.
- (Pauline) Take two trays.
- (Michael) Take two trays.
And then place three thistles
in each of the compartments.
(Michael) Two, three.
Two, three.
One, two, three.
This is like Waltzing, isn't it?
One, two, three.
We got an empty one there, whoa!
Sometimes it's easier
to do two at a time.
Oh, is it? Right.
What, left hand, right hand?
- Yes. Exactly.
- Let's try the double-handed approach.
- One, two...
- Do it simultaneously.
Three. One, two...
three.
They go past pretty fast, don't they?
(Pauline) They do, really.
You'll be a natural.
This is a merciless process!
Stop the conveyor belt!
I want to get off!
Shortbread has been attributed
to Mary, Queen of Scots,
who, in the mid-16th century, was said
to be very fond of petticoat tails,
a thin, crisp, buttery shortbread
originally flavoured with caraway seeds.
My next task is to feed 21st-century
shortbread into its wrapping machine.
The two-handed technique.
They're coming pretty fast
and furious at the moment.
Get in there! Get in there!
Get in there!
(man) Got to keep your wits about you,
haven't you?
You've got to be one step ahead
the whole time.
I'm going to have to leave a gap there.
I missed a few there.
It's like the nightmare
in The Sorcerer's Apprentice,
where you unleash forces
that you cannot control
and they descend relentlessly upon you.
The demands of mechanisation
cannot be assuaged.
Is there anyone to take over?
Phew, what a relief.
Thank you very much.
Hello. Now this looks to me
like the ultimate raw deal.
(man) Got to be pretty nimble.
Ah! Thank you very much.
Oh, no! This is definitely
the worst ordeal I've been set today.
This is...
Help! Somebody, help!
Well, Jim, I really enjoyed that.
I've done a lot of factory visits.
I'm not trying to butter you up,
but this one really took the biscuit.
That's what we're all about.
Thank you.
We had a busy time
learning about two of Scotland's
finest Victorian products,
and I'm hoping that at my final stop
of the day, I can sample them both.
- Ah, good evening.
- Hi, there.
I see your pub's called The Mash Tun.
What does that mean?
That's correct.
A mash tun is a large receptacle
used in the whisky-making industry.
It's somewhere that they used
to mix up all the ingredients,
hence a good name for a pub.
I see that you stand
behind the railway station.
Any connection with the railways?
Yes. This used to be the station
refreshment rooms, initially,
and then, obviously, once
the railway station closed down in '65,
it was then renamed The Mash Tun.
After the day that I've had, could I
have a glass of your local malt whisky
and a stick of shortbread, please?
Certainly.
- Thank you.
- There we are.
Now, do not try this at home.
Ah! A rush of sugar, butter and alcohol.
Refreshed and ready for the day ahead,
I'm continuing my journey by train
from my nearest station, Keith.
This small area of Scotland
is known as the golden triangle,
because of the pure local water
which allows companies to flourish
despite their remote location.
Today, I'll visit another industry
that also benefited greatly
from the arrival of the railways.
My first destination today is Elgin,
which my Bradshaw's tells me is,
"A borough five miles from the sea
on the River Lossie."
"It contains five chapels, a prison,
a library, assembly rooms,
literary and horticultural societies,
breweries, gas and water works,
woollen factory, grammar school
and free school."
Now, amongst those, I know that
the woollen factory still exists,
so no material change there.
Elgin was a favourite hunting ground
of early Scottish monarchs.
With its ancient cathedral and lying
either side of the River Lossie,
it grew steadily throughout
the medieval period,
until by the 17th century,
it boasted fine buildings
that reflected the prosperity
of its merchants.
When the railways arrived in the 1850s,
business tn the town boomed,
and firms like cloth manufacturers
Johnstons of Elgin blossomed.
James Sugden is the director.
James, hello.
- Good morning.
- Michael. Good to see you.
You're lost in your archives, I see,
which is not surprising because your
company goes all the way back to 1797.
Why was it that the woollen industry
took off in this particular place,
quite a remote place?
We had a local supply of fibre
from our sheep
and we had, also, that very important
ingredient, water. Soft Scottish water.
During the 19th century, what were
the developments in the business?
James Johnston made tweed
for the local market.
As time went on,
he moved into finer fibres
and with the advent of Queen Victoria,
we moved into design fabrics,
particularly tartans
and then the local estate tweeds.
Because Queen Victoria
actually rescues the tartan
from being a kind of banned thing
to being a fashion item
in a short period of time.
Yes, she made it very fashionable,
and we produced a lot of tartan
and still do,
but the other thing that her advent
to this district brought
was this estate tweed business,
making bespoke designed fabrics
for the upper class.
This is what the servants wore indoors,
but what they wore on the moors,
as well.
(James) The ghillies, the keepers,
the stalkers, they wanted camouflage,
but then they also wanted fabrics
that were distinctive
and so, often, the wives of the laird
would insist
on little quirky over-checks
and colourings
that were perhaps not just camouflage,
but their own idiosyncratic designs.
When did you get
your railway station here?
1852, and that's when
our export business really took off.
I think in the next 40 years,
our turnover went up by eight times
and it was all based
on the export business,
but export in those days
could have been considered London.
And does that impact of the railways
show up in your archives?
This was 1859, and here's a customer
in London still in existence,
A Gagniere & Company,
who are cloth merchants,
and there's a lovely entry here
which says "by rail all the way".
So that cloth came off the mill here,
was taken to Elgin Station
and went all the way to London,
probably within a couple of days.
- 18...?
- 1859.
1859. Great.
James Johnston seized the opportunities
afforded by the railway
and also expanded his business
by negotiating a supply of a fine thread
first made popular in Europe some years
earlier by Napoleon Bonaparte.
What's this book showing us?
This ledger here shows us
the first purchase of cashmere fibre...
Ah!
Which was really James Johnston's
first venture
into exotic, soft-handling fibres
and this was in 1850 from a company
called A Buxton in London.
And cashmere, this is a goat?
(James) It's a goat,
largely bred in Mongolia.
It's the soft underfleece
of the animal,
so when the fleece comes off the animal,
50%, 60% is coarse hair
and the down is what we extract to make
what people know as cashmere today.
(Michael) This is cashmere?
That's pure cashmere from Mongolia
which is our raw material today.
Most of our raw material comes
from that area.
Hmm, it is very, very soft.
And is that the finest thing you do now
No, we do have one other fibre called
vicuna, which I'll show you a sample of.
That's lovely soft stuff.
Is that more expensive
than the cashmere?
Yes, it's ten times the price
of cashmere.
Ten times.
And cashmere's ten times
the price of wool.
Lovely. Your company
clearly has an amazing history,
but also a present and future and I'm
going to go and look at your factory.
- Thank you so much.
- Thank you for coming, Michael.
As with many companies,
its success relies on the stability
and loyalty of its workforce.
Generations of the same families
have trodden the floors of this factory.
They've taken raw fibre through
every stage of the production process
from design to weaving to dyeing
to hand-crafted finishing.
Yarn manager, Mike Matheson,
is from such a family.
- Hello.
- Hello.
You have the most wonderful colours
here. Beautiful dyes.
Have you been in the business very long?
Yes, I've worked here
since I left school, since I was 16,
served my apprenticeship here.
For 36 years I've been with Johnstons.
Congratulations.
Were you an Elgin man, born and bred?
Yes, born and bred just up the road
in the Bishopmill area of Elgin.
My family are all Elginners,
come from Elgin.
Any of them in the business before you?
Yes, my great-auntie
was here in the '50s
and then my mother,
she started here in the '60s
and I started here mid-'70s.
Will it go on through your family,
do you think?
Yes, my daughter,
my younger daughter, she's 24
and she works in the dye house,
so we're carrying on
a son of family tradition,
of one of us being in Johnstons.
Well, let's hope it goes on
for a long time yet. Bye-bye, now.
I wonder whether, even in
a state-of-the-art textile house,
fine knitwear requires a human touch
in its design and its finishing.
Marketing assistant,
Kirsty Cunningham, should know.
During the 19th century,
the company was having to adapt
to new tastes and demands.
- Is it the same today?
- Absolutely.
We're very fortunate
to have such a big team of designers
based here in Elgin, woven designers,
and we also have a set of designers
in our knitwear factory in Hawick
and both teams work really hard
to keep up with the fashions of today,
but at the same time
they're very fortunate,
especially the designers here in Elgin,
as they have the fantastic resource
of an archive room
where they can look through manuscripts
or swatches of fabric
that date back to the 1800s.
(Michael) And when you are exporting,
is it helpful
not only that you're Scottish,
but that it's a rural
Scottish industry?
I think definitely. I think buyers today
look for authenticity of product
and I think we're very lucky in that
our product is 100% made in Scotland
and it has been for 215 years.
So in spite
of all these fantastic machines
that we have in the factory
nowadays, Michael,
one thing that is very special to
Johnstons of Elgin is the teasel head.
- The teasel?
- Yes.
Now, we use these teasels to raise
the pile of the cashmere
during the finishing process.
Now, you'll see there's very small
little hooks on the end of the teasel.
And it's those hooks that lift up
the pile of the fabric
and create that lovely rippled effect.
If you look at this cashmere here,
you'll notice there's almost a ripple.
- Yes.
- And a shine.
And that comes from the teasel.
- And you've found nothing better?
- Nothing that will replace the teasel.
- Where do you get these things?
- We buy these from Spain.
In the land of the Scottish thistle,
you need the help of the Spanish teasel?
Indeed.
Cutting it fine, I'm bound now for
Invemess where HI change trains.
I'm now directed south
to the winter resort of Aviemore
along one of the most
picturesque lines in Scotland.
- Hello, I'm Michael.
- Pleased to meet you.
This main line from Inverness
down to Edinburgh hadn't been built
when my Bradshaw's was published
and my guidebook gives me a clue
as to why.
It says of Inverness-shire that,
"The surface is, in general,
extremely rugged and uneven,
consisting of vast ranges of mountains
separated from each other
by narrow and deep valleys."
So no wonder the railway
was constructed so late
and there's no better place
to get an idea
of the challenge
presented to the railway engineer
by this terrain
than in the driver's cab.
I'm riding the famous
Inverness-to-Aviemore direct line.
It was opened in the 1890s to out
journey times south from Invemess.
And with two major rivers to cross
and a mountain pass of 1,3151%
to conquer,
building it was no mean feat.
Gordon, I can hear the train wearying
as it goes up this steep gradient.
Do you ever think
about what it must have been like
for the engineers planning
and building this line?
I couldn't imagine the work
that must have gone into this.
It's a beautiful line, I must say.
At the moment, we're not seeing snow,
we're seeing some beautiful heather.
We're at the time of year
to be seeing the heather coming out.
In winter, sometimes,
it's like a toboggan run
just made for the train, because
the snow is cleared for the train,
but on either side there's maybe
three, four or five feet of snow.
This line really is a railway
connoisseurs delight,
because just outside of Inverness,
standing to the east
of the famous Culloden battlefield,
the longest masonry viaduct in Scotland,
measuring 544 metres,
spans the River Nairn.
This is a moment I've really
been looking forward to.
The line is descending quite steeply
towards the Culloden Viaduct
and very often you don't get a good view
of a viaduct when you're actually on it,
but fortunately, as we approach it now,
I can see it curving round to the right.
I'm getting a very good view of it
and it really is a spectacular piece
of architecture and engineering.
Built over five years, using local
quarry stone and completed in 1898,
like the rest of the line,
the Culloden viaduct was engineered
by Sir John Fowler and Murdoch Paterson.
I'm now headed to Aviemore
to meet Anne Mary Paterson,
who's written a biography
of her great-granduncle.
- Hello, Anne Mary.
- Oh, hello.
Hello, good to see you.
So, here you are admiring
your great-granduncle's railway line.
(Anne Mary) That's right, yes.
I came over that viaduct just now
and it's a great structure.
What did he think Of it'?
He thought it was his masterpiece,
but by the time
it was nearing completion, he was ill,
because he was long past retiring age,
in his early 70s,
and he had been out in all weathers
and so on
without proper protective clothing.
(Michael) Did he get to see
the viaduct completed?
(Anne Mary)
No, he didn't see it completed.
He was staying in
the station master's house at Culloden
and he realised that he was never
going to go on a train across it,
so he asked the railwaymen
if they would push him across on a bogie
and he could look
and see if everything was alright
and give them orders
about what should be done.
So they pushed him across and back again
and then he went to the house
and he just died shortly after.
You must be very proud of your ancestor.
Yes, I am. That was why I decided
that I was going to write about him.
Thank you, Anne Mary, very much.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Small towns in northern Scotland
are home to major industries
that grew rapidly
once the railways reached them.
The worldwide fame
that they've since acquired
hasn't gone to their head.
They remain proudly Scottish,
commercially independent,
rooted in their historic communities
and reliant on the skills
of local people.
On the next leg of this journey,
I ride a picturesque railway.
I have no words,
I'm out of superlatives.
I visit Scotland's smallest station.
Nearly everyone has joined the queue
to get off at the single door
that opens at the incredibly
short platform at Beauly.
And I go on a spa break,
Victorian-style.
After you've been hosed down
with warm salty water,
your doctor will probably
have prescribed you
a glass of sulphurous water.
- And would I be cured?
- You might well be.
in the British Isles.
His name was George Bradshaw,
and his railway guides inspired
the Victorians to take to the tracks.
Stop by Stop
he told them where to travel,
what to see and where to stay.
Now, 170 years later,
I'm making a series of journeys across
the length and breadth of these isles
to see what of Bradshaws Britain
remains.
At the halfway point,
my Scottish journey has brought me
to the Highlands.
Here in the rural county of Moray,
small-scale industries based
on high-quality local resources
were transformed by the railways
and are now brand names sought out
by connoisseurs across the globe.
Today, I learn how Victorian
whisky trains were raided by robbers.
- You think anyone's spotted us?
- Don't think so. I'll keep an eye out.
I traverse one of Scotland's
most impressive viaducts.
It really is a spectacular piece
of architecture and engineering.
And I discover that life ism always
sweet on a shortbread production line.
Stop the conveyor belt!
I want to get off!
Using my 1880s "Bradshaw's",
this trip started in Stirling,
passed through Perthshire,
moved on to the granite city of Aberdeen
and is now taking me west to Banffshire,
thence to the classic lochs
of the Highlands,
to finish at John o'Groats.
Today's leg begins in Dufftown,
in northeastern Scotland,
indulges my sweet tooth in Aberlour,
samples some luxury in Elgin
and, via Inverness,
ends in mountainous Aviemore.
My Bradshaw's has guided me
onto these tracks
which are carrying me towards Dufftown,
of which my book says that,
"It is situated on the River Spey
at the foot of a range of hills,
the principal and centre of which
is Ben Rinnes."
"A little further south lies Glenlivet."
There's the clue.
I'm travelling on the most northerly
heritage railway in Britain,
the Keith and Dufftown,
also known as the Whisky Line.
Although its castle, Balvenie,
dates back to the 13th century,
Dufftown was founded only in 1817,
when James Duff, 4th Earl of Fife,
decided to create a new town,
where, following the Napoleonic wars,
local people could find work.
Dufftown attracted
a cluster of distilleries
for some of the most famous names
in Scotch whisky.
And I'm meeting senior guide,
Jennifer Proctor, atone of them,
Glenfiddich, to find out why.
- Jennifer, hello.
- Hello, nice to meet you.
Good to see you. What a stunning place.
Beautiful setting in the hills.
Why is it that great whisky
is made here?
Well, pretty much
from what you can see.
The surrounding countryside supplies us
with the barley we need for the malt.
It also gives us the water we need,
the vital ingredients for making whisky.
Originally, this area was perfect,
as well, because of the transport links,
so there's a great deal of railways
that could transport things
that we didn't have here onto the site,
but it also meant we could take
the finished product of whisky off
and eventually transport it
all around Scotland.
- You're still making it today.
- Yes, we are.
In 1886, founder William Grant
set out to fulfill a lifelong ambition
of creating the best dram in the valley.
With the help of his seven sons
and two daughters,
William built his distillery
in a single year.
Their hard work was rewarded
on Christmas Day 1887,
when the first drop
of spirit flowed.
William named his
distillery Glenfiddich,
Gaelic for "valley of the deer".
What actually is distilling?
Well, basically what we're trying to do
is refine a beer-like liquid
into a spirit that we can go on
to put through the maturation process
and eventually that will become whisky.
Matted barley, water and yeast
are the ingredients.
Scotch malt whisky is produced
from a natural chemical alteration
of wort,
a sugary liquid which is fermented
in vats, then distilled in copper stills
and finally matured in wooden casks.
Would this be recognisable
to a Victorian?
Yes. I mean, it's certainly larger
in terms of its scale,
but the process hasn't really changed
a great deal over the years.
The railways, then.
What difference did they make?
Essentially, all distilleries at that
time pretty much had their own sidings
and there were a lot more train lines,
railway lines, put in
specifically for transporting
goods like whisky.
So, really, it was fundamental
to the distilleries
that these lines were put in place.
(Michael) Was there any downside
to having the railways?
There were a few. The most noticeable
would have been the theft they found
that happened
from the trains themselves.
Distillers, they kind of accounted
for a certain amount of loss,
but the trains often were very slow
and they would take a day or two
to get from somewhere like Dufftown
down to Glasgow,
where the whisky
was actually going to be going to.
During that time, a lot of it
would be spent in very remote sidings,
so they were unprotected.
It was very easy for people
to go and siphon off a bit of whisky
and take it home.
I see. So they weren't taking
a whole barrel,
which would be quite challenging.
No, they were siphoning it off a cask,
usually only a small amount,
enough for themselves
or maybe them and a friend.
It wasn't huge quantities
people were taking.
I'm intrigued by these
Victorian whisky thefts
and wonder whether Ian MacDonald,
Glenfiddich's master cooper,
can show me how it was done.
- Ian.
- Hello, Michael. How are you doing?
- Very well.
- Nice to meet you.
I don't think I've ever met a cooper
before. That's what you are, isn't it?
Yes. I'm what they term a master cooper.
I served a five-year apprenticeship
to become a craftsman.
Ian, I'm thinking about my retirement,
and I was thinking of turning
to a little whisky theft in my old days,
and I've been hearing a bit about it.
How would I set about it, then?
We'll remove a hoop,
we'll bore a hole and remove a bung
and hopefully we can extract
some of the good old whisky that way.
Great. I can't wait. Right.
OK, so what we'll do is
just use a boring brace.
- Would you like to have a shot?
- Yes, let me have a shot.
Put a wee bit of pressure on
and twist it round at the same time.
That's it.
American oak is quite a hard oak,
so you do need a really sharp bit.
- You think anyone's spotted us yet?
- Don't think so. I'll keep an eye out.
I can see the shavings of wood
coming out.
Whoa, we're through.
This should create a vacuum.
Not too noisy.
(Michael) Whoa, there she flows!
- (Ian) Here we go! Tilt her back.
- (Michael) That is magnificent!
You're spilling a bit,
but it doesn't matter
as long as we get our bottleful.
Are you paying?
OK, up you go.
Right, what do we do now
to cover our crime?
Oh, no problem.
We'll just plug the hole
so it won't spoil.
Look at that.
So we'll just replace the hoop.
That's it back on. Never know.
It's as good as new, isn't it?
Just as well you work
for the forces of law and order!
- I'll just give you a wee souvenir.
- Thank you.
Tastes all the better
for being purloined.
Good.
Feeling both warm and mischievous,
I'm proceeding by road
to my next destination,
the Speyside village of Aberlour.
Thomas Telford, the renowned civil
engineer, designed Craigellachie Bridge,
spanning the River Spey
about two miles north.
But I'm in Aberlour
for a different reason.
Bradshaw's tells me
that at Craigellachie,
"The rail system divides into two,
one of which runs along Strathspey,
the valley which gives its name
to a highland dance,
passing in its route
the station of Aberlour."
Well, the station
no longer has any trains.
Nowadays, it's a café,
feeding hungry Strathspey tourists
taking a short break with shortbread.
In 1898, Joseph Walker,
a baker with a passion for shortbread,
borrowed £50 and opened a shop.
More than a century tater,
his shortbread,
a blend of flour, butter, sugar
and salt, is sold in 80 countries
and its factory produces
500 million shortbreads a year.
Joseph's grandson Jim
is a joint managing director.
Hello, Michael.
Welcome to Walker's, welcome.
Thank you very much.
The changing room second on your left
and we'll get togged up
to go into the factory.
Jim, Scotland really is enormously
associated with shortbread, isn't it?
Why do you think that is?
Shortbread is one of those foods
that is synonymous with Scotland.
Scots can readily claim
to have invented shortbread
and it's really always been pan
of Scotland, it's pan of the heritage.
The distances here are huge,
aren't they?
Yes, indeed. It seems a long way.
The ovens are 60 metres long.
(Michael) Does the heat vary
at different places in the oven?
Yes, indeed. The heat
varies right through the oven,
so we end up at the end
with a nice flash of hotter temperature
to make the shortbread
a nice golden brown,
because that's exactly how it should be.
- I'm going to introduce you to Pauline.
- Pauline, hello.
- Hello. Pleased to meet you.
- Michael Portillo.
May I have gloves
and then I can join in?
Indeed, yes.
- (Pauline) Take two trays.
- (Michael) Take two trays.
And then place three thistles
in each of the compartments.
(Michael) Two, three.
Two, three.
One, two, three.
This is like Waltzing, isn't it?
One, two, three.
We got an empty one there, whoa!
Sometimes it's easier
to do two at a time.
Oh, is it? Right.
What, left hand, right hand?
- Yes. Exactly.
- Let's try the double-handed approach.
- One, two...
- Do it simultaneously.
Three. One, two...
three.
They go past pretty fast, don't they?
(Pauline) They do, really.
You'll be a natural.
This is a merciless process!
Stop the conveyor belt!
I want to get off!
Shortbread has been attributed
to Mary, Queen of Scots,
who, in the mid-16th century, was said
to be very fond of petticoat tails,
a thin, crisp, buttery shortbread
originally flavoured with caraway seeds.
My next task is to feed 21st-century
shortbread into its wrapping machine.
The two-handed technique.
They're coming pretty fast
and furious at the moment.
Get in there! Get in there!
Get in there!
(man) Got to keep your wits about you,
haven't you?
You've got to be one step ahead
the whole time.
I'm going to have to leave a gap there.
I missed a few there.
It's like the nightmare
in The Sorcerer's Apprentice,
where you unleash forces
that you cannot control
and they descend relentlessly upon you.
The demands of mechanisation
cannot be assuaged.
Is there anyone to take over?
Phew, what a relief.
Thank you very much.
Hello. Now this looks to me
like the ultimate raw deal.
(man) Got to be pretty nimble.
Ah! Thank you very much.
Oh, no! This is definitely
the worst ordeal I've been set today.
This is...
Help! Somebody, help!
Well, Jim, I really enjoyed that.
I've done a lot of factory visits.
I'm not trying to butter you up,
but this one really took the biscuit.
That's what we're all about.
Thank you.
We had a busy time
learning about two of Scotland's
finest Victorian products,
and I'm hoping that at my final stop
of the day, I can sample them both.
- Ah, good evening.
- Hi, there.
I see your pub's called The Mash Tun.
What does that mean?
That's correct.
A mash tun is a large receptacle
used in the whisky-making industry.
It's somewhere that they used
to mix up all the ingredients,
hence a good name for a pub.
I see that you stand
behind the railway station.
Any connection with the railways?
Yes. This used to be the station
refreshment rooms, initially,
and then, obviously, once
the railway station closed down in '65,
it was then renamed The Mash Tun.
After the day that I've had, could I
have a glass of your local malt whisky
and a stick of shortbread, please?
Certainly.
- Thank you.
- There we are.
Now, do not try this at home.
Ah! A rush of sugar, butter and alcohol.
Refreshed and ready for the day ahead,
I'm continuing my journey by train
from my nearest station, Keith.
This small area of Scotland
is known as the golden triangle,
because of the pure local water
which allows companies to flourish
despite their remote location.
Today, I'll visit another industry
that also benefited greatly
from the arrival of the railways.
My first destination today is Elgin,
which my Bradshaw's tells me is,
"A borough five miles from the sea
on the River Lossie."
"It contains five chapels, a prison,
a library, assembly rooms,
literary and horticultural societies,
breweries, gas and water works,
woollen factory, grammar school
and free school."
Now, amongst those, I know that
the woollen factory still exists,
so no material change there.
Elgin was a favourite hunting ground
of early Scottish monarchs.
With its ancient cathedral and lying
either side of the River Lossie,
it grew steadily throughout
the medieval period,
until by the 17th century,
it boasted fine buildings
that reflected the prosperity
of its merchants.
When the railways arrived in the 1850s,
business tn the town boomed,
and firms like cloth manufacturers
Johnstons of Elgin blossomed.
James Sugden is the director.
James, hello.
- Good morning.
- Michael. Good to see you.
You're lost in your archives, I see,
which is not surprising because your
company goes all the way back to 1797.
Why was it that the woollen industry
took off in this particular place,
quite a remote place?
We had a local supply of fibre
from our sheep
and we had, also, that very important
ingredient, water. Soft Scottish water.
During the 19th century, what were
the developments in the business?
James Johnston made tweed
for the local market.
As time went on,
he moved into finer fibres
and with the advent of Queen Victoria,
we moved into design fabrics,
particularly tartans
and then the local estate tweeds.
Because Queen Victoria
actually rescues the tartan
from being a kind of banned thing
to being a fashion item
in a short period of time.
Yes, she made it very fashionable,
and we produced a lot of tartan
and still do,
but the other thing that her advent
to this district brought
was this estate tweed business,
making bespoke designed fabrics
for the upper class.
This is what the servants wore indoors,
but what they wore on the moors,
as well.
(James) The ghillies, the keepers,
the stalkers, they wanted camouflage,
but then they also wanted fabrics
that were distinctive
and so, often, the wives of the laird
would insist
on little quirky over-checks
and colourings
that were perhaps not just camouflage,
but their own idiosyncratic designs.
When did you get
your railway station here?
1852, and that's when
our export business really took off.
I think in the next 40 years,
our turnover went up by eight times
and it was all based
on the export business,
but export in those days
could have been considered London.
And does that impact of the railways
show up in your archives?
This was 1859, and here's a customer
in London still in existence,
A Gagniere & Company,
who are cloth merchants,
and there's a lovely entry here
which says "by rail all the way".
So that cloth came off the mill here,
was taken to Elgin Station
and went all the way to London,
probably within a couple of days.
- 18...?
- 1859.
1859. Great.
James Johnston seized the opportunities
afforded by the railway
and also expanded his business
by negotiating a supply of a fine thread
first made popular in Europe some years
earlier by Napoleon Bonaparte.
What's this book showing us?
This ledger here shows us
the first purchase of cashmere fibre...
Ah!
Which was really James Johnston's
first venture
into exotic, soft-handling fibres
and this was in 1850 from a company
called A Buxton in London.
And cashmere, this is a goat?
(James) It's a goat,
largely bred in Mongolia.
It's the soft underfleece
of the animal,
so when the fleece comes off the animal,
50%, 60% is coarse hair
and the down is what we extract to make
what people know as cashmere today.
(Michael) This is cashmere?
That's pure cashmere from Mongolia
which is our raw material today.
Most of our raw material comes
from that area.
Hmm, it is very, very soft.
And is that the finest thing you do now
No, we do have one other fibre called
vicuna, which I'll show you a sample of.
That's lovely soft stuff.
Is that more expensive
than the cashmere?
Yes, it's ten times the price
of cashmere.
Ten times.
And cashmere's ten times
the price of wool.
Lovely. Your company
clearly has an amazing history,
but also a present and future and I'm
going to go and look at your factory.
- Thank you so much.
- Thank you for coming, Michael.
As with many companies,
its success relies on the stability
and loyalty of its workforce.
Generations of the same families
have trodden the floors of this factory.
They've taken raw fibre through
every stage of the production process
from design to weaving to dyeing
to hand-crafted finishing.
Yarn manager, Mike Matheson,
is from such a family.
- Hello.
- Hello.
You have the most wonderful colours
here. Beautiful dyes.
Have you been in the business very long?
Yes, I've worked here
since I left school, since I was 16,
served my apprenticeship here.
For 36 years I've been with Johnstons.
Congratulations.
Were you an Elgin man, born and bred?
Yes, born and bred just up the road
in the Bishopmill area of Elgin.
My family are all Elginners,
come from Elgin.
Any of them in the business before you?
Yes, my great-auntie
was here in the '50s
and then my mother,
she started here in the '60s
and I started here mid-'70s.
Will it go on through your family,
do you think?
Yes, my daughter,
my younger daughter, she's 24
and she works in the dye house,
so we're carrying on
a son of family tradition,
of one of us being in Johnstons.
Well, let's hope it goes on
for a long time yet. Bye-bye, now.
I wonder whether, even in
a state-of-the-art textile house,
fine knitwear requires a human touch
in its design and its finishing.
Marketing assistant,
Kirsty Cunningham, should know.
During the 19th century,
the company was having to adapt
to new tastes and demands.
- Is it the same today?
- Absolutely.
We're very fortunate
to have such a big team of designers
based here in Elgin, woven designers,
and we also have a set of designers
in our knitwear factory in Hawick
and both teams work really hard
to keep up with the fashions of today,
but at the same time
they're very fortunate,
especially the designers here in Elgin,
as they have the fantastic resource
of an archive room
where they can look through manuscripts
or swatches of fabric
that date back to the 1800s.
(Michael) And when you are exporting,
is it helpful
not only that you're Scottish,
but that it's a rural
Scottish industry?
I think definitely. I think buyers today
look for authenticity of product
and I think we're very lucky in that
our product is 100% made in Scotland
and it has been for 215 years.
So in spite
of all these fantastic machines
that we have in the factory
nowadays, Michael,
one thing that is very special to
Johnstons of Elgin is the teasel head.
- The teasel?
- Yes.
Now, we use these teasels to raise
the pile of the cashmere
during the finishing process.
Now, you'll see there's very small
little hooks on the end of the teasel.
And it's those hooks that lift up
the pile of the fabric
and create that lovely rippled effect.
If you look at this cashmere here,
you'll notice there's almost a ripple.
- Yes.
- And a shine.
And that comes from the teasel.
- And you've found nothing better?
- Nothing that will replace the teasel.
- Where do you get these things?
- We buy these from Spain.
In the land of the Scottish thistle,
you need the help of the Spanish teasel?
Indeed.
Cutting it fine, I'm bound now for
Invemess where HI change trains.
I'm now directed south
to the winter resort of Aviemore
along one of the most
picturesque lines in Scotland.
- Hello, I'm Michael.
- Pleased to meet you.
This main line from Inverness
down to Edinburgh hadn't been built
when my Bradshaw's was published
and my guidebook gives me a clue
as to why.
It says of Inverness-shire that,
"The surface is, in general,
extremely rugged and uneven,
consisting of vast ranges of mountains
separated from each other
by narrow and deep valleys."
So no wonder the railway
was constructed so late
and there's no better place
to get an idea
of the challenge
presented to the railway engineer
by this terrain
than in the driver's cab.
I'm riding the famous
Inverness-to-Aviemore direct line.
It was opened in the 1890s to out
journey times south from Invemess.
And with two major rivers to cross
and a mountain pass of 1,3151%
to conquer,
building it was no mean feat.
Gordon, I can hear the train wearying
as it goes up this steep gradient.
Do you ever think
about what it must have been like
for the engineers planning
and building this line?
I couldn't imagine the work
that must have gone into this.
It's a beautiful line, I must say.
At the moment, we're not seeing snow,
we're seeing some beautiful heather.
We're at the time of year
to be seeing the heather coming out.
In winter, sometimes,
it's like a toboggan run
just made for the train, because
the snow is cleared for the train,
but on either side there's maybe
three, four or five feet of snow.
This line really is a railway
connoisseurs delight,
because just outside of Inverness,
standing to the east
of the famous Culloden battlefield,
the longest masonry viaduct in Scotland,
measuring 544 metres,
spans the River Nairn.
This is a moment I've really
been looking forward to.
The line is descending quite steeply
towards the Culloden Viaduct
and very often you don't get a good view
of a viaduct when you're actually on it,
but fortunately, as we approach it now,
I can see it curving round to the right.
I'm getting a very good view of it
and it really is a spectacular piece
of architecture and engineering.
Built over five years, using local
quarry stone and completed in 1898,
like the rest of the line,
the Culloden viaduct was engineered
by Sir John Fowler and Murdoch Paterson.
I'm now headed to Aviemore
to meet Anne Mary Paterson,
who's written a biography
of her great-granduncle.
- Hello, Anne Mary.
- Oh, hello.
Hello, good to see you.
So, here you are admiring
your great-granduncle's railway line.
(Anne Mary) That's right, yes.
I came over that viaduct just now
and it's a great structure.
What did he think Of it'?
He thought it was his masterpiece,
but by the time
it was nearing completion, he was ill,
because he was long past retiring age,
in his early 70s,
and he had been out in all weathers
and so on
without proper protective clothing.
(Michael) Did he get to see
the viaduct completed?
(Anne Mary)
No, he didn't see it completed.
He was staying in
the station master's house at Culloden
and he realised that he was never
going to go on a train across it,
so he asked the railwaymen
if they would push him across on a bogie
and he could look
and see if everything was alright
and give them orders
about what should be done.
So they pushed him across and back again
and then he went to the house
and he just died shortly after.
You must be very proud of your ancestor.
Yes, I am. That was why I decided
that I was going to write about him.
Thank you, Anne Mary, very much.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
Small towns in northern Scotland
are home to major industries
that grew rapidly
once the railways reached them.
The worldwide fame
that they've since acquired
hasn't gone to their head.
They remain proudly Scottish,
commercially independent,
rooted in their historic communities
and reliant on the skills
of local people.
On the next leg of this journey,
I ride a picturesque railway.
I have no words,
I'm out of superlatives.
I visit Scotland's smallest station.
Nearly everyone has joined the queue
to get off at the single door
that opens at the incredibly
short platform at Beauly.
And I go on a spa break,
Victorian-style.
After you've been hosed down
with warm salty water,
your doctor will probably
have prescribed you
a glass of sulphurous water.
- And would I be cured?
- You might well be.