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Reflections on Caol
Pictures and Story by Margaret Muncie
First published February 2006 in Lochaber Life Magazine
Do you remember Caol before Caol was there?
I can recall walking from Banavie down the track from the signal box, parallel to the canal, virtually the same route as the road now heads into Caol from the Banavie end, only the junction from the main road was hard by the bridge and the signal box.
It was a sunny day in my youth, and we were heading for the shore and a picnic, with bags of sandwiches and lemonade. The area of moss and bog to the left hand side of the road was virgin. Just the sun and the breeze and the rolling flat ground with the loch in the distance and the canal high up on the right of us.
Strangely, no memory of the picnic remains, but that picture of the empty sun-blown plain soon to be filled with houses and people remains an almost mythical memory. 
Work on the building of Caol commenced in 1949, one of the biggest changes to occur in the area in the 20th century.
But in ‘Romantic Lochaber, Arisaig and Morar’, Donald B MacCulloch tells us that Caol was not the first community to be established here. This was the original site of Corpach, in the area from the shore to near Kilmallie Road. There was “ a scattered shore-clachan, or settlement, with crofts at intervals stretching round the arc, or strip, of ground about three hundred yards broad between the head of Loch Linnhe and the original southern margin of Corpach Moss, or the Blar Mor.”
“Corpach is mentioned in a grant of Lochaber lands of 1461, in which the name is spelled Corpych, but according to old chronicles and maps the name Corpach was not applied to the site of the present township of this name until about the second or third decade of last century.” Mr MacCulloch again enlightens us: “The present township of Corpach was founded to house the workers when the Caledonian Canal was being constructed.”
He goes on to say that the area of the sea-ward part of Caol continued to be called Corpach for a number of years. “Local evidence that the original settlement of Corpach fringed Breuncamus, where is now the early part of the township of Caol, was given to me by my good friend Johnny Wilson, of Tomonie, an elderly but clear-headed Abrach. In place-names, the word Caol, or caolas, usually means a narrow channel, or strait, and Johnny said, ‘When young, I heard old folk say that the full name of Caol was Caol-na-Corpaich and referred to the channel between the Rudha Dearg of Ardgour and the opposite shore at the present township of Caol.’ . . . When Corpach was a shore-clachan fringing Breuncamus there was a road or track to it branching from the Kilmallie-to-Banavie road across by way of Tomonie. That old road to the original Corpach went out of use when the canal cut through it.” The construction of the canal started in 1803.”
Mr MacCulloch also notes that in 1969, the population of Fort William was 4,006, while Caol just exceeded this with 4,019. According to Government statistics in 2004, these figures have changed to 3,824 and 2,273 respectively. We have no statistics available regarding the population of the old settlement from the fifteenth century, nor when it ceased to be.
Today, the houses in Caol are some of the best and most attractive in Lochaber. Some of them have views down Loch Linnhe which are incomparable. Caol was described by Donald MacCulloch, as “a clean and tidy, well laid-out scheme of bright, substantial Council houses with colourful gardens and a broad grassy margin between the houses and the shore, and has an energetic community.
It is still the same today, only perhaps more so.
The Caledonian Canal of course runs along the north western edge of Caol. When Donald MacCulloch last updated his invaluable book, he mentioned that access was prohibited with “a barbed-wire fence . . . across the path leading to the canal bank.” This was to prevent a perceived wear and tear of the bank with too much usage. Fortunately today, no such ban is in place, and we are at liberty to stroll down the bank, followed closely on the water by some bold swans and ducks, always on the look-out for some crusts and left-overs. It’s a great pleasure strolling here, taking the air, and marvelling at the sensational juxtaposition of people, mountain, loch, canal and village.
The pictures here were taken from the bank of the canal on the Banavie side which presents a quite different perspective on Caol. Hope you enjoy them half as much as we did snapping them!
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