The Marble Quarry, Iona, Argyll & Bute, Scotland - Active Quarries on Waymarking.com

A small inlet on the south east coast of Iona is called The Marble Quarry.

This quarry has a very long history. It may have been worked as early as 1745 by the Earl of Breadalbane when he founded the Marble and Slate Company of Netherlorn. it was first officially opened in the late 1700s by the Duke of Argyll but because the marble was difficult to extract and transport was uneconomical it did not operate for long. There was a failed enterprise by the Argyll Quarry Company in the 1800s, which hoped to quarry on an industrial scale, but the remote and rocky location proved too hazardous for shipping. A final attempt was made in 1907 but it closed for the last time at the end of World War I.

Examples of the marble quarried here can be seen in the font and the high altar of the Abbey Church here on the island. It was also used in the construction of the Albert Memorial in London. Other site were the marble can be seen are; St. Columba’s Church Pont Street in London, Scots Kirk in Paris, St Andrew’s Church in Jerusalem, Tibilsi in Palestine and Adelaide in NSW, Australia.

Today all that remains in the small inlet are the remains of a large winch and cable, a cutting frame, water tank, gas engine, wheeled platform and white cut stone blocks. These are listed as a Scheduled Ancient Monument. The remaining machinery has recently, 2012, been given a coat of black gloss paint by the National Trust for Scotland to protect it from the environment. Considering the harsh conditions on the south coast of Iona the metal has held together very well.

The gas engine is by Fielding and Platt who began to manufacture Gas engines in about 1880 which worked with hit and miss governors. Then Mr John Fielding developed and patented a very ingenious graduated governing system which controlled the lift of the gas admission valve and provided only sufficient gas on each stroke to match the load on the engine, for which design he gained the Gold Medal at the Brussels Exhibition 1896.

This is a very early Fielding and Platt Gas Engine at the disused marble quarry on the south coast of Iona, probably an example of the earliest equipment Fielding and Platt manufactured in the 1880s, but may well have had the modified governor. Surprisingly the producer gas is Carbon Monoxide, CO, which is safe enough in an open air situation such as this. It was usually produced by burning charcoal with a limited air supply and feeding it into a cylinder where it powers a piston, just as in a petrol engine. The large cylinders can be seen and the remains of the pipe-work connecting to the engine.

Type of Stone/Ore mined: Marble, green-veined. Associated Web Site: [Web Link]

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