Gunpowder Works Memorial at Millhouse

This bell - the "Dolphin Bell" - stands at the top of a memorial pillar just outside the tiny community of Millhouse which is between Tighnabruaich and Portavadie on the Cowal Peninsula in Argyll. It commemorates 16 named individuals who were killed in six dated accidents at the Millhouse works of the Kames Gunpowder Company between 1846 and 1922 as well as four others who were lost when the "works steamer "Guy Fawkes was sunk in 1864. The bell was the timekeeping bell for the gunpowder factory and was erected in 2000.

There was another gunpowder works at Clachaig on the road from Dunoon to Glendaruel and I have a photograph taken during the second world war of the so called "gunpowder ships" which were moored in Loch Riddon. They stored munitions which were manufactured at the Ardeer works on the Ayrshire coast.

I suppose if you had to find a safe place to make dangerous things it would have to be where there were few people - just like round about here !