Bonawe lies at the side of Loch Etive, just as the loch turns sharply northwards, creating a narrowing of the water. Settlements grew up either side which were initially all Bonawe, then became Bonawe and Taynuilt, joined until the middle of the 1900's with ferries and many local boats.
This was a significant location for salmon fishing ..
It became a very significant settlement with the development of the quarry, about which we have much to learn.
Charles Hunter's paper on Bonawe 1730-45
Visitor - in 1786 To the Highlands in 1786: The Inquisitive Journey of a Young French Aristocrat By Alexandre de La Rochefoucauld, Maximilien de Lazowski, Norman Scarfe
Bonawe Quarry
Bonawe settlement - the area changed and grew so much as the quarry developed that this is a separate page
Bonawe Ferry
Bonawe was the original post office for the area - there are many letters that pop up on Ebay with the Bunaw seal from the 1700 / 1800's.
1842 - John Cameron Post master, according to letter on ebay from D MacIntyre, dancing professor ! it is possible this is the same man who was Transported Van Dieman's Land after a trial in Inveraray
The Quarry brought more and more men and their families into the area, the census records showing how the population grew, as the tenements were built.
https://www.electricscotland.com/history/gazetteer/vol1page200.htm
drawing of Bonawe in the 1930's
Adam Bruce Thomson Bonawe Quarry, Loch Etive, Argyll, c.1934
charcoal, pen & inkH:34cm W:40cm
https://scottish-gallery.co.uk/exhibitions/untroubled-certainty
