ALDOURIE Castle is a Baronial-style mansion built in the mid-19th century that incorporates a tower dating back to 1626. It was enlarged in 1850 by the owner of the time, Colonel William Fraser-Tytler.
Part of the reconstruction involved laying a cement fireproof floor between the ground and the first floor. This appears to have laid the ghost of a “lady in grey”, said to have haunted the area between the west bedroom and the front room of the castle.
To the south lies Aldourie Pier and nearby is the curved galley-stance where the military galley which supplied the Redcoat garrison at Fort Augustus was berthed in the 18th and early 19th centuries.
Two of the galley’s small cannon are now at the castle.
The castle was the home of Mary Fraser-Tytler who in the mid-19th century married the distinguished Victorian artist, George Frederick Watts.
A painting by Watts, entitled Death Crowning Innocence and showing the Angel of Death cradling a boy in his arms, was recently sold at auction for an undisclosed sum in a London gallery.
It was inspired by the death of a three-year-old boy who fell from a
horse and trap near the castle grounds in the 1880s.
In 1996 it was used to host the premiere party for the Hollywood movie Loch Ness starring Ted Danson and Joely Richardson.