The Lighthouse Stevensons - Tapa dura

The epic story of how Robert Louis Stevenson’s ancestors built the lighthouses of the Scottish coast against impossible odds.

‘Whenever I smell salt water, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors,’ wrote Robert Louis Stevenson in 1880. ‘When the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father!’

Robert Louis Stevenson was the most famous of the Stevensons, but not by any means the most productive. ,The Lighthouse Stevensons,, all four generations of them, built every lighthouse round Scotland, were responsible for a slew of inventions in both construction and optics, and achieved feats of engineering in conditions that would be forbidding even today. The same driven energy which Robert Louis Stevenson puts into writing, his ancestors put into lighting the darkness of the seas. ,The Lighthouse Stevensons, is a story of high endeavour, beautifully told; indeed, Bella Bathurst writes like a dream and this should be one of the most celebrated books of the season. As one reads the mesmerising account of the establishing of the Bell Rock lighthouse one almost feels the floor swinging like the sea beneath one; as a unique history that evokes the exact feel of time and place it is quite exceptional.

‘My own interest in “The Lighthouse Stevensons” is threefold. Firstly, from the writings of Robert Louis Stevenson, who turned his family’s trade into the raw gold of all his best fiction. Secondly, from various trips around Scotland. The country’s coast is a mass of storm-beaten rocks and treacherous headlands on which even the seagulls have trouble landing. It is impossible not to speculate what combination of courage and skill built the lighthouses around such an environment. And thirdly, because somewhere in there, unrecognised and unsung, is the most wonderful story!’

For centuries, the seas around Scotland were notorious for shipwrecks. Mariners negotiated not just the natural obstacles – jagged coastline, riptides, currents and storms – but also the human threats of press gangs, privateers and wreckers. The sailors' only aids were skill, luck and a single coal-fire light on the east coast which was usually extinguished by rain.

In 1786, the Northern Lighthouse Trust was established and a few years later Robert Stevenson was appointed their Chief Engineer. It was the beginning of a partnership spanning almost two centuries and four generations of the same family, who became known as the 'Lighthouse Stevensons'.

Robert fought foul weather and opposition to build the Bell Rock light near Arbroath. His eldest son, Alan, designed Skerryvore, considered 'the most beautiful lighthouse in the world'. David Stevenson was responsible for the light at Muckle Flugga, Scotland's northernmost point, and Thomas Stevenson for Dhu Heartach, immortalised in Kidnapped. In all, the family designed and built ninety-seven lights speckled around the Scottish coast, as well as an exceptional range of works including harbours, roads, bridges, and railways.

It was the work of Robert Louis Stevenson, who trained as an engineer but escaped into writing, that brought fame to the Stevenson name. But the Lighthouse Stevensons, as much as anyone, are responsible for their country's appearance today.

Bella Bathhurst has traced the extraordinary careers of the Stevensons, from the first of the lights to the last of the keepers. In sharp, inspired prose she presents a mesmerising account of these little-known Scottish heroes, of whom their better-known literary descendant remarked, 'I might write books till 1900 and not serve humanity so well.'