Eye on Millig: The human stories behind Helensburgh's hurricane

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FIFTY YEARS ago this week, Helensburgh and district was counting the cost of the chaos caused by Hurricane Low Q in the early hours of Monday, January 15, 1968.

The bigger of two hurricanes to strike the area in the 20th century — the first during the day of January 28, 1927 — neither killed nor seriously injured anyone, but the damage it caused was dramatic, extensive and distressing.

It was believed that the bill for Helensburgh and Cove and Kilcreggan burghs alone could exceed £250,000.

Added to that was the dreadful devastation in Garelochhead, the worst hit community in the area, and it was increased by the toll from other lochside villages.

It was reckoned that when the last slate was in place and the last chimney head repaired there would be little change out of £1 million — £16 million in today’s money.

An exact figure is not known, but that probably was not far wrong.

Helensburgh town councillors were told that about 80 per cent of the 958 council houses in the town were damaged. Repairs were estimated to cost up to £20,000. The bill for private property was impossible to estimate.

At Cove and Kilcreggan, Town Clerk Douglas Dow said that the actual damage to public and private property was up to £25,000, and that plus the estimated repair cost would mean a final bill of £100,000.

In Dunbartonshire it was evident that private property bore the brunt of the damage. Of the county’s total damage of £415,000, the storm cost private owners £210,000.

Damage to county council houses amounted to £90,000. Also hard hit were public properties, such as schools, which suffered £49,000 damage, and it cost £8,500 to clear the roads.

Local people may not have been injured, but they had some frightening moments and many stories to tell.

In the shrieking winds at 2.30am the Sweeney family were suddenly awakened in their home at 73 Buchanan Road, Helensburgh. Choking fumes from a damaged chimney sprayed into the two bedrooms where Mr and Mrs Sweeney and their child were sleeping.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Mr Sweeney, a digger driver. “Our whole home was ruined in seconds. Soot and grit flew everywhere, and we just had to get out of the house. It was terrible.”

At Sommerville Place — the blocks of flats on the seafront alongside the then Queen’s Hotel — death came very close.

Seven out of nine of the chimney heads were toppled. One fell through the roof and burst the ceiling. It weighed more than two tons, and lay balanced precariously.

If it had moved a fraction more it would have crashed through three occupied flats to the foundations. Builders faced a very hazardous job later when they shored up the masonry.

Among people who had to evacuate their homes were the Cranston family at 1 Rosneath Drive — an area badly hit — as the chimney stack came down through their ceiling.

A few days later the Town Council made an important decision, agreeing to grant remission of rent to Thomas Cranston, as it was covered by insurance for loss of rent.

On the first landing Mrs C. McBrierty pointed to a damaged ceiling and said: “We’ve just managed to clear away the plaster. It is still dangerous and we’ll have to keep away from it.

“Fortunately the Burgh Factor knows about it. We were all up out of our beds at 2am, and he is going to get a tarpaulin on the hole on the roof.”

The same tale was repeated when the chimney above the home of Miss Marion Walker came down through the rafters into the living room at 4 Hanover Street.

A tenant whose home escaped serious damage said that she was lucky in having gas and was able to help neighbours with all-electric homes whose babies needed bottles.

All along West King Street and Baird Avenue tenants reported damage. A few chimney heads had to be taken down, and a few fell down, bringing with them TV aerials.

At the Sinclair Street home of local dental surgeon Ronnie Marshall a huge greenhouse collapsed into a pile of broken glass and splintered timber. A block further up, a giant fir from the home of the Baillie family, Thornton Lodge, crashed across the main road.

East Abercrombie Street was blocked at two points and cars had to run over muddy grass verges to pass. One car sank in the mud and had to be towed clear.

One family missed the excitement — the Lambertons of Arden, Charlotte Street. But while they were holidaying in South Africa, dawn broke to reveal chaos in their garden.

Three giant trees were downed. One crashed through the roadside wall and blocked Abercrombie Street. Another fell across the garden, and a third completely blocked the entrance to the large garage.

Residents of the town’s Glade Estate suffered badly. Fences and gardens were flattened, cars — still in their garages alongside some houses — were wrecked when the wind lifted the roofs and dropped them on top of the cars.

At Kidston Park there was little sleep for the families.

The Gorries, who had just moved there, had a night to forget. Slates flew from their roof, and a workman’s hut flew across the main road to smash their garage doors. Next door the chimney head of a house fell through the garage roof.

Many of the local tradesmen worked valiantly in the early morning hours setting up makeshift barricades and boarding up broken windows. Soon they had enough work for weeks ahead and waiting lists.

Also snowed under with work were men of the GPO.

"In the first two days after the storm, 7-8,000 faults were reported and at one stage we were only 40 short of 10,000 faults in the Helensburgh area,” said area telephone manager W.T. Warnock.

“The district took a terrible pasting.”

GPO linesmen worked long hard hours laying a cable from Helensburgh to Luss and within 24 hours things were almost back to normal. But during this crisis the vandals chose to strike.

Mr Warnock said: “We think vandals cut the cable on Saturday and power was lost.”

At Ardencaple Nurseries the constant crash of breaking glass made the hurricane hours a nightmare and left a trail of damage amounting to £1,000.

The greenhouses withstood the gale, but panes of glass flew off in all directions.

Woodend Nurseries and Rosevale Nursery also both suffered extensive damage to greenhouses which needed to be repaired before the tomato planting-out.

Even the cattle suffered. At Drumfork Farm near Colgrain there was no power to operate the milking machine on Monday afternoon and 80 Ayrshires missed a milking.

But their plight was nothing compared to the farmer’s own. During the night his little girl Vairi, aged 11, was rudely awakened when a slate smashed through her bedroom window. She joined her mum and dad next door just in time to see their bedroom window blow in.

The high winds ripped the large roof off the farmer’s calf shed and hurled it on to the top of a byre, wrecking that too. Alongside, a shed caved in.

Next door to the farm a Faslane foreman, Tom Black, found his car standing alone next morning. The gale had lifted the garage clean off and tossed it over a hedge.

All along the shore at Rhu a whole line of large trees crashed and tore up the roadside wall as they plunged to the ground, leaving huge holes where their roots had been. One tree blocked Pier Road.

The peninsula was similarly affected.

Early morning travellers found that they were marooned as the Garelochhead road and the Peaton road were completely blocked.

The MacDonald brothers, Lachie and John, of Meikle Rahane, were called out by the police at 4am and worked heroically with a power saw to clear the fallen trees. By half past eight traffic was able to move freely again.

A young Clynder man battled for hours cutting a path through fallen trees to get an expectant mother to hospital. When it was realised that the birth was imminent, the young mother contacted Malcolm MacGregor junior, whose house, Altmhor, was nearby.

Mr MacGregor — son of a former convener of the County Council — got her into his car with her husband and set off for Overtoun Maternity Hospital in Dumbarton.

He had the forethought to pack a power saw — and he needed it! He was soon brought to a halt by uprooted trees so he climbed out of his car and cut a path.

Once they reached Garelochhead they inquired at the police station about the road to Helensburgh. They were told that the road was completely blocked.

Mr MacGregor set off again — this time with a police escort. But a huge tree crashed down between his car and the police vehicle following behind. Helensburgh

Police were contacted and a C.I.D. car came out from the town and escorted them onwards.

Then it was found that the road to Over- toun was blocked, so it was decided to make for Braeholm Maternity Hospital in Helensburgh. There the happy birth of a bouncing baby brought a joyous ending to a nightmare journey.

A young naval couple moved out of their chalet home beside the church in Rosneath the day before – and their empty chalet was the only one to be completely flattened by a tree.

Helensburgh's Provost, J. McLeod Williamson, received messages of sympathy for those who suffered from both the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh, and the Secretary of State for Scotland, Willie Ross.

The Provost later told the Town Council that a fair number of local authorities were not insured against storm damage, but Helensburgh was fully covered.