When Robert Clyne was promoted to Principal Lightkeeper in August 1895, he moved from Langness Lighthouse on the Isle of Man, to become the first Lightkeeper of  Rattray Head Lighthouse on the East coast of Scotland. The granite base is topped by a white tower, and stands 34 metres high, giving 3 white  flashes every 30 seconds and visible for 28 miles.

For many years previously, petitions had been made for a lighthouse on the Rattray Briggs; one petition stated that "it is a rare thing to pass this dangerous point without finding a ship of some sort stranded, and it is one of the most prominent turning points of North East Scotland".  Other reports referred to banks of fog in the area as well as rapid tides, high seas and shifting ground. When  Trinity House  repeatedly refused to agree to the building of this station, the Northern Lighthouse Board, with the support of both local fishermen and a large number of well established shipping companies, eventually appealed directly to the Board of Trade, who overturned the decision and sanctioned the building of both the lighthouse and a first-class siren fog signal. (see Rattray Head Archives)   Rattray Head Lighthouse was built on the Ron Rock ("Ron" is the Gaelic for "seal"),  part of the Rattray Briggs; a major rock lighthouse, albeit very close to shore, its design was unique at the time, built so that the base of the tower could house the engines and foghorn, with the lightkeepers' room and lantern in the upper section.  At high tide, the base of the tower is covered to a depth of about seven feet, but at low tide, it is actually possible to walk ashore.  As a result, although the relief of Keepers and the transport of stores was originally carried out by boat (see Rattray Head Archives), as happened at other rock lighthouses, in latter years, these operations were taken over by tractor and trailer. The proximity to the shore also meant that in the early days, communication between shore and lighthouse could sometimes be achieved by the use of a  megaphone, although both semaphore and morse signalling was also used.  It was not until the onset of the First World War that a telephone system was considered and installed, carried by a lead-covered and armoured cable, and it was not until as late as 1977 that a   mains electricity cable and a telephone cable were laid under the sea bed.

Robert Clyne's main and rather sad memories of Rattray Head related to the many shipwrecks that occurred in the neighbourhood, although he was aware that in the past, the livelihood and very existence of  many of the neighbouring crofters depended on a "good" shipwreck, when food and clothing, as well as timbers and other valuable cargoes, were washed ashore.  One of the saddest shipwrecks Robert witnessed was that of a trawler, driven close to shore in a furious wind.  The ship was close enough that he was able to fire a line to attach to the ship, but the surf, the ferocity of the wind and the incoming tide prevented the assembled company of lightkeepers, coastguards and villagers from being able to operate the life-saving cradle.  By the time the lifeboat arrived, the vessel had been pounded to matchwood, and the crew had one by one, been washed away to their deaths, all before their very eyes.  Perhaps this was his most gruesome description, but Robert was aware that every wreck meant devastation to someone. As well as the wrecks, there was also a mystery ship, a sailing vessel in full rig, which beached close by early one morning, but the boarding party found not a soul on board, nor were the circumstances of her fate ever learned, except that a few week's later, the ship's boat, was found empty, washed up on the Norwegian coastline.

However, there were many positive sides of life at Rattray.  One aspect of the station that pleased Robert Clyne was that the Lightkeepers' cottages were visible from the lighthouse, standing just back from the beach, nestling among the sand dunes. Today, the cottages are run as a Bed & Breakfast establishment.  The beach itself was, and still is, glorious - mile upon mile of almost deserted golden sands, with few points of access.  Here, for the first time, Robert's family were able to settle and enjoy life in their Scottish homeland, and before too long, another baby was born to complete the family (see Family photo taken in 1898, original owned by Jane Bain, Robert's Granddaughter, at end of Rattray Head Archives)

The rocks on which the lighthouse stands and the surrounding reef, attract a summer seal population, and there is an abundance of bird life; nowadays, the surrounding area, owned by the RSPB, is a nature reserve, including within its boundaries the Loch of Strathbeg.  By the time he moved to Rattray Head, Robert Clyne was already a keen ornithologist, as were many other lightkeepers; he wrote, "As the old stagehouses in the coaching days were the inevitable gathering places for the motley mixtures of moving human life, so the lighthouse attracts the interesting feathered travellers on their aerial journeys, and is the calling place of strange forms of marine life".  Rock lighthouses in particular were in a prime position to note the migration and passage of all kinds of birds and many "official" observations were carried out for various bodies.  Sadly, the hundreds of birds which were closely inspected, were often the casualties which had crashed into the lantern, lured there by its light and warmth, but the casualties were thankfully few in proportion to the hundreds of  thousands of visitors.  Virtually every type of local sea bird imaginable was to be found at one time or other, on or below their balconies.  One of the strangest, and in fact, most unpleasant of these birds, was a storm petrel, or "Mother Carey's Chicken" as the species was known - not only was it covered in parasites and smelled appalling, but on capture, it managed to vomit an oily discharge which was very difficult to remove. More surprising were the number of land birds which visited.  Starlings, blackbirds, thrushes, larks, redwing, nightingales and an odd robin arrived at one time; shortly afterwards two louder thumps heralded the arrival of woodcock, closely followed by a pair of gold-crested wrens. Spring visitors usually began with wheatears and warblers, whinchats, pipits and the occasional cuckoo.  Robert recorded that he saw only the odd finch.  At one lighthouse, a solitary swift perched on the kitchen window on a damp night.  By the following morning, the poor creature was very cold and wet, and in Robert's words, "instead of flying away, it clung, kitten-like to my hand."  He took into the warmth of the kitchen and allowed it to dry off and rest for some hours, before taking it back to the window, from where it flew off again, apparently quite refreshed.

Many years later, another keeper writing in the Lighthouse Journal recorded that he had spent over 200 hours watching and had counted over 150,000 sea birds of 33 different species (see Rattray Head Archives).  He noted that some remarkable counts had been made, the most memorable of these being a movement of kittiwakes on 29th October 1988, when 30,000 + birds had passed the lighthouse each hour.

Robert Clyne served at Rattray Head for 4 years and 9 months, before he received his letter from George Street, telling him that he was to be transferred again, this time further down the east coast, to what is probably the most famous of all Scottish Lighthouses, namely, Bell Rock.

Rattray Head Archives, Langness Lighthouse, Bell Rock Lighthouse, Noss Head