Town in Perthshire, Scotland
Crieff
Crieff once hosted Scotland's biggest cattle fair, and a few miles away a distillery cat named Towser made it into the record books for catching mice.
Key information
- County
- Perthshire
- Nation
- Scotland
- Known for
- Crieff Hydro, the old Tryst cattle markets, Glenturret Distillery and the Highland Gathering
- Famous people
- Thomas Henry Meikle, Thomas Morrison, Towser
About Crieff
The cat who caught 28,899 mice
Towser is the best-known resident of the Crieff area, and she was a cat. She lived at the Glenturret Distillery just outside town, and over about 24 years she is recorded as catching 28,899 mice. That earned her a place in the Guinness World Records as the world's champion mouser. She died in 1987. The distillery still treats her as a local legend and has marked her memory with a statue. Glenturret itself claims to be Scotland's oldest working distillery, with a founding date of 1763. The cat is the better story, though.
When Crieff sold the nation's cattle
Long before the tourists arrived, Crieff was a place where the Highlands met the money. From the 1600s the Crieff Tryst was one of the great cattle markets of Scotland. Drovers walked huge herds down from the glens and islands to be sold here to Lowland and English dealers. Tens of thousands of cattle could pass through in a season. The town filled with drovers, dealers and deals struck by handshake. The cattle were then walked south, many of them to markets in England. In the 1770s the main trade shifted to Falkirk, which was closer to the southern markets. Crieff lost its great fair but never lost its place as the doorway to the north.
The town that took the water cure
In the Victorian age, fashionable people believed cold water, fresh air and good walks could cure almost anything. Crieff had plenty of all three. In 1868 the Crieff Hydropathic Establishment opened on the hillside above the town. Crieff Hydro, as everyone calls it, grew into one of Scotland's best-loved family hotels. Its founder was Dr Thomas Henry Meikle, and the business is still independent. Generations of Scottish families have spent holidays here, and the hotel keeps its tradition of making guests busy, with riding, golf and activities for children. The hydro made Crieff a holiday town, and the grand villas and hotels on the slopes above the centre are part of that story.
A town built between hill and strath
Crieff sits on a slope above the Strathearn valley, with the Knock of Crieff rising behind it. The wooded hill is the town's favourite short climb, and the viewpoint at the top looks across the strath to the hills beyond. On a clear day you can see how the town got its Gateway to the Highlands nickname, since this is where the lowland farmland ends and the mountains begin. The centre has a market cross and a steep, handsome main street. Morrison's Academy, founded in 1860 through the bequest of Thomas Morrison, is one of the town's best-known institutions, and its buildings add to the grand, Victorian look of the place. Golf is a local passion, and the surrounding countryside has long been walking and fishing country. Drummond Castle Gardens, with their formal parterre, are a short drive away.
Games, gatherings and a burned-out past
Crieff has had its share of drama. When the Jacobite army retreated north in early 1716, Crieff was among the Perthshire settlements burned on the order to leave nothing useful for the pursuing government troops. The town was rebuilt, and the stone houses of the old centre largely date from afterwards. Today the town's big day out is the Crieff Highland Gathering, held in summer. It brings together heavy events, pipe bands, Highland dancing and hill running in a way that has kept Highland tradition going in a town that was once its busiest marketplace. The food and drink scene has a distinctly Perthshire feel, with whisky from nearby Glenturret, local game and plenty of berries and soft fruit from the surrounding farms.