Hugh Miller

Hugh Miller, 1802-1856, was a geologist, writer and evangelical christian from Cromarty. He became interested in geology when he worked as a quarryman. Self-taught, obviously brilliant, he was instrumental in the development of the Free Church in Scotland and actively opposed the idea of evolution, preferring to believe in creationism but conceding that it must have taken God rather longer to create the world than previously thought. He produced a weekly newspaper called 'The Witness', writing up to 10,000 words every week.

He suffered, or thought he suffered, from a disease of the brain and shot himself on Christmas Eve 1856. They thought enough of him to put his statue on a pedestal looking out over Cromarty within a couple of years of his death and there he is today. Next to the statue is the Gaelic Chapel, built for gaelic speakers in the 1770s.