INVERCLYDE dramatically voted against Scottish independence by a wafer thin margin — with only 86 votes in it.

In a night of twists and turns at the Waterfront Leisure Centre in Greenock, returning officer John Mundell finally delivered the result everyone was waiting for shortly after 3.30am.

The Better Together campaign triumphed in the end but only by the skin of their teeth.

In an unbelievably close race a total of 27,243 people backed the Yes side while No gathered 27,329 votes.

The turnout was huge — with 54,601 ballot papers cast, representing a whopping 87.4 per cent of the registered electorate.

Mr Mundell said regardless of the result that it had been a ‘historic moment for Scotland’ and said it was ‘a privilege’ to be part of.

There were only 29 rejected ballots.

The evening started off with buoyant Yes activists convinced they had done enough to win over the Inverclyde public.

Many senior figures in the No camp also feared a late surge in support for breaking away from the union.

At one point the vote was so close that a recount looked certain with both sides agreed that it was simply ‘too close to call’.

When the final totals for both sides were eventually read out it was met with gasps from all sides.

National Better Together figures expressed their delight at the result, with Tory leader Ruth Davidson describing it as a ‘massive’ moment.

The close count regisered internationally too — within minutes of it being announced and discussed on TV, the word Inverclyde was trending worldwide on Twitter.

At the count, triumphant Better Together campaigners punched the air with joy, hugged each other and let out huge sighs of relief while Yes activists were left shattered by the outcome.

But both sides were quick off the mark to call for the people of Inverclyde to put their differences aside in the wake of the split decision, while there was also shared delight at the turnout.

Places like Branchton were said to be just 30 ballots short of a full house and Gourock and Larkfield both above 90 per cent, while upper Port Glasgow and Kilmacolm were also said to around the 80-85 per cent mark.

TIMELINE THIS is how things unfolded on a night of high drama.

The first result came just before 1.30am and was a sign of things to come as Yes Scotland’s hopes of taking Clackmannanshire were dashed, when No claimed 54 per cent of the vote.

They soon followed up with Orkney and then the Shetlands. More of a surprise was the result at 3am which saw the Western Isles go to No in a bodyblow to the Yes camp.

They hoped that Inverclyde would deliver their first win only to fall agonisingly short in a result described as ‘breathtaking’ by commentators.

Our near neighbours in Renfrewshire backed No by a more decisive margin but just when it looked like one way traffic, Dundee voted Yes and a victory in West Dunbartonshire shortly afterwards made it two in a row. A flurry of declarations just after 4am was dominated by a thumping No majority in East Lothian. Better Together also secured Midlothian and a crucial win in Stirling, where there was a massive 90 per cent turnout Yes campaigners found some solace in a clear cut win in Falkirk and at 4.20am, with 12 out of 32 areas declared, the No camp led by 45,543 votes.

The clear sense was that momentum was with the pro-union side now and in the space of less than 10 minutes they won in Angus, Dumfries and Galloway, East Renfrewshire, East Dunbartonshire and Aberdeen. With No on 56 per cent nationally, the Yes side desperately needed the victory they claimed in North Lanarkshire soon afterwards.

But the result was reversed with a larger margin right next door in South Lanarkshire and Perth & Kinross and West Lothian both voted No in quick succession. By this point it was clear the Yes side needed a big win in Glasgow and while they took the spoils in the country’s largest city, they needed a bigger margin than 53 per cent.

A series of wins then went to No in quick succession and while the Scottish Borders result was entirely expected, their win in East Ayrshire was billed as a surprise by the political pundits.

Sandwiched in between were victories in North and South Ayrshire and by this point the historic referendum was all over bar the shouting, with the broadcasters ‘calling’ the result as No in their official forecasts. After a lull, Aberdeenshire went to No and then the capital city, Edinburgh, saw a resounding 61 per cent vote to stay in the union, followed by a similar scenario in Argyll and Bute.

At 6.07am the result from Fife confirmed what everyone already knew — that Scotland had voted against independence and decided to remain in the United Kingdom, making the two remaining results academic to the result.

For the record, Moray and the Highlands both voted no, leaving the final result 55 to 45 per cent in favour of No on a truly remarkable overall turnout of 84 per cent.