Leith Local History Society Articles
Roses lime Juice
In the late 1850'2 Lachlan Rose (1829-1885), the son of a Leith shipbuilder, set up a business provisioning ships. Among these provisions in 1863 was lime juice - a commodity every sea going vessel was required to carry by virtue of the Merchant Shi .......
Leith Fort
Leith Fort built in the 1780's is not to be confused with the Citadel in Dock Street built for Cromwell in 1656 of teh Martello Tower built on 1809. Therein lie two other stories.
John PAul Jones, the Scot from Kirkcudbright, the founder of the Ame .......
Martello Tower
The Martello Tower now lies half buried in the reclaimed land on what is now the eastern breakwater. It was built in 1809 to a design used at Mortella in Corsica. There are many of them dotted around estuaries in Britain as a deterrent to the Frenc .......
The Citadel, Leith
Cromwell marched on Scotland determined to bring her back into the Commonwealth. Without going too deeply into the history of the period, we know the Scots were heavily defeated at Dunbar and Cromwell entered Edinburgh and Leith.
In Leith, General .......
Leith Fort Gatehouse
Leith Fort built in the 1780's is not to be confused with the Citadel in Dock Street in 1656 or the Martello Tower built in 1809. Therein lie two other stories.
John Paul Jones, the Scot from Kirkcudbright and founder of the American Navy, sailed .......
Leith Heroes
Over the years Leith has had many heroes both in peace and in war.
Two have won the country’s highest decoration for valour, the “Victoria Cross.”
Archibald Adam born at 49 Couper Street, Leith, on 14th January 1879, the son of David, a dock po .......
Leith Heroes
LEITH NAUTICAL COLLEGE
I joined the Radio Department of Leith Nautical College in August 1963 after spending 3 years with Ferranti following 5 years in London teaching, mainly, Marine Radar Maintenance. The London course, I believed, was the best .......
MEMORIES OF GREAT JUNCTION STREET
257 Great Junction Street - that sombre Victorian building and identical to so many other tenements now long gone – opposite the State cinema was the family home.
Unfading memories include the big wooden front door and two rows of brass pull bells .......
GREAT JUNCTION STREET ANCESTORS
GREAT JUNCTION STREET ANCESTORS
My Great-Grandfather, Anthony, had a sawmill at 89 Great Junction Street from 1880 until 1899. The sawmill was known as “Seaport Sawmill” and I have a photograph of him and his employees (bowler hat and flat caps) .......
SOURCES FOR RESEARCH INTO THE SHIPPING OF LEITH
Sources for research into the shipping of Leith, 1600-1850
For the 17th century the best single sources are the port books. These are far from comprehensive but do give an insight into the trade of the port of Leith. They identify the ships, s .......
LEITH INFIRMARY
LEITH INFIRMARY
A correspondent complains at being very much shocked at the uncomfortable appearance of the Leith “Infirmary Cart” as he calls it, for conveying invalids to the hospital. If this “Cart” have all the faults he mentions, of which we .......
Summer Outing 1905 style
A summer outing – 1905 style
On 9th June 1905 the members of Leith Burns Club went on an excursion to Aberfoyle. They left Leith on special train from Junction Bridge Station and picked up more passengers at Bonnington and Waverley. Event .......
South Leith Church
South Leith Parish Church
Some little known information on South Leith Parish Church and its place in the history of Leith in the 17th century.
Elders had more responsibility than they have today. In his district an Elder had to see that the s .......
Records of Leith
Records of Leith
Did you play the game, Chinese Whispers, when you were young? A phrase was whispered along the line and the last person shouted our what he or she had heard. Invariably it bore no relation to what had been whispered in the first .......
Leith Police Court
Leith Police Court - extracted from Leith Burgh Pilot
Week ending May 1873
James Smith, Labourer, Fox Lane, for assaulting his wife in his house there, fined 20s with alternative of 20 days imprisonment.
Elizabet McIver or Robertson, with no f .......
Astonishing Discovery
An “Astonishing Discovery”
From Leith Burgh Pilot - Saturday 11th July 1914
The committees of both Houses of Parliament unanimously agreed to pass a Bill for the withdrawal of sewage from the Water of Leith.
Unable to prevent the Bill being .......
William Sanderson, Distillers
William Sanderson & Son Ltd
Distillers, Leith
In 1852 Mark Sanderson, respected wine and spirit importer in Leith, sent his thirteen year old son William to his best friend Matthew Buchan, master wine and spirit merchant and cordial manufacturer .......
"Of course we shouldn't have"
Of course we shouldn’t have but we did!
What am I talking about? Instead of crossing the 22 yards to the air raid shelter in Taylor Gardens, the family – well two families living almost next door to each other in Ballantyne Road – bunked together. .......
The Battle of Trafalgar
It is interesting to note on this 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar that four men from Leith served aboard HMS Victory at that battle. They were:
Joshua Murray, aged 27, Able Seaman
Robert Ross, aged 20, landsman
James Sibbald, aged 19 .......
1742 - Trouble in the Kirkyard
In 1742 many people in South Leith had their suspicions about George Carkettle the grave-maker. They thought that he was selling bodies to anatomists.
This came to a head one July evening when Robert Henderson, a Custom House porter, and his wif .......
Leith People from the Past
The Leith Newspapers from the 19th and early 20th centuries contain lots of “potted biographies” of Leith people. Some of these were published when the person concerned was elected to the Town Council, the School Board or some other local body. The .......
American Hospital in Leith in 1918
For a few months in 1918 there was an American Naval Hospital in Leith. It was located at the Leith Poor House - better known to later generations as the Eastern General Hospital.
The Leith Poor House had earlier in the First World War been requi .......
A Scandinavian Connection
In North Junction Street, wedged between a tenement and Ferrylee Nursing Home, stands a small, but significant, building still referred to by many Leithers as The Scandinavian Church. In 1863 a graduate of divinity - Johan Cordt Harmens - came to Ed .......
Old Cannon Found in Junction Place
In August this year two bollards embedded in concrete outside the Victoria Baths were found to be cannon. They are believed to date from the late 18th or early 19th centuries and to have some connection with the old Leith Fort.
Leith Fort was bui .......