... through old maps in the National Library of Scotland and Edinburgh Central Library
Editor’s note: We recently received this article about the course of the Lochrin Burn, a lost waterway at Tollcross. It was written by our member, Frank Donald in 2017 and we thought it worth publishing on our website. It makes full use of the National Library of Scotland’s Maps website and we are very grateful to be able to re-use the images and others he photographed in Edinburgh Central Library.
The NLS maps in the article are hyperlinked so that you can zoom in on the detail should you wish.
A lost waterway
Dr Armitage’s fascinating talk, “The Prehistoric Landscape of Edinburgh”, at the Old Edinburgh Club meeting on 17th February 2016 mentioned the City’s lochs. A member asked a question about the course of the Lochrin Burn, commemorated in the buildings and streets off Home Street, which was presumed to have taken taken the outflow from the South or Borough Loch – where the Meadows are today. Charles J Smith’s indepensible book, Historic South Edinburgh, describes the Borough Loch, and states that “the (shallower) west end was ‘the head of the loch’ where, in 1700 was the Fleck Yett or small sluice gate across the burn, the Loch-rin, which ran out at the north west. Over the years the City authorities regulated the ‘clowse’ or sluice to prevent the loch draining and becoming too shallow.”
He continues “Before Edinburgh’s first piped water supply was brought from Comiston in 1621 the South Loch was the town’s principal source of drinking water. In 1598 the Town Council decided to bring water from the loch to four wells in the High Street, but there is no evidence that this was ever done. Two years earlier, access to the Loch’s water was given to the Fellowship and Society of Brewers, and several breweries were established …. at the east end of the loch. …. The brewers drew heavily upon the South Loch, and by the time the Society was dissolved in 1619 the loch had greatly shrunk. This was one of the main reasons why the Town Council considered the Comiston supply in 1621”.
Starting in 1657 there was a series of projects to drain the loch. Middle Meadow Walk was established in 1737 to allow the public to cross the partially drained bed. The earliest map I have found in the archives is Andrew and Mostyn Armstrong’s Map of the Three Lothians of 1773 [Map 1 below] which shows the line of the Burn from near the north west corner of the Meadows, and flowing under Fountain Bridge, and down the hill past Dalry to the Water of Leith at Roseburn.
Kincaid’s Plan of the City and Suburbs of Edinburgh in 1784 shows the line of the Burn out of the Meadows and rather scathingly calls it the “Common Sewer via Lochrin”. The details of the expanding city is clearly shown on Map 2 below.
The Strangers’ Guide of 1805 [Map 3] more optimistically calls the stream the ‘Dalry Burn’, and decorates it with lines of trees on each bank. To quote Charles Smith, “In 1804 the Edinburgh Town Council began the reconstruction of the Meadows. A covered drain was laid which emerged in the King’s Park. However the disappearance of the old South Loch did not please everyone. James Haig of Lochrin Distillery in Wrychtishousis (situated at the corner of what are now Home Street and Gilmore Place) strongly opposed any interference with the Lochrin Burn, water from which he used, he said, ‘for cooling my worms’ meaning his spiral distillation tubing. Haig’s complaint was upheld and the Lochrin Burn was left untouched, though eventually channelled underground to join the Water of Leith at Coltbridge”.
Kirkwood’s Map of the environs of Edinburgh (1817) [Map 4] shows the proposed line of the Union Canal crossing the line of the Lochrin Burn (which is shown as far as its meeting with Fountain Bridge). Construction began the following year and the first cargo arrived at Port Hopetoun on 4th May 1822. As the canal runs on a higher contour, it would not have been possible for the Burn to flow into it. Rather the canal water would have backed up onto the Meadows. The line of the Burn between Fountain Bridge and Dalry House is no longer clear in this map.
John Wood and Thomas Brown’s Plan of the City of Edinburgh, including all the latest and intended improvements in 1831 [Map 5] shows the Burn relative to some long disappeared streets and fields. The Lochrin Distillery is shown in all its glory, as is the Drumdryan Brewery, on the site of the modern King’s Theatre. The western stretch of the Burn continues from the Distillery and under the canal north of the Lochrin Basin, more or less where the truncated and gentrified canal now begins and ends.
Zooming out from the previous image, you can see where the Burn makes almost its last public appearance [Map 6]. It shows the Burn relative to both actual and projected streets. North of the never-to-be-built Morton Crescent and of Rigg Street, now Panmure Place, and west of the Lochrin Distillery, it appears to be as much a property boundary as a watercourse.
The 1852 Ordnance Six Inch map [Map 7] also shows the Lochrin Burn as a property boundary, though water may still be flowing through the uncovered portions which are shown in blue. The geography of Toll Cross is changing rapidly, with a large number of slaughter houses standing east of the Canal, and there are a number of Rope Walks. The Distillery still stands north of Lochrin House. The Burn reappears to the west of the Canal and describes an elegant curve, turning downhill to pass under Fountain Bridge at its junction with Gilmore Park
Another view of the 1852 Ordnance Six Inch map [Map 8] illustrates the country between Fountain Bridge and Dalry House, last seen on Kirkwood’s 1817 Map. Across the road from the end of the open Burn stand Brandfield House with a parterre and Brandfield Place with a more conventional garden. The new Caledonian Railway (now the Western Approach Road) cuts across the line of the Burn and, while it may feed the pond north of Brandfield House, there is no sign of it beyond the tracks.
In this further extract from the Six Inch map [Map 9] Drumdryan House and Brewery still stand, but the east side of Home Street is marked out with building plots with a timber yard behind. The Burn is marked on the map in blue and presumably still has water in it, but it disappears abruptly at the edge of the timber yard. There are curling ponds along the north side of Meadow Walk.
Moving on to the 1877 OS map Gilmore Place occupies the bottom of the map, and Lochrin House still remains [Map 10]. The Distillery has gone, to be replaced by a Paraffin Oil Works, with a Riding School to the north. West of the Canal the curve of the Burn remains, very much as a boundary.
The 1877 map [Map 11] shows how much the layout of the streets to the east had evolved since 1852, into the state they are in today. Chalmers Street, Melville Drive, Brougham Place and Panmure Place are all in their current form.
The line of the Burn leaves the Meadows just to the west of Chalmers Street (where the Unite Students’ Residence now stands). Until fairly recently it would have been set in stone by the back walls of the Chalmers Street houses, but these have been greatly modified by the construction of the new St Thomas of Aquin’s School. The Burn is still fossilised by the wall at the bottom of St Catherine’s Convent lawn and the back-garden walls on the north side of Panmure Place, and unexpectedly passes just to the north of St Michael and All Saints Church.
Forty eight years on from the 1877 OS sheets Bartholomew’s Post Office Plan of Edinburgh and Leith [Map 12] shows how the Canal has been cut back and the Lochrin Basin filled in. The curve of the Burn west of the Canal can just be discerned to the right of the “G” in Gilmore Park. The slaughter houses have been succeeded by Tollcross Primary School. Lochrin House has gone and Lochrin Place and Lochrin Terrace have been laid out on the site of the Paraffin Oil Works. Though not marked the Cameo Cinema has been established on the corner of Lochrin Place and Home Street, and the King’s Theatre has replaced the Drumdryan Brewery. The Meadows are being developed for recreation, and the ghost of the Burn can still be seen between Chalmers Street and Brougham Place.
Map 13 shows how the area looked in the the mid-2010s, 90 years on, according to Google, before the Unite Students Residence had been built. Lochrin Place has been knocked through to the area where the Canal bank is being commercially developed and gentrified. Whether the underground culvert still remains somewhere in the vicinity or has been incorporated into the main drainage system must be the subject of a separate study.
Using the National Library of Scotland's Maps website
Editor’s postscript:
These maps begin to illustrate what is freely available on the National Library of Scotland’s Maps website, https://maps.nls.uk/. NLS has digitised an amazing collection which you can use in many ways.
One invaluable feature is the ability to compare different maps side by side. This is ideal for investigating when physical changes were made on the ground. You can also pull in satellite and LiDAR images should you wish for modern aerial views and what is below the surface.
You could revisit Frank’s research to get a feel for how the side-by-side viewer works, or try a similar exercise following the path of the Braid Burn as it changes to the Figgate Burn and down to the sea at Portobello.
There is an overarching guide to the website at: https://maps.nls.uk/guide/
The side-by-side viewer is explained at: https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/help.html#sidebyside
Essentially: go to https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/side-by-side/ and in the left hand panel, select a category, eg, ‘Scotland, Town Plans’, then a map or map series, say ‘Edinburgh OS 1849’, then zoom in to the level of detail yu want, and compare this what the image in the right hand panel. There is a satellite image set as default, but you can choose your next map for comparison.
A second postscript
We are grateful to Graeme Cruickshank for proposing a minor correction regarding the timing of the construction of the Union Canal. Kirkwood’s 1817 map (Map 4) shows the proposed not actual route of the canal and we have amended the original text accordingly.
Graeme is author of ‘Port Hopetoun, Eastern Terminus of the Union Canal’, Book of the Old Edinburgh Club, New Series, 20, 2024, pp. 93–111.
