Dalkeith

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is about the town in Scotland. For the Perth suburb, see Dalkeith, Western Australia.

Dalkeith (Scottish Gaelic: Dail Cheith) (pop. 11,566 in 2001) is a town in Midlothian, Scotland, lying on the River North Esk. It was granted a burgh of barony in 1401 and a burgh of regality in 1540. The settlement of Dalkeith grew southwestwards from its 12th-century castle (now Dalkeith Palace).

In 1650 Cromwell’s army came to Dalkeith. His officer, General Monck, was Commander in Scotland and the government of the country was based out of Dalkeith castle.

In the 17th century Dalkeith had one of Scotland's largest markets in its exceptionally broad High Street. In 1831 Dalkeith was linked to Edinburgh by a railway line that transported coal, minerals and agricultural produce and two decades later, in 1853, a Corn Exchange, the largest interior grain market in Scotland, was built.

The Collegiate Church of St Nicholas Buccleuch stands on the High Street. Dedicated to St Nicholas, this medieval church became a collegiate establishment in 1406, founded by Sir James Douglas. The nave and transepts date from 1854, when the inside of the church was greatly altered. The chancel was abandoned in 1590, walled off from the rest of the church, and is now ruinous. Sir James Douglas, 1st Earl of Morton, and his wife Joanna, daughter of James I, are buried in the choir and have stone effigies.

Dalkeith Palace, which replaced the castle in the late 16th century and was rebuilt in the early 18th century, lies at the north-east edge of the town. It is a seat of the Duke of Buccleuch, surrounded by parkland and follies.

Built in 1648, the building on the High Street now known as the Tolbooth began to be used as a tolbooth for the administration of the town in the early 1700’s. It served as a place for law and order and featured a prison in the west half, a court room on the east, and a dungeon known as the ‘black hole’ below ground. In front of the building there is a circle of stones to mark the spot where the last public hanging in Dalkeith occurred in 1827.

Other notable buildings include Watch Towers at the cemetery (1827 and 1829) and early 19th-century iron mills.

Dalkeith is the main administrative centre for Midlothian. It is twinned with Jarnac in France.

Born in Dalkeith were the poet John Roland (1575), the politician Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville (1742), the artist John Kay (1742), Robert Aitken who published the first Bible in North America^[1], and the mathematical physicist Peter Guthrie Tait (1831). During the election campaign of 1880 (the "Midlothian campaign") that resulted in the defeat of Disraeli's government, William Gladstone delivered a famous speech in Dalkeith.

The town is divided into four distinct areas: Dalkeith proper with its town centre and historic core, with Eskbank to its west and Woodburn to its east. Eskbank is the well-heeled district of Dalkeith with many large Victorian and newer houses. To the south of Eskbank is Newbattle with its abbey. Woodburn could not be more different, being a working class council estate built after World War II.

Dalkeith has a large 24 hour out-of-town Tesco supermarket in Hardengreen, located on the A7 between Dalkeith (Eskbank) and Bonnyrigg.

[edit] Transport

Dalkeith lies on the A68, one of the main routes south from Edinburgh to Jedburgh and across the border to Darlington. A new bypass to take traffic away from the town centre is under construction. This will become the A68 when it is completed.

Other main roads serving Dalkeith are:

A6094 - leads SW towards Bonnyrigg and Peebles, and NE towards Musselburgh.
A768 - leads west from Eskbank to Lasswade and Loanhead.
B6373 - a road wholly within Dalkeith, leaving and rejoining the A68.
B6414 - leaves the A6094 on the NE edge of Dalkeith (at Woodburn) and leads NE to Tranent.
B6392 - runs north-south through Eskbank, and is formerly the route of the A7 which leads from Edinburgh to Galashiels and Hawick.
B703 - leads south from Eskbank, through Newbattle, to Newtongrange.
B6482 - leaves the A68 on the SE edge of Dalkeith (at Woodburn) and leads into Easthouses and Mayfield.

The planned reestablishment of the Waverley Railway Line will link Dalkeith to the national rail network, with a station at Eskbank on the western edge of Dalkeith.