Publication Account
Date 1951
Event ID 1096705
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1096705
129. The General Register House, Princes Street.
The story of the building of this repository for the National Records of Scotland has already been told (1) by Mr. H. M. Paton, formerly Curator of the Historical Records, and his account has been freely used in preparing this article. He points out that, before 1662, such of the National Records as had been spared by Edward I and Cromwell, or had accumulated since the latter's depredations, were stored in the Castle. In that year, however, the judicial records were removed to the Laigh Parliament House, and by 1689 most of the others had followed them to the same place, where they lay heaped together, unsorted and ravaged by rats and mice. The Town Council, to whose notice the matter was brought, feeling that such an unsatisfactory state of affairs should not be allowed to continue, assumed responsibility, and proposed to include a new Record Office in their scheme of 1722 for accommodating the Court of Justiciary. They accordingly took powers to that end, but on the score of economy alternative proposals were made-to use either the N.E. tower of Heriot's Hospital or the upper part of the Abbey gatehouse. Nothing was done until 1765, when, at the instance of James, 14th Earl of Morton, who had been appointed Clerk Register five years earlier, the Lords of Session and the Barons of Exchequer made certain representations to the Treasury as the result of which George III granted £12,000, the major part of the sum accruing from the sale of estates forfeited after the Forty-five, for securing a site and constructing a suitable building. Thereupon Trustees were appointed to administer the fund and to carry out the project.
The site first considered was in the gardens of Heriot’s Hospital, at that time the only open area in the capital that was sufficiently large to accommodate the building envisaged by the Earl. This building, if it was the one drawn by Robert Baldwin, architect, and engraved in 1767, was designed on a square grid-iron plan of two vaulted storeys, the lower of which was to be subterranean while the upper one was to be surmounted by a dome. However, objections were raised to this site as being too far from the Session-House and the centre of business, and in 1768 the Earl of Morton died. Meanwhile the New Town had been projected, and its access, the North Bridge, was already nearing completion. The magistrates consequently found themselves able to offer the Trustees a monumental site facing the outer end of the new bridge; and realising that the proposed building would not only add to the amenity of the city but that, if built on this spot, would also · promote the feuing of the municipal lands lying N. of the bridge, they proposed to make a free gift of the site. But the parcel of ground available on the lower slopes of Moultrie's Hill was, by itself, too small; additional properties on N. and W. had therefore to be acquired by purchase. The Trustees, having accepted the Town's offer and having purchased the adjoining properties, requested Lord Frederick Campbell, who had now succeeded to the post of Lord Clerk Register, to obtain designs for the new building. In 1772 he reported that he had instructed Messrs. Robert and James Adam of London to prepare a design*, which he exhibited and which the Town Council duly approved. The brothers Adam were thereupon appointed as the architects, and James Salisbury as Clerk of Works. The architects were instructed to take tenders for carrying out the first portion of the work; and they undertook to furnish all the necessary drawings and to visit the work once in two years, or annually if necessary, for a fee of two and a half per cent of the total cost with a further sum of fifty guineas for each visit made from London. If this fee seems moderate in comparison with the modern scale, it must be remembered that the design allowed for the continuous repetition of units and that the drawings supplied, to judge by the casual collection preserved in three portfolios in the Historical Research Room, are much less elaborate than is now considered necessary, a good deal being left to the initiative of the tradesmen. At the same time, these drawings are quite adequate, and they show that the office and building methods of their time were in essentials similar to those in use to-day.
By August 1773 the preliminary work on the site had been carried out, and the contract for the mason work placed with John Wilson and David Henderson. The conditions of contract, it is interesting to note, prohibited building during the winter, that is to say between October 31st and March 1st, to avoid the danger of frost; and they wisely specify that "the building shall be carried on so leisurely from year to year as to allow the parts built successively to settle and consolidate before the others are put above them." On June 27th, 1774, the foundation stone was laid in the presence of the Lord Provost and Magistrates by three of the Trustees, the Lord Clerk Register, the Lord Advocate and the Lord Justice Clerk. It bore a brass plate inscribed CONSERVANDIS TABULIS PUBLICIS POSITUM EST ANNOMVIILXXIV (sic) MUNIFICENTIA OPTIMI ET PIENTISSIMI REGIS GEORGII TERTII** ("Founded for the preservation of the public records in the year 1774 by the generosity of the excellent and most pious King George III"),and within it was a cavity in which was deposited a glass vase containing a gold medal struck to commemorate the King's coronation together with a specimen of each gold, silver and copper coin minted in his reign.
(See RCAHMS 1951, 192-195, No. 129 for a full description).
RCAHMS 1951, visited c.1941
*This drawing, fully rendered in monochrome, is preserved in the Register House. It bears the superscription ‘signed July 30th 1882 Fredk. Campbell Cler. Regis.’
**The foundation stone itself not being visible, the inscription has been taken from the Trustees minute-book.
(1) O.E.C., xvii, pp.147-55
