Archaeology Notes

Event ID 720799

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Archaeology Notes

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/720799

NT68SW 4.00 6371 8125

NT68SW 4.01 637 812 Pillbox (possible)

(NT 6371 8125) Cairn (NR)

OS 6" map (1969)

Cairn, St Baldred's Cradle: This fine round cairn of stones covered with grass is situated on a promontory, about 40ft OD and some 120 yards W of the rock known as St Baldred's Cradle. It is 60ft in diameter and 11ft high.

RCAHMS 1924, visited 1913

This cairn consists of a stony mound now covered with sand and grass; it is oval in shape rather than circular and measures 28m from E to W by 25m transveresly and has an an average height of 3.0m. The top of the cairn is flattish and measures 13m from E to W by 12m transversely. There is no evidence of a cist or kerb.

Revised at 1:2500.

Visited by OS (WDJ) 14 November 1962

This cairn was demolished early in the last war, and the mound now visible covers only the remains of a concrete pill-box.

H C Nisbet 1975.

This is an oval cairn 3-4m in height, grass covered and with a flat top. The only visible remains of the WW2 pill-box, which was sited on the top of the cairn, are two loose stones. The cairn seems to be stabilised by the course dune grass covering it, traces of the pill box may remain underground. Several footpaths criss-cross the mound but are causing minimal damage. The pillbox as observed on 1946 AP's, was of the classic type 22 hexagonal shape. The pillbox had either been sunken deep into the ground, or material had been piled up around it to roof level, and an attempt was made to disguise the roof with a covering of turf.. It is therefore possible that the pillbox is now totally buried in situ and that the centre of the cairn was destroyed during its construction. B108 7196-7 15/4/46.

Site recorded by GUARD during the Coastal Assessment Survey for Historic Scotland, 'The Firth of Forth from Dunbar to the Coast of Fife' 17th February 1996.

A visit to the site in November 2001 confirms that this cairn survives and is as the Ordnance Survey description of 1962. The cairn still stands to a height of over 3m.

There is no evidence of a pillbox that has possibly demolished this site, but 150m to the SW is an area of disturbed ground which are the remains of a Second World War trench system. Mr Nisbet may have mistaken these for the location of the cairn in 1975.

Information from D Easton, November 2001