Publication Account

Date 2013

Event ID 967469

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/967469

There was a bleachfield at Claverhouse since at least 1792, operated then by Thomas Collier & Co. In 1814, the firm of Turnbull & Co, was founded at Claverhouse by Hector Turnbull with William Baxter and Henry Boase. Most successful and longest lived of the bleachfields on the Dighty, not least because those downstream had to contend with its pollution. The manager lived in the largest house within the complex, and several others were allocated to key positions in the business. A long two-storey range incorporated a school as well as a counting house, with a bell and a clock. The other surviving building is a beetling mill. A chimney, reduced in height, still has an impressive stone plinth. This was the bleachworks for Low and Bonar Ltd that included Baxter Brothers, (DE9) so it kept in work until the 1970s, then became a kitchen furniture factory, and then a housing development. The ponds and lades now are managed for their historic and nature conservation interests.

M Watson, 2013