Cross Keys HBR and WB

Date 5 February 2014 - 30 May 2014

Event ID 992207

Category Recording

Type Standing Building Recording

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/992207

GUARD Archaeology Ltd were commissioned to undertake a programme of historic

building recording and watching brief during ground breaking works at 24 Northgate,

Peebles during the course of refurbishment works to the Cross Keys Hotel between

February and May 2014. It appears that the original building - the townhouse built by

Williamson of Cardrona in 1653 - was L-shaped in plan with many later additions and

alterations. The major alterations and extensions appear to have carried on well into the

twentieth century. Many of the features recorded during the works were only partially exposed,

which makes detailed phasing of the building difficult. These features have been covered

over and protected again by modern fittings and little if any detrimental impact has

been made to the majority of the features recorded during the works programme.

The watching brief recorded a limited number of partially exposed features, comprising

walls, recent cellared areas, floor surfaces and drainage associated with changes of

use of the buildings. These were mainly in the former stable or barn forming the north

range of the building and relate to its change of use from a byre or stable to residential

accommodation.

The most notable feature perhaps, was the wall forming the northern end of the main

building, which measured 1.68 m wide at ground floor level and was found with a

relict window opening at first floor level on the northwest corner of the wall and

a further possible relict window opening on the right hand side of the fireplace at

first floor level. The width of the wall is unusual compared to the rest of the building

and it may be that this wall was the fragmentary remnant of a predecessor building

destroyed during the English raid on the town in 1549, largely robbed of stone and

subsequently incorporated into the townhouse built in 1653.

The first seventeenth century phase of the building comprised an L-shape in plan and

the earliest improvement shortly followed in the form of an outshot forming a porch

in front of the original main door entrance to the property; this was built in 1693.

Single storey extensions to the north and east of the building appeared to have been

built sometime in the eighteenth century with first floor additions to these added in

the twentieth century. A new extension over three floors was added to the east of the

building in the nineteenth century and a stable block to the north of the hotel appears

to have been built at this time with many subsequent alterations carried out well into

the twentieth century.

The building has undergone major alterations during the three hundred and fifty years

it has been standing and the main fabric retains this story.