Edinburgh, 32, 34, 36 Dalmeny Street, Territorial Army Drill Hall

Anderson, Simon & Crawford, 1900-01, 2-storey, 7-bay symmetrical "Wrenaissance" classical military drill hall. Office building to street with polished sandstone ashlar facade, squared and snecked side elevations with polished ashlar dressings, red brick rear elevation. Large drill hall to rear, of red and yellow striped buttressed brickwork over rubble base. Base course, cill course at 1st floor navigated around down pipes, mutuled cornice at eaves.

Centre bay slightly advanced and pedimented, segmental vehicle arch flanking banded pilasters with capitals and bases; arch centred with keystone, frieze above with inscription; "7th Bn. The Royal Scots". Engaged obelisks framing 1st floor, bipartite window at centre.

Segmental pediment over eaves with matching bracketed cornice, carved coat-of-arms and date 1901 in tympanum. Bipartite windows at ground and 1st floors of other bays except 2nd and 6th bays with matching doors at ground floor, architrave with cornice over pulvinated frieze, carved Roman military motifs at 1st floor. 3-bay with single ground floor window flanked by slit windows.

15-pane timber sash and case windows to street elevation, multi-pane windows to end elevations. 2-leaf doors to centre archway, 8-pane glazed upper section, evenly spaced nailheads and iron hinges. Green-grey slate piended roof with platform, square pyramidal cupola over N pitch to left of centre. Slate-hung box dormer to W pitch. Flagpole at cill of centre 1st floor window. Cast-iron downpipes at end of street elevation and profiled gutter at eaves. Tall ashlar shouldered wallhead stack centring E elevation, matching stack to outer left of W elevation. Additional ashlar stacks at right angles to N and W elevations, with red cans.

In 1914 the the drill hall was the HQ of the 7th battalion, The Royal Scots, and base for "A" to "H" Companies of the battalion.]

This building is significant historically in its connection to the worst disaster to befall the community of Leith. On Friday 22 May 1915 a south-bound troop train crashed into a stationary local train outside the signalbox at Quintinhill, near Gretna, and was then hit by a north-bound express. 227 passengers were killed, and 246 injured.

485 officers ["and men"] of the 7th battalion of the Royal Scots, on their way to Gallipoli, were on the train, 214 of whom were killed. Relatives of the soldiers congregated outside the drill hall seeking news, and eventually a list of the dead was read out from a window, before being posted up outside. By Sunday the bodies had been transported from Gretna to Leith Central Station, and were taken to the drill hall then functioning as a temporary mortuary. This is a building with good quality details surviving intact.

Historic Scotland Listed Building Description; Information from HS/RCAHMS World War One Audit Project (GJB) 28 October 2013.