Brechin, 30 High Street, Old Town Hall

The first reference to a Tolbooth (pretorium) in Brechin occurs in 1450 (Thoms, 1977, ll). In 1580 and 1697 there were notices of repairs being carried out on the Tolbooth which apparently stood on the corner of High Street and Nether West Wynd (Church Street). While the council and bailies' court met on the first floor, part of the ground floor was used as a jail. A town council ordinance of 1767 which said that the Tolbooth stair 'shall be the Cross and mercat place of Brechin is all time coming' presents the only indication of the appearance of the pre-1789 Tolbooth (Thoms, 1977, 140). A new two-storey structure was built on the site of the old Tolbooth in 1789.

Information from ‘Historic Brechin: The Archaeological Implications of Development’ (1977).

The two-storeyed town-house is set in the NW angle of Church Street and High Street, which here broadened out for use as a market-place. It is rectangular on plan, measuring 14.5m across its S front by 7.7m, and is constructed of greybrown sandstone ashlar with rusticated quoins. The S front is of four regular bays, with a ground-floor doorway in the W bay giving access to the staircase, and a central gablet incorporates a renewed date-stone inscribed ' 1789'. A modern shop-front in the ground floor of the E wall replaces three square-headed lights visible in early photographs, but at first floor level there is an original Venetian window and in the E gable there is a clock-face surmounted by an open bellcot with an ogee-shaped roof.

Some internal alterations were carried out in 1855-6, notably to the staircase and the ground-floor rooms, while the main first-floor room has been partitioned during modern fireplaces in the N wall and is overlooked by a W gallery framed by wooden pilasters and surmounted by a plaster alterations. This room, which has a coombed ceiling, had two cornice decorated with swags. A small recess to the N of the Venetian window evidently contained a rope which enabled the bell to be rung from inside the building.

HISTORY

While Brechin possessed a pretorium (court-house) where a sheriff's inquisition into market-privileges was held in 1450, the present town-house replaces one of late 17th-century date which by 1789 was in 'great disrepair'. The new building was begun in that year and completed in 1790. It was agreed that John Gourlay, mason, should ' oversee the carrying on the whole work of that building', while the mason-contractor was George Scott. The town council agreed to fund the new building by public subscription, and contributions were received from the guildry and from the local Member of Parliament, Sir David Carnegie. For their contribution, the guildry received the right to call the main first-floor room, which was also used as the council-chamber, 'The Guild Hall of Brechin'.

The ground storey originally contained a shop, court-room, debtors' prison and two cells for criminals, one of them a 'black hole'. Gurney in 1819 described 'a tolerably decent apartment for debtors, and two wretched, dirty cells for criminals', one of which allowed communication by a grating with passers-by. The prison inspector in 1835 considered that it was 'one of the worst prisons I have visited', and despite subsequent repairs a new prison was built on the edge of the town in 1844. Part of the ground storey was subsequently used as a police-station.

Information from ‘Tolbooths and Town-Houses: Civic Architecture in Scotland to 1833’ (1996).

NO 5969 6018 Brechin Town House is on a corner between the High Street and Church Street. The High Street frontage, built between 1789 and 1790 to replace the earlier tollbooth on the same site, is well recorded. However, during the reconstruction of the Town House a number of previously unknown features relating to the building at 2–4 Church Street, the Church Street elevation and a number of internal structures were exposed. The structural evidence suggests that this building was built soon after the High Street frontage. It was possible to trace the original form of the Church Street façade and compare it with a drawing from 1867 and a photograph from c1900. In the early 19th century this end of the building held the cells and later a police office. A blocked internal doorway would have given access to the cells. A drainage trench below the floor inside the new toilets revealed a short section of wall foundation which may be part of the wall footings of the

original 15th-century tollbooth. These features were recorded 22 January–10 February 2009.

Report: Aberdeenshire SMR and RCAHMS

Funder: Angus Council

HK Murray and JC Murray – Murray Archaeological Services Ltd