Winchburgh, General

WINCHBURGH

Before the arrival of the shale industry and particularly of Irish miners to serve it in the 1860s, Winchburgh was but a small hamlet at the junction of road and canal, with an inn and staging post. Its setting was rapidly industrialised; road, rail and canal (some good canal bridges nearby). Shale-oil bings dominated it to south and east - that to the south a veritable Table Mountain, one of the biggest bings in Scotland comprising 15 million tonnes, with a footprint of 158 acres. Neat red-brick, late-19th-century miners' rows, in an unusual interlocking L-plan with red sandstone dressings, were laid out east of the canal, the names chosen from the Hopes of Hopetoun.

Taken from "West Lothian: An Illustrated Architectural Guide", by Stuart Eydmann, Richard Jaques and Charles McKean, 2008. Published by the Rutland Press http://www.rias.org.uk

NT07SE 16 095 744.

The name "Winchburgh" - called Wincelburgh in 1189, means "town in the nook or angle". The presumption is that the "angle" is a bend in the Niddry Burn, but this interpretation does not suit the present village of Winchburgh, some distance from the burn. It should be noted, however, that the barony of Niddry or West Niddry was often known as the barony of Winchburgh, and it is not unlikely that Winchburgh was originally beside Niddry Castle - a site which topographically fits the suggested interpretation.

A Macdonald 1941

Centred at NT 095 744: The area surrounding Niddry Castle (NT07SE 1) is covered by multi-period rig cultivation with associated field banks, but no buildings were located. At NT 0956 7439 are four small recent stack yards consisting of slightly raised circular earthen platforms c.3.0m diameter edged with stones.

Visited by OS (DWR) 6 March 1974

NT07SE 16.00 c. 08854 74880 Winchburgh, general

The town is also depicted on the Map sheet NT07NE.

Edinburgh, Winchburgh.

Glendevon Farm.