Blaikie Heugh, Balfour Monument

The monument to the memory of James Maitland Balfour (1820-1856), erected two years after his death from tuberculosis in Madeira, comprises a tall obelisk surmounting a pedestal with a stepped base, all finished in red ashlar. A yellow sandstone plaque on the south side of the pedestal reads: ‘Erected to the memory of James Maitland Balfour Esq, of Whittinghame, Major Commandant of the East Lothian Yeomanry Cavalry by the officers, non-commissioned officers and privates of the corps in testimony of their great respect and esteem for him as a commanding officer, of their affectionate regard for him as an amiable and able country gentleman and of their deep and lasting regret for his premature removal from among them. MDCCCLVIII.’

The monument is enclosed within a small square enclosure defined by a low random rubble wall topped by a dressed, slightly convex, sandstone cope but now missing its original iron railings. A disturbed gap on the east probably indicates the position of a once-gated entrance. Both the monument and the small enclosure in which it stands have been built on a raised platform measuring approximately 16m square by 1m in height. On the W, N and E, this platform is revetted by a well-constructed stone wall with a rounded cope; on the S there is a sharp drop towards the adjacent public road.

The monument is liberally adorned with a range of both historic and contemporary graffiti. The recent examples tend to be poorly executed and written in chalk or scratched into the surface with a sharp stone. The older graffiti, where a date is given, stretches back as far as 1911, but there is likely to be even older examples present. The majority of the graffiti comprises names or sets of initials and names, many of them paired, e.g. ‘ES + TC’, and ‘Max loves Claire’.

Visited by HES Survey and Recording (JRS) 18 July 2018.