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Coatbridge
(Cotts Brig)
"COATBRIDGE, (From: http://www.british-history.ac.uk) a village, in the
late quoad sacra parish of Gartsherrie,
parish of Old Monkland, Middle ward of
county Lanark, 1½ mile (N. W.) from
Airdrie; containing 1599 inhabitants.
This is a very thriving place, which has
more than doubled in extent and
population within the last fifteen
years, owing to the extension of the
iron trade in the district, and to its
being in the vicinity of valuable
coal-mines; the Dundyvan and Summerlee
iron-works in the neighbourhood are
conducted on a large scale, and afford
employment to a great part of the
population. The village is on the road
from Airdrie to Glasgow; and the
Monkland canal also affords facilities
of communication with the adjacent
towns. A post-office has been
established here, and there is a place
of worship for members of the Free
Church"
At the turn of the last century
Coatbridge was the eight largest town in Scotland. It was formed by the
amalgamation of a number of local
villages:
Old Monkland
and Kirkshaws, Coatbridge, Coatdyke, Dundyvan,
Gartsherrie,
Langloan and Whifflet.
The area around
Coatbridge was described in the 1799
Statistical Account as an "immense
garden" and it was not until the 1830s
that the character of the district began
to change from a rural landscape of
small hamlets and farmhouses to a
crowded industrial town.
see
http://www.monklands.co.uk/kirkwood\index.htm
The industry which
transformed Coatbridge was the iron
industry. In 1811 Old Monkland
parish, which included Coatbridge, was
recorded as having less than 6000
inhabitants. By the mid 1800's the Iron
industry was predominant in the town and
when it achieved Burgh status in 1885 it
was known as "the Iron Burgh" and its
population had increased to around
25,000. As it grew, its landscape
changed from a country area to a crowded
industrial town. Today, the population
is now estimated at over 48,000.
The present-day street layout of the
town centre was largely influenced by
the planning of the Baird family, owners
of one of the town's largest ironworks.
Coatbridge was the eighth largest town
in Scotland in 1911.
Old Monkland Parish as described in Pigot's
& co's national commercial directory
1854
This is perhaps
one of the most productive and
beautiful parishes in Lanarkshire.
It is well enclosed, cultivated and
finely planted with forests and
fruit trees and to a stranger the
resemblance is that of an immense
garden, embellished with numerous
seats and villas principally
belonging to the merchants of
Glasgow.
A description of Coatbridge is given
in a book on the industries of Scotland
by Bremner in 1869: 25 years later!!
"Though Coatbridge is a most
interesting seat of industry, it is
anything but beautiful. Dense clouds of
smoke roll over it incessantly, and
impart to all the buildings a peculiarly
dingy aspect. A coat of black dust
overlies everything, and in a few hours
the visitor finds his complexion
considerably deteriorated by the flakes
of soot which fill the air, and settle
on his face. To appreciate Coatbridge,
it must be visited at night, when it
presents a most extraordinary and when
seen for the first time startling
spectacle.
From the steeple of the
parish church, which stands on a
considerable eminence, the flames of no
fewer than fifty blast furnaces may be
seen. In the daytime these flames are
pale and unimpressive; but when night
comes on, they appear to burn more
fiercely, and gradually there is
developed in the sky a lurid glow
similar to that which hangs over a city
when a great conflagration is in
progress. For half-a-mile round each
group of furnaces, the country is as
well illumined as during full moon, and
the good folks of Coatbridge have their
streets lighted without tax or trouble.
There is something grand in even a
distant view of the furnaces but the
effect is much enhanced when they are
approached to within a hundred yards or
so. The flames then have a positively
fascinating effect. No production of the pyrotechnist can match their wild
gyrations. Their form is ever changing,
and the variety of their movements is
endless.
Now they shoot far upward, and
breaking short off, expire among the
smoke; again spreading outward, they
curl over the lips of the furnace, and
dart through the doorways, as if
determined to annihilate the bounds
within which they are confined; then
they sink low into the crater, and come
forth with renewed strength in the shape
of great tongues of fire, which sway
backward and forward, as if seeking with
a fierce eagerness something to devour".
The following was said about Coatbridge
in the latter part of the 19th
century:
"There is no worse place out of hell
than that neighbourhood. At night
the
groups of blast furnaces on all sides
might be imagined to be blazing
volcanoes at most of which smelting is
continued on Sundays and weekdays,
day and night - without intermission"
The Coatbridge
Fountain - as it was in 1950s -The Fire
Station is on the right.
If you place the mouse on the pic you
can see a photo of the fountain taken in
December 2009 by
Ray Devlin. The fountain has
been moved to the right corner of main
Street - it isn't very conspicuous.
The Coatbridge
Fountain - as it was in early 1900s -
The fountain has moved a few times since
then - it is now located near to the
left of the picture - it may
move again
note the Baxters bus just coming into
view.
TODAY
Today the older, heavy industries have
almost disappeared and newer light
industries are taking their place.
Coatbridge has a number of attractions,
including Summerlee Heritage Park -
"Scotland's noisiest museum" and the
Time Capsule leisure complex. It has a
public baths, five railway stations -
Coatdyke, Sunnyside, Blairhill, Central,
& Whifflet. It has many public
parks including the very popular
Drumpellier Country Park with it's Peace
Garden, two golf courses, one cricket
club, an indoor and outdoor sports
centre, an indoor bowling centre, a ten
pin bowling club, six industrial estates
and a modern shopping centre.
Coatbridge Tinplate work c1890
To quote the latest
North Lanarkshire Official Guide: "This
vibrant town now boasts unrivalled
leisure and entertainment facilities as
well as ample shopping opportunities in
the town centre precinct and retail
parks".
This view is
taken from the bottom of the hill at
Kirkstyle cottages. These cottages
were named as such because of the
proximity to the church Gate - Kirkstyle!
C1860. These cottages
are no longer there and the right side
of the picture is now occupied by Forsyths Fruit & Veg Merchants.
-The Old Monkland Cemetery is on the
left.- note the old greenhouse. Directly opposite the
Old Monkland Church Gate is a more
modern row of 4 Cottages (c1904) - also
formally named Kirkstyle Cottages.
(below)
Recent photo 2008 -
the Church is hidden by trees - note the
cars at the entrance.
This photo
show a traffic jam in Baird Street as it
was in the early 1900's
- the carts are loading (or unloading?)
water and the kids seem to be enjoying
it!
The church at the top of the hill is
Garsherrie Church
- now known as St. Andrews
This is a view of Coatbridge looking
towards the Whifflet - The Front Row of
the infamous Rosehall Rows is on the
left.
Rosehall Rows looking
North towards Whifflet
along Back Row
"The rows are the
property of Addie & Company, coalmasters.
They are a wilderness of single- and
double-(mostly single-) roomed houses.
They cannot be described justly, and to
do so unjustly would flatter the owners.
They consist of four long parallel rows
of single-storey hovels; most of them
have not even rhones to carry the rain
from the roofs. Rain-water simply runs
down the roof and then runs down the
walls, or falls off as chance or the
wind decides. There are no coal-cellars;
coals are kept below the beds. There are
no washhouses. Water is supplied from
stands in the alleys. The closet
accommodation is hideous.
The
closets outside are not used by the
women. In some of the rows 7 or 8 people
occupy a single room. The sanitary
conveniences are in a
state of revolting filth.
A number of
these hovels are built back to back.
Rents for single apartment, 3s. 9d. per
fortnight, deducted at the office of the
colliery. The whole place is an eyesore,
and positively disgraceful. Surely the
Commission can find time to see this
place." [Extract from evidence presented
to Royal Commission, 25th March 1914]
They were eventually
cleared in the 1920s
and replaced by the current housing
between Coathill Street and Whiffiet
Street.
The Rosehall Rows were built for the
workforce of Rosehall colliery, which
was owned by Robert Addie and Sons. In
1938 their registered office was at 36
Robertson Street, Glasgow. Rosehall was
one of the largest collieries in
Lanarkshire and just before the Great
War had over 1300 underground workers.
The coal mine clearly had a long life
surviving well into the 20th
Century. In 1938 the workforce had
declined to 232 with 168 working below
ground. The pits closed in 1945.
Shawhead Pits
These pits were run by Robert Addie &
sons - most of the miners who worked
there lived in the Rosehall Rows.
The Iron Burgh by
Alistair Ewen
Coatbridge was famed
as the "iron Burgh". The nineteenth
century boom in iron was made possible
by David Mushet’s (1801) discovery of
blackband ironstone in the bed of North
Calder Water and James Beaumont
Neilson’s invention of the hot Blast
furnace in 1828. These breakthroughs,
together with the ample supply of coal
and the benefit of the Monkland Canal
for transport led to a rapid
industrialisation of the area from 1830
onwards.
By the 1860’s there
were 8 ironworks producing pig iron from
banks of large blast furnaces and 12
malleable iron works producing iron
rails and plate for engineering firms in
Airdrie and Glasgow.
This rapid
industrialisation was mirrored by a
dramatic increase in population. In the
20 years from 1831 to 1951 the
population nearly tripled from 10,000 to
just fewer than 30,000. The pressure on
housing and living conditions became
particularly acute during these years.
Over time local supplies of coal
ironstone ran out and new technology
made steel cheaper to produce. By the
1920’s most of the ironworks had either
closed down or switched to rolling steel
or tube making. Today only one rolling
mill and one tube works remain.
Northburn
Steelworks
and Waverley Ironworks -
closed in 1967
Gasworks and
cooling tower c1966
Gasboard House in
Burnbank St c1960
Drumpellier
Country Park
The Park was gifted to the town by DWR
Carrick Buchanan in 1919. The
Drumpellier estate can be traced back to
1161 and was the site of the original
Grange built by the monks of Newbattle
Abbey. The farming Grange,
which stood on the ridge near the site
of Drumpellier House, was probably built
from wood with a thatched roof.
The monks cleared part
of the extensive forest which covered
the area at the time they cultivated the
land extensively and by the 16th
century had leased most of the lands to
farmers. After the reformation the monks
land was sold to the Hamilton family.
In 1739 Andrew Buchanan
purchased the Drumpellier Estate from
the Colquhoun family of Langloan.
In 1741 he built Drumpellier House, a
Georgian mansion on the estate.
The mansion was demolished in the late
1960's.
The park soon became popular with the
townspeople of Coatbridge.
During the 1920's and 30's large groups
of people from Glasgow arrived by tram
and spent their weekends camping by the
lochs.
In 1984 Drumpellier was officially
designated as a Country Park and a
visitor centre was opened by the then
Provost Cairns of Monklands District
Council The park is popular for
a number of recreational activities
including: an adventure playground,
guided walks, Jogging, dog walking,
picnic areas, water - based activities
such as boating, and angling.
Nowadays the park is popular with
passers-by and day trippers from all
over, who arrive by car to take
part in the most popular activity by
far, feeding the multitude of swans,
geese and other birds (strictly against
the rules) - or just sitting
and watching them.
Drumpellier Home Farm - as it was c1980
Photo by Ray Devlin
The old railway station - converted to
Watermans restaurant -
now empty.
(F.H. Groome, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland (1882-4) Coatbridge. a municipal burgh of Old Monkland parish, Lanarkshire. It stands, at 300 feet above sea level, on the Monkland Canal, and in the midst of a perfect network of railways, being 2 miles W by S of Airdrie, 9 miles E of Glasgow, and 34 W by S of Edinburgh.
Fifty years since it was only a village; and its rapid extension is due to its position in the centre of Scotland's chief mineral field. The Airdrie and Coatbridge district comprises some twenty active collieries; and in or about the town are several establishments for the pig-iron manufacture, malleable iron and steel works, and numerous rolling mills. Nor are these the only industries; boilers, tubes, tinplate, firebrick and fireclay, bricks and tiles, oakum, railway waggons etc., being also manufactured. It is governed by a Provost, 4 bailies, and 15 councillors, with a treasurer and Dean of Guild. Splendid municipal buildings are in course of erection.
Coatbridge, in its growth, has absorbed, or is still absorbing, a number of outlying suburbs: Langloan, Gartsherrie, Sunnyside, Coats, Clifton, Drumpellier, Dundyvan, Summerlee, Whifflet, Coatdyke, etc.
Fire, smoke and soot, with the roar and rattle of machinery, are its leading characteristics; the flames or its furnaces cast on the midnight sky a glow as if of some vast conflagration.
It has stations on the Caledonian and North British railways, a post office (1894), with money order, savings bank, insurance and telegraph departments, branches of the Clydesdale, Commercial, National, Royal, and Union banks, several hotels. the Alexander Hall, a reading room. gas-work, a water supply conjointly with Airdrie and a Wednesday paper, the Coatbridge Express.
- A theatre and music hall, seating 2000 spectators, was opened in 1875.
- At Langloan is the West End Park, where in 1880 a red granite fountain was erected in memory of Janet Hamilton (1195-1873), the lowly Coatbridge poetess;
- and a fine public park was in 1887 gifted by Mr Weir of Kildonan.
- New Municipal Buildings, containing Town-Hall, Municipal Chambers, and Police buildings, were erected in 1894, on ground presented by W. Weir, Esq.
- Gartsherrie quoad sacra church (1839; 1050 sittings) cost over £3300, and is a prominent object, with a spire 130 feet high; and
- Coats quoad sacra church (1875; 1000 sittings) is a handsome Gothic edifice, built from endowment by the late George Baird of Stitchell
- Of 4 Free churches- Middle, East, West, and Whifflet - the finest was built in 1875; and
- other places of worship are 3 U.P. churches, a Congregational church, an Evangelical Union church, a Baptist church, a Wesleyan church (1874), St John's Episcopal church, and two Roman Catholic churches.
- Besides other schools noticed under Old Monkland, Coatbridge and Coats public school, Langloan public school, and St Patrick’s and St Augustine's Roman Catholic schools, with respective accommodation for 1682, 552, 588, and 489 children, had (1891) an average attendance of 1102 day and 102 evening, 385 day and 81evening, 403, and 416, and grants of £1242, 11s. 6d. and £52,12s. £407, l1s, 8d. and £48,12s., £395, 14s. 6d, and £364. There is, besides, the Coatbridge Technical School and West of Scotland Mining College.
Valuation of burgh (l892) £132,024,4s 3d.
Pop (1831) 741, (1841) 1599, (1851) 8564, (1861) 12,006, (1871) 15,802, (1881) 21,812, (1891) 30,034..—Ord. Sur., sh. 31,1867.
Read other version at
http://www.scottish-places.info/towns/townhistory411.html
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Some nearby
attractions
Coatbridge today is a thriving bustling
town. The old industries have gone. The air
is clean - the dust has gone.
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