Inveresk Explained

Country:Scotland
Official Name:Inveresk
Gaelic Name:Inbhir Easg
Static Image Name:Inveresk Parish Kirk - geograph.org.uk - 2358040.jpg
Static Image Caption:St Michael's Parish Church, Inveresk
Coordinates:55.937°N -3.047°W
Pushpin Map:Scotland East Lothian
Os Grid Reference:NT346719
Post Town:MUSSELBURGH
Postcode District:EH21
Postcode Area:EH
Dial Code:0131

Inveresk (Gaelic: Inbhir Easg) is a village in East Lothian, Scotland situated NaN0NaN0 to the south of Musselburgh. It has been designated a conservation area since 1969. It is situated on slightly elevated ground on the north bank of a loop of the River Esk. This ridge of ground, 20 to 25 metres above sea level, was used by the Romans as the location for Inveresk Roman Fort in the 2nd century AD.[1]

The prefix "Inver" (Gaelic inbhir) means a river mouth and refers to the point where the River Esk meets the Firth of Forth.[2]

The village was formerly in the Midlothian parish of Inveresk and developed separately from the burgh of Musselburgh.

History

A Roman cavalry fort sat on the hilltop around 200AD and numerous Roman artefacts and buildings have been found in the village over the years. In 2004, archaeological excavations by Headland Archaeology found Roman artefacts on Inveresk Brae.[3] The lands were gifted to Dunfermline Abbey in the 12th century.[4]

Inveresk centres on a street of fine 17th- and 18th-century houses. Its location being thought to be agreeable and healthy earned for the village the name of the Montpellier of Scotland.

Inveresk Lodge (1683) is now privately leased, but the adjacent Inveresk Lodge Garden belongs to the National Trust for Scotland, and its west facing gardens overlooking the river Esk are open to the public. This was formerly the mansion of James Wedderburn who had made his fortune as a slave-owning sugar plantation owner in Jamaica. When his son by one of his slaves, Robert Wedderburn, travelled to Inveresk to claim his kinship, while his father did not deny him to be his son, he "called me a lazy fellow, and said he would do nothing for me. From his cook I had one draught of small beer, and his footman gave me a cracked sixpence". This experience turned Robert Wedderburn to radicalism.

Halkerstoun dates from around 1690. The Manor House was built in 1748 for Archibald Shiells. Catherine Lodge built in 1709 for Alexander Christie. Eskhill was owned by Thomas Mylne in 1710 and incorporates a finely carved 1760 doorpiece moved from a demolition in George Square, Edinburgh in the 1970s. Oak Lodge dates from c.1720, Eskgrove House from around 1750. Inveresk House is one of the oldest in the group dating from at least 1643, and Inveresk Gates dates from 1773.[5]

The war memorial, south of the church, was designed by Sir Robert Lorimer in 1920.[6]

St. Michael's Church

The church site predates the Reformation and originally belonged to the Abbey of Dunfermline. From 1560 it came under the Presbytery of Edinburgh but in 1591 transferred permanently to the control of the Presbytery of Dalkeith.

The village is dominated by St. Michael's church that stands at its west end on the summit of a hill overlooking Musselburgh. Its graveyard/cemetery stretches westwards for almost 300m and is split into separate walled sections (marking its various stages of extension) which can be broadly bracketed as original (mainly 18th century), a late Victorian extension, an Edwardian/ early 20th century extension to the north, and a modern section to the far west.

The current church is by Robert Nisbet and dates to 1805 and has a stone spire of Wren-influence.[7]

Noteworthy graves

The graveyard has a number of notable graves:

John Grieve was awarded the Victoria Cross for his bravery at the Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War.

Other notable persons linked to Inveresk

References

Citations
  • Sources

    • External links

    Notes and References

    1. Burnet,JEM (1999) A reason for Inveresk. Courtyard Press, Inveresk.
    2. Web site: The Placenames of Midlothian . 2012-07-04 . Dixon . Norman . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110827184800/http://spns.org.uk/PNsMIDLOTHIANv3.pdf . 2011-08-27 . "'The mouth of the R. Esk' v. G. inbhir, inbhear: 'the confluence of a stream with the sea.'"
    3. Web site: Vol 30 (2009): Archaeological monitoring in the streets of Musselburgh: recent discoveries Scottish Archaeological Internet Reports. 2021-08-12. journals.socantscot.org.
    4. Buildings of Scotland: Lothian by Colin McWilliam
    5. Buildings of Scotland: Lothian by Colin McWilliam
    6. Dictionary of Scottish Architects: Robert Lorimer
    7. Book: McWilliam, Colin . Buildings of Scotland Lothian except Edinburgh. 1978 . Penguin Books .
    8. Web site: Waterloo Men.
    9. Web site: Obituary: Rev. Mary Levison, minister of the Church of Scotland. www.scotsman.com. en. 2020-01-13.
    10. Book: Dickson Wright , Clarissa . Clarissa's England: A gamely gallop through the English counties . Hodder & Stoughton . 2012 . 9781444729139.

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