Flowing Rivers of the Scottish Borders - Sepia Saturday

A lad fishing is the prompt image from Sepia Saturday this week.  Below the only matching image I have.

A lone fisherman on the River Clyde at Largs on  the west coast of Scotland.  In the background the ferry linking the town of Largs to the Isle of Cumbrae.

But I live near one of Scotland's prime  salmon fishing rivers - the 90 mile River Tweed and its many tributaries, so take a  journey through the Scottish Borders - a land of rolling hills and flowing rivers. 

 

The famous Leaderfoot Viaduct built in 1865 over the River TWeed was the major engineering feat of the Berwickshire Railway Line from the east coast  to the central Borders.  The statistics are impressive -  the viaduct stands 126 feet (38 m) from the floor of the river valley, and  its 19 arches, each has a 43 feet span.  

 

 

The Berwickshire Railway was badly affected by severe flooding in 1948.   The last train ran over the viaduct in 1965.  It  is  now  under the care of Historic Environment Scotland and   remains a  popular spot for  photographers today 

                         A charming tinted photograph, c.1900

 

 

 

 

Coldstream Bridge over the River Tweed was opened  in 1767 and marks the boundary between Scotland and England  - and is still the main route south today.

Coldstream Bridge Tollhouse at the north end of the bridge,  was more than just the location for collecting taxes.  For it was akin to Gretna Green towards the west as  the location for a Scottish  "Irregular Marriage".  This was in the form of a verbal declaration by the couple  giving their consent  before witnesses and did not require a clergyman, but anyone who took on the role for a fee.  No notice, such as banns,  was required, no parental consent  and no residency requirement.  Such marriages were valid in Scotland but were increasingly frowned upon and became less  and less acceptable. 

In the meantime, however, many English couples in particular,  eloped to places just across the Border,  to escape the stricter English marriage laws and obtain a quick, easy  and cheaper marriage.     

 It was on the bridge that Scottish bard  Robert Burns (1759-1796) had his first glimpse of England, as marked  by a plaque.

                          

 

 

The Rennie Bridge over the River Tweed at Kelso was built in 1803  to replace one washed away in floods of 1797. Designed by John Rennie, it was an earlier and smaller scale version of his  Waterloo Bridge in London. 

The Toll House, where the payment had to be made, was the scene of a riot in 1854, when  local people   objected to continuing to pay the tolls when the building costs had been long cleared. It still took three years for tolls to be withdrawn. 

For nearly 200 years, this narrow bridge  remained the only way across the Tweed at Kelso, causing many a bottleneck, until the building of a new one in 1998 to the east of the town. Progress here is sometimes rather slow! 

 

The Chain Bridge at Melrose beneath  the Eildon Hills crosses the famous salmon river of the Tweed.   It was opened  in 1826 as a footbridge. 

Conditions were imposed on  its use including the restraint that no more than eight people should be on it at any one time and  "no loitering, climbing or intentional swinging" permitted.  Contravention of the rules was  punishable by a £2 fine (£135 in today's money) -  or imprisonment.  (Currency Converter)

 Since payment had to be made to cross the bridge, a ford downstream for horse drawn vehicles continued to be used by pedestrians for some time, with a box of stilts at each end of the crossing.  

 

                                 The River Tweed at Melrose

I

Crossing the River Tweed is Mertoun Bridge, near St. Boswells built c.1840, replacing an earlier  partly wooden construction.   It was later replaced in 1886 with the 5 arch sandstone bridge  we see today.

   

The River Tweed near Dryburgh Abbey

 

Dryburgh Abbey on the wooded banks of the River Tweed was founded in 1150 and is now the final resting place of 19th century writer Sir Walter Scott and  First World War Commander, Field Marshall Earl Haig, who lived nearby at Bemersyde.

 

 

The River Teviot at Hawick, one  of the Rover Tweed's main tributaries -  Hawick was our home for 41 years.

 

 

Leader Water  at Earlston where we now live.

 

 



Gala Water running through the town of Galashiels - helping to power its tweed mills  in the 19th century 

****************

Sepia Saturday gives bloggers an opportunity

to share their family history through photograph

                                

 

 
  Click HERE to find out how other bloggers are enjoying 

Down by the Riverside.

 

********************