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Leith Links ( gd, Fìghdean Lìte) is the principal open space within
Leith Leith (; gd, Lìte) is a port area in the north of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, founded at the mouth of the Water of Leith. In 2021, it was ranked by ''Time Out'' as one of the top five neighbourhoods to live in the world. The earliest ...
, the docks district of
Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...
,
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...
. This public park is divided by a road into two main areas, a western section and an eastern section, both being largely flat expanses of grass bordered by mature trees. Historically it covered a wider area extending north as far as the shoreline of the
Firth of Forth The Firth of Forth () is the estuary, or firth, of several Scottish rivers including the River Forth. It meets the North Sea with Fife on the north coast and Lothian on the south. Name ''Firth'' is a cognate of ''fjord'', a Norse word meani ...
. This area of grass and former sand-dunes was previously used as a golf links.


Current uses

The west section of the park contains children's play areas, football pitches and, in the north-west corner, three public bowling greens and new tennis and petanque courts. In the east section an informal cricket pitch has existed since 1826. It is used by Leith Franklin Academicals Beige cricket club which, taking its name from
Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin ( April 17, 1790) was an American polymath who was active as a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher, and political philosopher. Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the leading int ...
, was established in 1852 as the Leith Franklin cricket club. The club has a clubhouse outside, but adjacent to, the park next to the Seafield Bowling Club's enclosed
lawn bowls Bowls, also known as lawn bowls or lawn bowling, is a sport in which the objective is to roll biased balls so that they stop close to a smaller ball called a "jack" or "kitty". It is played on a bowling green, which may be flat (for "flat-gre ...
bowling green (from 1883) and clubhouse also outwith the park. In the first week of June, Leith Festival Gala Day is held here. The
Edinburgh Mela The Edinburgh Mela is an annual multi-cultural festival held in Edinburgh, Scotland, and is one of the 12 festivals that make up the Edinburgh Festival. The first '' mela'', a Sanskrit word meaning "gathering" or "to meet", was held in 1995 at ...
(since 2010) is held on the Links in late August


Previous uses

Historically the park contained a Victorian bandstand, a pond for model yachts, and was used for annual events such as pageants.
Leith Races Leith Races were the most important horse racing event in Scotland in the eighteenth century. They took place on the sands to the east of the harbour at Leith, near Edinburgh from 1504 (or earlier) to 1816. They first gained popularity through t ...
were held on Leith Sands at the edge of the original links.


History

During the
Scottish Reformation The Scottish Reformation was the process by which Kingdom of Scotland, Scotland broke with the Pope, Papacy and developed a predominantly Calvinist national Church of Scotland, Kirk (church), which was strongly Presbyterianism, Presbyterian in ...
, on 25 July 1559, the Protestant
Lords of the Congregation The Lords of the Congregation (), originally styling themselves "the Faithful", were a group of Protestant Scottish nobles who in the mid-16th century favoured a reformation of the Catholic church according to Protestant principles and a Scot ...
made a
truce A ceasefire (also known as a truce or armistice), also spelled cease fire (the antonym of 'open fire'), is a temporary stoppage of a war in which each side agrees with the other to suspend aggressive actions. Ceasefires may be between state ac ...
with the Catholic Queen Regent,
Mary of Guise Mary of Guise (french: Marie de Guise; 22 November 1515 – 11 June 1560), also called Mary of Lorraine, was a French noblewoman of the House of Guise, a cadet branch of the House of Lorraine and one of the most powerful families in France. Sh ...
, at the Links, who agreed to vacate
Holyroodhouse The Palace of Holyroodhouse ( or ), commonly referred to as Holyrood Palace or Holyroodhouse, is the official residence of the British monarch in Scotland. Located at the bottom of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, at the opposite end to Edinburgh ...
and leave Edinburgh. During the Siege of Leith in 1560, English and Scottish troops made use of the area to create siege trenches. Two mounds on Leith Links, known as "Giant's Brae" and "Lady Fyfe's Brae", identified on later maps as "Somerset's Battery" and "Pelham's Battery" respectively, are scheduled monuments as artillery mounds created for the siege in April 1560. However, a contemporary map at
Petworth Petworth is a small town and civil parish in the Chichester District of West Sussex, England. It is located at the junction of the A272 east–west road from Heathfield to Winchester and the A283 Milford to Shoreham-by-Sea road. Some twe ...
shows that Pelham's Battery was built on the slope to the south of Leith Links and Somerset's battery was located adjacent to the present
Pilrig Pilrig is an area of Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. The name probably derives from the long field (rig) on which a peel tower (pil/peel) stood. There is evidence of a peel tower situated on an area of higher ground above the Water of ...
House. The tradition that these two batteries were on the Links goes no further back than Campbell's "History of Leith" published in 1827. Lent authority by the Ordnance Survey 1852, the identification saved the mounds in 1888 when several other hillocks were removed during landscaping. Bishop Couper was playing golf on Leith Links in 1619 when he had a vision.
Charles I of England Charles I (19 November 1600 – 30 January 1649) was King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. He was born into the House of Stuart as the second son of King James VI of Scotland, but after ...
was playing golf on Leith Links in 1642 when he received news of the Irish rebellion. Games were frequently the subject of betting and
Captain John Porteous Captain John Porteous (c. 1695 – 1736), was a Scottish soldier and Captain of the Edinburgh City or Town Guard. Early life John Porteous was born at The Glen, Quair Water, near Traquair, in the Borders, the son of Stephen Porteous, a tai ...
bet 20 guineas in a match against Alexander Elphinstone (d.1732), brother of
Lord Balmerino The title of Lord Balmerino (or Balmerinoch) was a title in the Peerage of Scotland; it was created in 1606 and forfeited in 1746 on the attainder and execution of the 6th Lord Balmerino in the Tower of London. The title of Lord Coupar or Cupar w ...
in 1724. The same Alexander Elphinstone, who had riches but no employment, appears in a more dramatic event on 23 December 1729 when he challenged Lt Swift of Lord Cardigan's Regiment to a duel (with swords) on Leith Links. Elphinstone mortally wounded Swift. Leith Links is famous in the
history of golf The origins of golf are unclear and much debated. However, it is generally accepted that modern golf developed in Scotland from the Middle Ages onwards. The game did not find international popularity until the late 19th century, when it spread int ...
. Records show a 5-hole golf course which was typically played round twice. It had been played for a long time up until shortly before 1824, and was revived again in 1864. Both
Charles I Charles I may refer to: Kings and emperors * Charlemagne (742–814), numbered Charles I in the lists of Holy Roman Emperors and French kings * Charles I of Anjou (1226–1285), also king of Albania, Jerusalem, Naples and Sicily * Charles I of ...
and the future James VII and II were said to have played golf on the links while they were in residence at
Holyrood Palace The Palace of Holyroodhouse ( or ), commonly referred to as Holyrood Palace or Holyroodhouse, is the official residence of the British monarch in Scotland. Located at the bottom of the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, at the opposite end to Edinburgh ...
. The clubhouse was on the site of the former Leith Academy building on Duke Street, on the south-west corner of the Links. A commemorative cairn and plaque marks this connection at the western side of the park. The rules of golf developed in Leith were adopted by the Royal and Ancient Company of Golfers on their move to
St. Andrews St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's four ...
in 1777.''The Life and Times of Leith'', by James Marshall It is believed the first international golf contest took place at the links, when the Duke of Albany played two English courtiers for national claim to the game of golf. The game resulted in the construction of
Golfers Land The Golfers Land is a site on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh, Scotland dating to around 1681. The site gets its name from the town house of John Paterson, said have been the teammate of the Duke of Albany in what is often regarded as the first inter ...
on the
Royal Mile The Royal Mile () is a succession of streets forming the main thoroughfare of the Old Town of the city of Edinburgh in Scotland. The term was first used descriptively in W. M. Gilbert's ''Edinburgh in the Nineteenth Century'' (1901), de ...
by the Duke's partner, the Edinburgh cobbler John Paterson. The entire area was only formalised as a public park (as opposed to a public open space) in 1888 as part of the Leith Improvement Plan. At this time the area was levelled (other than the two surmised gun batteries) and planted with trees along its perimeter and several paths dividing the area. Cast iron railings enclosing the entire area were erected but these were removed during World War II as part of the war effort. Following the creation of the park, golf was discouraged, but was not officially banned here until 1905. As part of the remodelling in 1888 various discoveries were made: foremost of these were two burial areas at either end of the Links. That to the extreme west, in the triangle of land isolated by Wellington Place, was surmised to be burial pits from an outbreak of the plague which affected Leith in the middle of the 17th century.


The Plague of 1645

The plague which struck Leith in 1645 was only one of many periodic outbreaks of plague that occurred in Edinburgh and Leith between the 14th and 17th centuries. The historian Christopher Smout believes that the 1645 epidemic, which occurred at a time when warring armies were on the march, probably resulted from the spread of
typhus Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposure. ...
. It may have been carried north by Scottish soldiers present at the
Siege of Newcastle The siege of Newcastle (3 February 1644 – 27 October 1644) occurred during the First English Civil War, when a Covenanter army under the command of Lord General Alexander Leslie, 1st Earl of Leven besieged the Royalist garrison unde ...
where plague was reported after the town's surrender to
General Leslie David Leslie, 1st Lord Newark (c. 1600–1682) was a Scottish cavalry officer. He fought for the Swedish army of Gustavus Adolphus during the Thirty Years' War. He had entered Swedish service in 1630, serving as a captain in the regiment of Ale ...
on 19 October 1644. The records of
South Leith Parish Church South Leith Parish Church, originally the Kirk of Our Lady, St Mary, is a congregation of the Church of Scotland. It is the principal church and congregation in Leith, in Edinburgh. Its kirkyard is the burial place for John Home (author of ''Do ...
reveal that the first cases of "the pest" appeared in Yardheads in April 1645 and that the outbreak reached its height that summer. David Alderstone, member of the
Kirk Session A session (from the Latin word ''sessio'', which means "to sit", as in sitting to deliberate or talk about something; sometimes called ''consistory'' or ''church board'') is a body of elected elders governing each local church within presbyterian ...
and the town's Water Bailie, left a unique, detailed record of the epidemic. The town was divided into quarters, each under the supervision of a
quartermaster Quartermaster is a military term, the meaning of which depends on the country and service. In land armies, a quartermaster is generally a relatively senior soldier who supervises stores or barracks and distributes supplies and provisions. In ...
charged with ascertaining the number of infected in each quarter and supplying them with food. As a
quarantine A quarantine is a restriction on the movement of people, animals and goods which is intended to prevent the spread of disease or pests. It is often used in connection to disease and illness, preventing the movement of those who may have been ...
measure the infected were removed to huts on the Links, divided into quarters corresponding to those in the town and similarly placed under quartermasters. An
overseer Overseer may refer to: Professions * Supervisor or superintendent; one who keeps watch over and directs the work of others *Plantation overseer, often in the context of forced labor or slavery *Overseer of the poor, an official who administered r ...
appointed to co-ordinate their activities reported initially that "he cannot gait up ane list of the names and ludges in the Linkes becaus none will go with him", but by 17 July he had succeeded in handing in "a paper book of paper wrytin on both sides...divyding the Ludges, who buildit thm, to qm homthei appertaine, how many people were in everie Ludge". However, he seems to have fallen victim to the plague because an entry for 20 July names someone else as overseer. An entry for 17 July, when it was "ordained to provyd some wemen to help to fill ye cairts f muck and refuse suggests there was a shortage of able-bodied men for cleansing the town. The women were drawn mainly from the infected, although female prisoners were also put to work. The bailies and quartermasters visited the huts daily, distributing to each person three half-loaves of bread, a Scotch pint of ale and any other necessities. A special storehouse manned by two storekeepers was built to accommodate the provisions. The huts were cleaned by "foul clengeris" who wore a distinctive uniform described as "ane joupe
oat The oat (''Avena sativa''), sometimes called the common oat, is a species of cereal grain grown for its seed, which is known by the same name (usually in the plural, unlike other cereals and pseudocereals). While oats are suitable for human con ...
of blak with a St. Andrew's Cross of quhyte clayth sewit about with the sam for designing and knawing of thame be utheris". Clothing was disinfected by boiling in large iron cauldrons. Clothing that could not be so treated was burned, or placed in kilns to subject it to the smoke and heat of burning heather and whins. One such kiln in the form of a converted castle
doocot A dovecote or dovecot , doocot ( Scots) or columbarium is a structure intended to house pigeons or doves. Dovecotes may be free-standing structures in a variety of shapes, or built into the end of a house or barn. They generally contain pige ...
still stands at Lochend, about a mile south of the Links. Apart from a few exceptions in South Leith Kirkyard, the dead were buried on the Links, wrapped in the coarse blankets in which they had lain. After the outbreak had abated Aldinstone, a fortunate survivor, reported to the Session on 3 February 1646 that the number of fatalities for South Leith amounted to 2,421 (out of an estimated population in excess of 4,000), for Restalrig 160 and Craigend (i.e. Calton) 155, making a total of 2,736 for the whole parish. No records have survived in respect of the smaller parish of North Leith. During works in the playground of St Mary's RC Primary School (on the north edge of Leith Links) the remains of 79 bodies were found, thought to be victims of the plague. They were interred in Rosebank Cemetery in 2018 and marked with a memorial plaque.


Surrounding development

Leith Links originally lay wholly to the east of medieval Leith. Only from 1770 onwards did local law permit building outwith the old town wall. The first development was on the extreme north-west corner (now Queen Charlotte Street) where three roughly identical villas were constructed around 1775. From then various edges of the Links were gradually developed, those to the south-east being largely from the early 19th century and particularly grand. These houses, as well as both the eastern and western sections of the Links, feature prominently in the Leith based political crime novel - Kertamen by Mauro Martone. The majority of buildings facing the Links are the first building on their site and most date from the 19th century. A group of
colony houses The colony houses of Edinburgh were built between 1850 and 1910 as homes for artisans and skilled working-class families by philanthropic model dwellings companies. The first development was the Pilrig Model Buildings, near Leith Walk. Later de ...
are located to the south of the Links. Allotment gardens were created on the north-east edge during World War II and still remain. The industrial hinterland here originally held ropeworks and cooperages but for most of the 20th century operated as a bottling plant for
United Distillers United Distillers was a Scottish company formed in 1987 from combining the businesses of Distillers Company and Arthur Bell & Sons, both owned by Guinness. The company owned six single malt Scotch brands, which were relaunched as the ''Classic ...
until they vacated the site around 2005. Seafield Cemetery was developed at the extreme east end of Leith Links in 1887. Seafield Crematorium stands at the far east side of the cemetery, with a separate access from Seafield Road. It opened in 1939. The west side of the Links is dominated by the two large school buildings: Leith Primary and the former Leith Academy building by
Reid and Forbes Reid and Forbes was a firm of Scottish architects specialising in school buildings in central and southern Scotland from 1920 to 1964. They had a very distinctive style and many of their buildings are now listed buildings. History The firm was a ...
(now converted to housing).


Monuments

*Statue of
John Rattray John Rattray is a Scottish professional skateboarder. Early life Rattray was raised in Aberdeen and attained a university degree from the University of Glasgow. Professional skateboarding In 2001, Rattray initially turned professional for the ...
playing golf - on north edge *Memorial cairn to the founding of golf on the site - on west edge *Memorials plaques on Giant's Brae and Lady Fyfe's Brae explaining their military significance.


Botanical

Leith Links is noteworthy for its high concentration of mature elms, despite losses to
Dutch elm disease Dutch elm disease (DED) is caused by a member of the sac fungi (Ascomycota) affecting elm trees, and is spread by elm bark beetles. Although believed to be originally native to Asia, the disease was accidentally introduced into America, Europe ...
. Of some 270 mature trees in the park in 2013, just under half were elms. Most are
wych elm ''Ulmus glabra'' Hudson, the wych elm or Scots elm, has the widest range of the European elm species, from Ireland eastwards to the Urals, and from the Arctic Circle south to the mountains of the Peloponnese and Sicily, where the species reaches i ...
, though there are also examples of
Huntingdon Elm Huntingdon is a market town in the Huntingdonshire district in Cambridgeshire, England. The town was given its town charter by King John in 1205. It was the county town of the historic county of Huntingdonshire. Oliver Cromwell was born th ...
, of the variable Field Elm, of exotic species like European White Elm and
Japanese Elm Japanese elm is a common name for several plants and may refer to: * ''Ulmus davidiana'' var. ''japonica'' *''Zelkova serrata ''Zelkova serrata'' (Japanese zelkova, Japanese elm or keyaki or keaki; ja, 欅 (ケヤキ) keyaki /槻 (ツキ) tsu ...
, and of rare cultivars. At the east end of Claremont Park there is a (now rare) mature
English Elm The field elm (''Ulmus minor'') cultivar 'Atinia' , commonly known as the English elm, formerly common elm and horse may, Republished 1978 by EP Publishing, Wakefield. and more lately the Atinian elm was, before the spread of Dutch elm disea ...
. Losses to disease have to some extent been made good by planting of disease-resistant elm-cultivars such as ''Ulmus'' 'Regal'. Elms were originally preferred for planting because of their tolerance of salty sea-winds.Ian Nimmo, ''Edinburgh's Green Heritage: Discovering the Capital's Parks, Woodlands and Wildlife'' (Edinburgh 1996) File:Unknown Ulmus, Vanburgh Place, Edinburgh (3).jpg, ''Ulmus'' × ''hollandica'' 'Viminalis', Vanburgh Place, Leith Links, 2016 File:Unidentified Ulmus minor. Links Place, Edinburgh (1).jpg, ''Ulmus minor'' 'Rueppellii', Links Place, Leith Links, 2016 File:Ulmus minor 'Cucullata' (2).jpg, Convex-leaved field elm cultivar, Duncan Place, Leith Links, 2016 File:Possible Ulmus x hollandica 'Dauvessei' or 'Haarlemensis' (3).jpg, ''Ulmus'' × ''hollandica'' 'Dauvessei', Claremont Park, Leith Links, 2016 File:Ulmus. Hermitage Place, Leith Links, Edinburgh (1).jpg, Blandford Elm, Hermitage Place, Leith Links, 2016 File:AZ0114 Ulmus x hollandica. Hermitage Place, Edinburgh. (03).jpg, Dutch elm cultivar, Hermitage Place, Leith Links, 2016 File:Possible Ulmus davidiana var. japonica. Vanburgh Place, Leith Links, Edinburgh (3).jpg, Unidentified elm, south corner of Leith Links, 2016


References


Bibliography

*


External links


Bartholomew's ''Chronological map of Edinburgh'' (1919)
{{coord, 55, 58, 15.74, N, 3, 9, 50.29, W, region:GB_type:landmark, display=title Sports venues in Edinburgh Parks and commons in Edinburgh Leith Golf clubs and courses in Edinburgh