County Buildings is a municipal structure in Ettrick Terrace,

Selkirk, Scottish Borders Selkirk is a town and historic royal burgh in the Scottish Borders council district of southeastern Scotland. It lies on the Ettrick Water, a tributary of the River Tweed. The people of the town are known as Souters, which means cobblers (sho ...

, Scotland. The complex, which was the headquarters of Selkirkshire County Council and was also used as a courthouse, is a Category B

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

History

The first judicial building in the town was a

tolbooth A tolbooth or town house was the main municipal building of a Scotland, Scottish burgh, from medieval times until the 19th century. The tolbooth usually provided a council meeting chamber, a court house and a jail. The tolbooth was one of th ...

in the Market Place which dated back at least to the early 16th century. The prison cells in the building were improved at the expense of

James Hamilton, 5th Duke of Hamilton James Hamilton, 5th Duke of Hamilton and 2nd Duke of Brandon (5 January 1703 – 2 March 1743), was a Scottish peer, the son of the 4th Duke of Hamilton. Hamilton attended Winchester College from 1716 to 1717. He matriculated at Christ Church ...

, in 1742 and a steeple was added at the east end of the structure in 1746. The

sheriff-depute A sheriff court () is the principal local civil and criminal court in Scotland, with exclusive jurisdiction over all civil cases with a monetary value up to , and with the jurisdiction to hear any criminal case except treason, murder, and rap ...

Walter Scott Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European literature, European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'' (18 ...

, complained about the dilapidated state of the building in 1801 and burgh leaders agreed that it should be demolished. Court hearings were then held in the

Town House A townhouse, townhome, town house, or town home, is a type of terraced housing. A modern townhouse is often one with a small footprint on multiple floors. In a different British usage, the term originally referred to any type of city residen ...

which was completed in 1805. In the 1860s, it was decided that there should be a dedicated

sheriff court A sheriff court () is the principal local civil and criminal court in Scotland, with exclusive jurisdiction over all civil cases with a monetary value up to , and with the jurisdiction to hear any criminal case except treason, murder, and ra ...

and meeting place for the

Commissioners of Supply Commissioners of Supply were local administrative bodies in Scotland from 1667 to 1930. Originally established in each sheriffdom to collect tax, they later took on much of the responsibility for the local government of the counties of Scotland. ...

. The new building was designed by

David Rhind David Rhind FRSE (1808 – 26 April 1883) was a prominent Scotland, Scottish architect, mainly remembered for his public buildings, banks, churches and schools, most of which are now listed buildings. Life Rhind was born at 15 Gayfield Plac ...

in the

Scottish baronial style Scottish baronial or Scots baronial is an architectural style of 19th-century Gothic Revival which revived the forms and ornaments of historical architecture of Scotland in the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period. Reminiscent of Scot ...

, built in

ashlar Ashlar () is a cut and dressed rock (geology), stone, worked using a chisel to achieve a specific form, typically rectangular in shape. The term can also refer to a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, a ...

stone at a cost of £10,152 and was completed in 1870. The design involved an asymmetrical main frontage of three bays facing onto Ettrick Terrace. The central bay featured a round headed doorway with a

fanlight A fanlight is a form of lunette window (transom window), often semicircular or semi-elliptical in shape, with glazing (window), glazing bars or tracery sets radiating out like an open Hand fan, fan. It is placed over another window or a doorway, ...

and a

hood mould In architecture, a hood mould, hood, label mould (from Latin , lip), drip mould or dripstone is an external moulded projection from a wall over an opening to throw off rainwater, historically often in form of a '' pediment''. This moulding can be ...

on the ground floor,

oriel window An oriel window is a form of bay window which protrudes from the main wall of a building but does not reach to the ground. Supported by corbels, bracket (architecture), brackets, or similar cantilevers, an oriel window generally projects from an ...

s on the first and second floors and a

stepped gable A stepped gable, crow-stepped gable, or corbie step is a stairstep type of design at the top of the triangular gable-end of a building. The top of the parapet wall projects above the roofline and the top of the brick or stone wall is stacked in ...

above. The left-hand bay was fenestrated by a

sash window A sash window or hung sash window is made of one or more movable panels, or "sashes". The individual sashes are traditionally paned windows, but can now contain an individual sheet (or sheets, in the case of double glazing) of glass. History ...

and by a smaller window with a gablet on the second floor. The right-hand bay, which was recessed and single storey, was fenestrated by a single sash window on the ground floor. There were

bartizan A bartizan (an alteration of ''bratticing''), also called a guerite, ''garita'', or ''échauguette'', or spelled bartisan, is an overhanging turret projecting from the walls of late-medieval and early-modern fortifications from the early 14th c ...

s at the left and right hand corners and a

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal keyed into and projecting from a wall to carry a wikt:superincumbent, bearing weight, a type of bracket (architecture), bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in t ...

turret Turret may refer to: * Turret (architecture), a small tower that projects above the wall of a building * Gun turret, a mechanism of a projectile-firing weapon * Optical microscope#Objective turret (revolver or revolving nose piece), Objective turre ...

to the right of the centre bay. Internally, the principal room was the courtroom on the first floor. Following the implementation of the

Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889 The Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889 ( 52 & 53 Vict. c. 50) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which was passed on 26 August 1889. The main effect of the act was to establish elected county councils in Scotland. In this it fol ...

, which established county councils in every county, the new county leaders needed to identify a meeting place for Selkirkshire County Council and duly arranged to meet in the courthouse. The council's staff were based at the Bank of Scotland Buildings in the Market Place in Selkirk. After the abolition of Selkirkshire County Council in 1975, the building continued to serve a judicial function, being used for hearings of the sheriff's court and, on one day a month, for hearings of the justice of the peace court. The building was threatened with closure in 2015 but retention was recommended.

References

External links

*{{commonscat-inline Government buildings completed in 1870 Selkirk Category B listed buildings in the Scottish Borders Court buildings in Scotland Selkirk, Scottish Borders Listed government buildings in Scotland 1870 establishments in Scotland Scottish baronial architecture

History

See also

References

External links