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Peter Puddock and the Puddocky: the thread about Municipal Frogs and Flood-prone Pitches

An unexpected – and irresistible – eBay find in recent days was this charming (or, depending on your feelings towards anthropomorphic frogs, terrifying) button badge featuring Peter Puddock, the one-time mascot of Edinburgh’s Royal Commonwealth Pool. Peter was created as a marketing campaign by the District Council in 1987 and his name was chosen by a children’s competition which attracted some three hundred entries.

ROYAL COMMONWEALTH POOL – Peter Puddock

The lucky winner was ten year old Marjorie Drysdale from Prestonfield. In addition to securing the naming rights she was awarded a photo-shoot with Peter, who presented her with two golden passes for a year’s free swimming at The Commie. In addition, from the chairman of the council’s Recreation Committee, she received one of these badges and a matching t-shirt.

Marjorie and Peter at the Commonwealth Pool, she sporting her t-shirt and holding the prize tickets, he resplendent in his enormous bow tie. Edinburgh Evening News photo, 18th March 1987

Following this, Peter’s first official public outing was at McDonald Road Library on March 21st, the occasion being the sale of 20,000 ex-circulation books. After that, what became of him is not recorded in the pages of the Evening News or any other newspaper. However, in August 2018 the Dartmouth Chronicle reported that a Peter Puddock had accused Kingswear Parish Council of financial mismanagement and running up a £17,000 financial shortfall. Coincidence? Who is to say…

So what’s in a name? As recorded in the Dictionaries of the Scots Language, Puddock is the word for a frog in that leid (or a toad, the two species are often confused). It can also be spelled puddick, poddock or paddock, but does not share an etymology with the English word paddock (from parrock or park), instead having its roots in the Old Norse padda for toad. It may be used as an adjective – puddockie or puddocky – to describe the sort of wet, boggy ground which abounds in amphibians. It has various reduced forms including paddy but it’s pure coincidence that the same word is used in English for a flooded field where rice is grown; in this case that’s a loan from the Malay word pādī.

Three Frogs, by Jemima Blackburn (née Wedderburn), mid 19th century. National Gallery of Scotland collection.

Sections of the Water of Leith were once commonly known as the Puddock Burn although by the mid-19th century it was remarked upon that this was a nostalgic notion on account of the river pollution having rendered it almost entirely devoid of such wildlife. This association is also used more specifically for the section of the river between Canonmills Bridge and Powderhall, long known as The Puddocky.

“Water of Leith from Back of Warriston Cemetery”, a romantic scene at The Puddocky in the 19th century – in reality the river here by this time was extremely polluted. Note the steam train running along the railway embankment on the middle right distance. 1850, John Reid Prentice. Credit; Edinburgh Museums and Galleries.

While it’s true that generations of children have fished here for frogs with bits of string and jeelie jars, the name instead derives from an older placename of Paddockhaw or Puddockhall, a farm of that name in this location being recorded in 1724. There was no actual hall here however, the word being referred to is the Scots Haugh; a level plain alongside a river, seasonally wet land prized by farmers and frogs alike.As a place it disappeared after 1763 when the river was significantly straightened in an attempt to deal with flooding, but the name has persisted in to modern times.

Robinson & Fergus 1759 Town Plan of Edinburgh (left, photo © Self) and Kirkwood’s 1817 Town Plan (right, reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland) overlaid on each other, move the slider to compare. This shows the development of the area around this time, in particular the straightening of the Water of Leith that trapped a portion of land belonging to Heriot’s Hospital that was once contiguous with the holding on the north bank of the river on the south instead.

The persistence of the name in collective memory has perhaps been helped by its surprisingly prominent literary profile. In an 1898 biography of Robert Louis Stevenson – educated nearby at the Canonmills school of the Free Kirk – Evelyn Blantyre Simpson relates that on learning the 23rd psalm (“The Lord’s my Shepherd, I’ll not want; he makes me down to lie in pastures green; he leadeth me the quiet waters by“) the boy’s over-active imagination pictured this as being his riverside playground of the Puddocky where he spent many an hour splashing around, attended by his ever-present nursemaid Cummy.

A statue dedicated to Robert Louis Stevenson, depicting him as a boy, located by the Water of Leith at Colinton Parish Church where his grandfather was minister. CC-by-SA 4.0 Rosser1954

The young RLS was not the only Edinburgh author to have formative memories of the place, Muriel Spark recalls in her autobiography Curriculum Vitae that “at weekends we roamed in the botanical gardens or went for walks at Puddocky“. She would use it as a location in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie where the character Teenie allegedly took a romantic “walk” with her boyfriend which resulted in an unwanted pregnancy. Norman Macaig refers to it in “his most sustained meditation on Edinburgh“, the 1973 poem Inward Bound:

Journeys, Mine were
as wide as the world is
from Puddocky to Stockbridge
minnows splinter in a jar
and a ten-inch yacht
in the roaring forties of Inverleith Pond
crumples like a handkerchief

The Puddocky name also has a number of long-standing associations with sport in the district. Part of Warriston Park was taken on as playing fields by the Edinburgh Institution (later to become Melville College) in the 1860s, with cricket played in the summer and rugby in the winter. This ground was part of the Water of Leith’s flood plain and had once been the site of the ornamental pond of Wester Warriston House. Unsurprisingly as a sports pitch it was perpetually damp, usually waterlogged in winter and more suited to webbed feet. It gained the derisory nickname of The Puddocky. It was taken over later by the Edinburgh School Board in 1910 and remains as playing fields for school use to this day.

Lothian Regional Council hasn’t existed for 30 years, but their sign for Warriston playing fields is nevertheless still in remarkably good condition

On the opposite bank from here was the triangle of land possessed by The Governors of Heriot’s Hospital that had been marooned on that side when the river was straightened out. From 1883 this was used as a football ground by the itinerant St Bernards F.C. but after 1887 it was transferred back to Heriot’s as school playing fields. Again this site was frequently damp and again it found itself nicknamed The Puddocky. The school lasted here for little more than a decade before removing to altogether more commodious and drier facilities further north at Bangholm. Renamed Old Logie Green, it became the ground of Leith Athletic F.C. who played here until 1915. The displaced St Bernards didn’t have too far to go however and moved just next door to the New Logie Green ground.

1894 OS 1:25 inch map of Edinburgh showing the various Puddocky sports grounds. The Institution’s Ground on the left can be seen below Eildon Street, now merged with Warriston Park as the council playing fields. The Heriot’s Ground is on the opposite bank of the river, and wound later be known as Old Logie Green. The ground marked as St Bernard’s Football Ground was New Logie Green. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

Once again the nickname Puddocky was applied for the usual reasons and this site holds a unique claim to fame in that it is the only football ground outside of Glasgow where the Scottish Cup has been held. Owing to a timetabling clash at the usual Hampden Park venue in 1896 the game was played instead at the ground of the holders – St Bernards. The match was an Edinburgh derby, Heart of Midlothian prevailing over their city rivals Hibernian by three goals to one. St Bernards departed here in 1899 when their lease expired and the ground was removed, Logie Green Road driven through its heart.

The 1896 Scottish Cup game, the unique occasion of it being an Edinburgh derby at an Edinburgh ground. On the left is the old house of Logie Green which abuts the pitch and in the background is the roof line of Warriston Crescent. Note the steam locomotive on the railway embankment, which appears to have stopped to spectate. Note also the pitch line markings are different from those we are familiar with these days.

To keep you on your toes if you are trying to research either of these two football teams or either of the two Logie Green grounds, Leith played very briefly at New Logie Green in the 1899 season and St. Bernards returned to Old Logie Green between 1921-24. From then until final closure in 1926 Old Logie Green was home to, you’ve guess it, Leith Athletic. In the century since then it has been the football boots of generations of Edinburgh school children playing soggy winter fixtures at Warriston that have trod on the last remaining Puddocky pitches.

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“From the Three R’s to Transistors”: the thread about Dean Public School

Preamble. The schools of the “School Board” era of public education (1872-1918) hold a particular fascination for me, one most profound where they have been “deconsecrated” and are either no longer in use as schools or have disappeared entirely. This thread began as a couple of lines for my own notes about the “Lost Board Schools of Edinburgh” but soon snowballed into an alphabetical deep-dive into each.

Part six of the series of posts looking at “Lost Board Schools of Edinburgh” pays a visit to the former Dean Public School. Judging by the crowds of tourists on phones who gather daily in crowds outside, this must be one of the most Instagrammed of schools. I wonder how many stop for a moment to consider its history and its claim to a unique first in the story of education in the city. So let us take a moment for ourselves to do just that.

Following the Education (Scotland) Act 1872 (which made schooling compulsory in Scotland between the ages of 5 and 13) the newly elected School Boards undertook a flurry of construction to rationalise, modernise and expand the existing provision. At its formation in 1873 the Edinburgh School Board (ESB) took stock of the situation it had inherited in the city and found there were almost twenty-two thousand pupils being taught in one hundred schools, with the majority run by the various churches. Unsurprisingly the Presbyterians dominated, educating forty-three percent of scholars.

ProviderSchoolsPupilsShareFree Church174,28219.7%Church of Scotland164,22219.4%Heriot’s Hospital163,74217.2%Non-denominational & private203,65416.8%R. C. Church82,0149.3%Episcopal Church91,5187.0%Industrial & free schools, etc.81,4266.6%U. P. Church68573.9%Total10021,715Elementary Edinburgh Schooling in 1873, census by Edinburgh School Board

In 1873 the Board held a survey of teachers in the city to help prioritise where new schools should be built and the following year held a competition to find architects for its first batch of seven purpose-built schools; Bristo, Causewayside, Leith Walk, North Canongate, Stockbridge, West Fountainbridge and the Water of Leith Village*. The work was divided between the successful applicants, that for the Water of Leith was awarded to Robert Wilson, who would later become the Board’s house architect.

* = The naming and jurisdiction of this school is somewhat confusing. While the area today is widely known as the Dean Village, well into the 20th century it was always known as Water of Leith village. “Dean” referred instead to the old Village of Dean slightly to the north. Both Water of Leith and Dean villages were in the Edinburgh School Board catchment and while the new school was in the former village it was christened Dean Public School at opening. This was most probably in recognition that it served the Dean quoad sacra Parish (an ecclesiastical division, but not a municipal one). To add further confusion, until 1895 there was also a separate St Cuthbert’s and Dean School Board. This covered the western hinterland outwith the city’s municipal boundaries as they then stood and was responsible for schools such as Gorgie, Roseburn, and South Morningside (extension of the city boundary in 1882 meant that the former two schools were actually now in Edinburgh but served by the St Cuthbert’s and Dean Board!)

Water of Leith village, looking northeast past the Bell’s Brae Bridge to Holy Trinity Episcopal Church pre-1875. The school would be built in front of the tall mill building with the circular windows on the left, where the low range sits in this picture. Thomas Vernon Begbie glass negative dated 1887 (incorrect). The Cavaye Collection of Thomas Begbie Prints; City of Edinburgh Council Museums & Galleries

Perhaps because it was the smallest, the Dean Public School was the first of the batch to complete. The opening took place on Wednesday December 8th 1875 making it the first purpose-built school by the Board in the city. The Scotsman reported that at two o’clock, the 150 children of the older division were assembled in the upper classroom in front of the Board and “a large number of gentlemen interested in the work“, including Lord Provost James Falshaw, James Cowan the MP for Edinburgh and numerous town councillors. Following the singing of a psalm and a prayer led by the Rev. Whyte of Free St George’s Church, the Lord Provost gave an opening address and observed that “it was to him a most gratifying circumstance that an auspicious event like the present had occurred during his term of office.”

The roundel of the Edinburgh School Board, “the female figure of education” dispensing knowledge to the young at Dean Public School. © Self

The Chairman of the Board, Professor Henry Calderwood, mentioned that at this time they had 7,386 children in public education at the nineteen schools under their charge but that most of these were small and overcrowded and there was much work ahead to provide purpose-built accommodation for them. Thanks were given to the kirk session of Dean Free Church for allowing the continued use of their schoolhouse since the 1872 act before the new school was ready.

OS Town Surveys of Edinburgh in 1849 and 1876, before and after the Dean Public School was built. Note that at this time the village itself was referred to as “Water of Leith”, as it always had been. Note the Dean Free Church on the old Queensferry Road where schooling took place before 1875. Move the slider to compare. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

The new school was arranged over two storeys with accommodation for 400 children (using a formula of 10 square feet of space per child). The infants were accommodated on the ground floor and the older children upstairs, each level having a principal large school room (57ft by 23ft, or 17m by 7m) which could be divided by movable glass partitions, as well as smaller classrooms. There were separate entrances for boys on one side and girls and infants on the other, with the playgrounds being similarly segregated. The total cost was £5,740 5s 2d; £1,030 9s 9d for the site and £4,709 15s 5d for the construction work.

Dean Public School in 1950, looking south. The squat gable of Drumsheugh Baths can be seen in the middle distance. Picture CC-by-NC-SA Dean Village Memories, via Edinburgh Collected

As early as 1878, in a report to the School Board the Inspector complained of overcrowding and a lack of writing desks in the school (those available were sufficient for only 1/3 of the children). This had “spoiled the writing, wasted time in the classes and has prevented the highest discipline grant through the copying traceable to over-crowding“. Failure to remedy these defects would result in the school’s government grant being cut. The school roll at this time was 311, with 200 children qualifying for the Examination in Standard – but the pass rates in these qualifications of 82% for Reading, 84% for Writing and 71% for Arithmetic were the lowest in the School Board. Headmaster Waddell was however praised for his organisation and discipline and the infant department was “in many respects a model one“.

Class portrait of older girls at Dean Public School, with the headmistress Miss Mary Mackenzie (labelled as Hunter). 1883 photograph by J. & S. Sternstein of Glasgow. Note that at least one girl has very short hair, likely the result of it being shaved to combat headlice. Edinburgh and Scottish Collection of Edinburgh City Libraries.Class portrait of boys at Dean Public School, with the headmistress Miss Mary Mackenzie (labelled as Hunter). 1883 photograph by J. & S. Sternstein of Glasgow. Note the boy on the left of Mary seems notably older, taller and better dressed than his peers and may be one of the pupil teachers. Edinburgh and Scottish Collection of Edinburgh City Libraries.Class portrait of boys at Dean Public School with (probably) their headmaster, Esdaile Duncan. 1883 photograph by J. & S. Sternstein of Glasgow. The boy to the left of her is notably taller, older and better dressed than the others and may be one of the pupil teachers,1883 class photos from Dean Public School

The lack of accommodation was remedied in 1888 with a 3-storey extension for 132 additional children added to the rear, comprising a play-room, a sewing room and an infant classroom. The space beneath was left open and served as a covered part of the playground.

1907 photograph showing the extension added at the rear of the school on the right, adjacent to the bridge. The apparently 17th century structure on the left is Well Court, in fact a late 1880s model workers housing complex in a Scottish Vernacular Revival style by architect Sydney Mitchell. 1907 photograph, Edinburgh and Scottish Collection, Edinburgh City Libraries.

When education was made free of charge in 1889 (the 1872 act had introduced fees, although assistance could be provided by the Parish Poor Boards for those who could not afford them), the headmaster at Dean wrote to the School Board to say that the hoped for improvement in attendance rates had not materialised within his district and that “the parents who before were indifferent, are now equally or more so“. In 1894, 120 children were sent to the school from the nearby Dean Orphanage, being reported as “perfect models of cleanliness and order” by the Scotsman and commended in the Evening News for making the school football eleven “a combination to be feared and respected“. They were moved to the new Flora Stevenson School in Comely Bank when it opened in 1901, before being moved back to Dean in 1913 when the new Parish Children’s Home on Crewe Road opened, putting pressure on capacity at Flora’s when there were 115 vacant places at Dean School.

The Dean Orphanage in 1850, recently relocated from its old location beneath the North Bridge where it been in the way of the North British Railway. The community of Bells’s Mill lies beneath and children from both of these locations would attend the Dean Public School. Salt paper print, unknown photographer. Edinburgh and Scottish Collection of Edinburgh City Libraries.

With no playing fields or local park to call its own, the school sports days were held at Warriston Playing Fields. In June 1912 the Edinburgh Evening News reported that the pupils from Dean – for the first time in the history of the ESB – had performed mass dancing as part of the day. One hundred and sixty pupils danced “with great zest… danc[ed] a reel to the music of the pipes.”

Pupils of the Dean Public School perform a maypole dance at Warriston Playing Fields as part of their annual sports day, June 28th 1913, Edinburgh Evening News.

In December 1914, the staff of the school contributed £1 4s 6t to the Edinburgh Belgian Relief Fund. The following year Robert Peter Smith, assistant teacher, was wounded during at the Dardanelles when serving as a lieutenant with the 1/4th King’s Own Scottish Borderers.

Officers of the 1/4th KOSB in 1915. Robert P. Smith is in the 3rd row, third from the left, the shorter man sporting a moustache. Photo via UK Photo and Film Archive.

In 1939 the school was requisition by the War Office and temporarily relocated “for the duration” to the St Mary’s Cathedral Mission Hall on Bell’s Brae, the ancient convening house of the Incorporation of Baxters (bakers) of Edinburgh. It was returned to educational use and in 1953 was placed under the charge of Dorothy Edmond. The new headmistress was determined to raise the school’s profile and instituted a uniform, having a school badge specially commissioned for the blazers.

She rallied parents together and asked for support financially. Although it would not be a lot, it was a lot to some folks and it caused some controversy… Miss Edmund was strict and eventually was held in high regard by both parents and children.

Recollection by pupil Kathleen Glancy of Dorothy Edmond. Via Edinburgh Collected.

Dean School badge, showing the castle of the arms of Edinburgh, open books symbolising learning, the blue of the Water of Leith running through the centre. The Boar’s Head is from the arms of the Nisbet of Dean family, The Cock’s Head may refer to the Poultry Lands of Dean, which in the 17th century conferred the holder the hereditary title of Poulterer to the King. From Kathleen Glancy by Dean Village Memories, CC-by-NC-SA via Edinburgh Collected.

But not even the determination of Miss Edmond could counter the significant long term depopulation in the neighbourhood, the result of much of the housing stock being decrepit and condemned combined with the decline of the remaining traditional industries of milling and tanning. In January 1961 the school closed, its roll having reduced to just 37 pupils, less than 10% of capacity. Those remaining were transferred to Flora Stevenson’s and the empty building was leased to the defence electronics company Ferranti Ltd. of Crewe Toll for a period of seven years as a training centre for apprentices and assembly line staff. The Evening News felt it an appropriate symbol of the city’s growing demand for specialist technical education that its oldest public school should have made the transition “from the Three R’s to transistors“.

Christine Robertson, age 10, photographed alone in the school on its last day, 20th January 1961,

Note to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.

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Ferranti did not require the two basement rooms and these were given over to the use of the Edinburgh Union of Boys Clubs as a base for an outdoor education scheme, the Adventure Centre for Use. A number of Ferranti staff were involved in this, including the works’ own Mountain Climbing Adventure Group for its younger employees. This provided equipment and specialist training to established clubs in activities such as climbing, mountaineering, canoeing and dingy sailing. After Ferranti’s lease was up, in 1969 the school became an annexe to Telford College, whose domestic courses were based nearby at the Dean Education Centre, the former Dean Orphanage.

Dean School in the 1960s. Picture from Dean Village Memories, CC-by-NC-SA via Edinburgh Collected

In May 1984 the school was disposed of on the open market (offers over £100,000) by Lothian Regional Council and was converted into flats in 1986 by James Potter Developments. Eighteen two, three and four-bedroom properties were created which would have cost between £39,000 and £55,000 when completed.

Former Dean Public School in 2025. Comparison of the photo with that further up the page shows how extra floors were cleverly inserted by reducing the window heights significantly from those of the Victorian schoolrooms. Photo by Fiona Coutts, via Britishlistedbuildings.

The previous instalment in this series looked at the Davie Street School(s) in the Southside. The next looks at Gilmore Place Public School.

Note to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.

If you have found this site useful, informative or amusing then you can help contribute towards its running costs by supporting me on ko-fi. This includes my commitment to keeping it 100% advert and AI free for all time coming, and in helping to find further unusual stories to bring you by acquiring books and paying for research.
Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends and like-minded people, sites like this thrive on being shared.

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#April20 #Army #BritishArmy #EdinburghCastle #Gaelic #Leith #May29 #Military

From “Rewards For Good Boys” to “Britain’s most unusual school”: the thread about the Davie Street School(s)

Preamble. The schools of the “School Board” era of public education (1872-1918) hold a particular fascination for me, one most profound where they have been “deconsecrated” and are either no longer in use as schools or have disappeared entirely. This thread began as a couple of lines for my own notes about the “Lost Board Schools of Edinburgh” but soon snowballed into an alphabetical deep-dive into each.

The fifth chapter of our series looking at the “Lost Board Schools of Edinburgh” looks at Davie Street School; with which I made the mistake of proclaiming “there doesn’t seem to be anything interesting about this one” before I had taken a proper look see. Naturally I proved myself completely wrong! And so actually what follows is the quite interesting story of the various schools that have called Davie Street home.

The first school at Davie Street was the Lancasterian School whose foundation stone was laid by the Lord Provost and Magistrates on Monday 12th October 1812. It replaced a temporary home which had been built on the Calton Hill, a “long, low, wood and brick erection“. The school was the work of the Edinburgh Education (Lancasterian School) Society, a charitable institution founded in 1810 by “several respectable Gentlemen…” to address the lack of education for the lower classes of the city by providing it at the “least possible expense of time and money“. It had been determined to use the educational system of Joseph Lancaster, thought it to be both the most economical and the most extensively tested system in practice.

Joseph Lancaster, portrait by John Hazlitt c. 1818 in the National Portrait Gallery, NPG99.

Lancaster’s was a Quaker and early pioneer of education for the masses, his schools being highly unusual at the time in being reward-based and almost entirely lacking in punishments. Like the contemporary Madras System of Dr Andrew Bell (familiar to generations of Leithers as the Dr Bell), the Lancasterian System taught large classes in a single “school room” with one teacher supported by multiple pupil monitors. These were older children who relayed the instructions to the younger and kept an eye on their work. The contemporary engraving below shows the pupil monitors walking amongst the rows of younger children, helping them with their work, with the teacher seated on a podium at the front. On the wall a sign reads “REWARDS FOR GOOD BOYS” and the walls and ceiling are hung with toys such as kites, hoops, racket and shuttlecocks, balls and bats which the children could win.

Contemporary engraving of a Lancasterian School – the Royal Free School on Borough Road. The teacher sits on a podium at the front, the children are arrayed in ranks by age (and ability) and the older Pupil Monitors move amongst the rows, relaying the lesson and checking the work.

Davie Street had two school rooms, boys and girls being taught separately, sufficient to hold 1,000 scholars and was one of the first steps on the route to a free, mass education in the city. For a subsidised fee of just 2s 6d per quarter, children over 6 years old were taught their Reading, Writing and Arithmetic with the only book in use for teaching being the Bible. However with its Quaker roots, the school was non-sectarian and counted amongst its founding directors in Edinburgh both Presbyterians and Episcopalians. Children were taught the Church of Scotland’s approved Catechism by rote but “the Directors, from respect to the rights of private judgement, do not impose it on children whose parents have conscientious objections to it“.

Davie Street showing the Lancasterian School, 1849 OS Town Survey of Edinburgh. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

The school was “the achievement of the Whigs and of the pious” and was well supported at the highest levels of Edinburgh and Scottish society, as evidenced by the titles of its presidents and directors in the below newspaper advert. It was not universally popular however and according to “Memorials of His Own Time” by Lord Henry Cockburn it was “cordially hated by all true Tories, who for many years never ceased to sneer at and obstruct it.”

Principal office bearers of the Edinburgh Education (Lancastrian Schools) Society in 1812 as published in the Caledonian Mercury.

A report of the Committee of Council on Education of 1844 noted that the headteacher, Mr Robert Dun, had supplied “at his own expense, a considerable assortment of philosophical apparatus, with which he performs, before his pupils, the more useful and interesting experiments in Chemistry and Natural Philosophy“. Dun was praised as running an institution being representative “of a well conducted monitorial school“.

There is no educational institution in Edinburgh which does a more extended share of substantial good than the Davie Street Lancasterian School, now 25 years established, and none upon which the public spirited and philanthropic can, to better account, bestow their money.

The school at this time was very much a family affair; it had 200 older boys taught by Robert and an assistant plus 100 infant boys by his father, Robert Senior. 250 girls were taught by John and Miss M. Dun – Robert’s siblings. Including evening classes, the total roll was 622 but it was noted that absence could run high, between 10 to 20 percent. The Duns had joined the school in 1826 and remained there for 35 years until Robert resigned in 1861 and received wide praise for their long-term efforts to educate and better the lot of the poorer children of the city.

Mr Dun, of the Edinburgh Davie Street School, decidedly the best Lancasterian teacher I have yet met, has introduced much useful knowledge into his plan; and, if the means were afforded him, would yet do much more.

James Simpson, “Necessity of Popular Education as a National Object”, 1834

A notable alumnus of the Lancasterian School was George McCrae (1860-1928), later Colonel Sir George McCrae DSO DL VD. A self-made man in the textile and drapery trade, McCrae was knighted in 1908 for his services as MP for Edinburgh East. He is best remembered in Scotland for raising and commanding the 16th Battalion, The Royal Scots during World War 1. This unit, better known as McCrae’s Own, was composed of Edinburgh men and its ranks included 16 members of Heart of Midlothian Football Club as well as players from Hibernian, Raith Rovers, East Fife, St. Bernard’s, Falkirk and Dunfermline football clubs. Much of the rest were drawn from the supporters of these clubs.

George McCrae during his time as an MP, by Sir John Benjamin Stone, 1901

At the time of the Duns’ departure the school was proving to be a financial liability for its directors. In that year its expenses were £147 14s 5d but they had raised only £98 9s 7d in subscriptions and fees; outgoings exceeded income by 50%. The Lancasterian School was being kept solvent only by the £900 proceeds of the sale of a bequeathed house. The trustees had therefore been looking to put the institution on a sounder financial footing and in 1857 had proposed to the Governors of the Heriot’s Hospital Trust that it be transferred to their care.

George Heriot’s Hospital (School) in 1966, looking towards the Castle. Edinburgh City Libraries, Edinburgh and Scottish Collection.

The Governors in turn remitted the request to a sub-committee who reported favourably on the idea “when the state of funds admitted to an increase“. In the event it was not until 1874 – with the State’s financial support as a result of the Education (Scotland) Act 1872) – that Heriot’s were able to complete the takeover of Davie Street which was to be converted to one of its Outdoor Schools. These schools, instituted in 1838, were outdoor in the sense that they provided education outwith the walls of Heriot’s Hospital itself. They were run on the Madras System and financed by the surplus of the Heriot Trust to provided a free education for the “children of burgesses and others“: in practice this meant the poor.

In October 1874, temporary accommodation was arranged for the non-paying pupils of Davie Street while their school was to be demolished and replaced with a larger and more modern building for 650 children. The architect of the Heriot Trust, John Chesser, drew up plans for a two storey school in a Jacobean style, richly ornamented with the roses and stars from the coat of arms of George Heriot and mouldings and corner towers directly inspired by the mother Hospital School.

Davie Street school as rebuilt by Heriot’s in 1875

The school reopened on Whitsunday 1875, the tablet on its principal gable now reading George Heriot’s Hospital School. Its first – and only – headmaster was to be Mr John McCrindle who held this position until his retirement in 1905. The infant headmistress was Miss Jane Johnston from 1877 to 1908, she herself having been educated at one of the Trust’s the Outdoor Schools at Heriot Bridge.

An engraved portrait of John McCrindle by the Edinburgh Evenening News upon his retirement, July 18th 1905

In 1879 a tragedy occurred when a pupil, Ellen Bennet, died from burns she had received at the school; on a cold November day she sneaked unsupervised back into her classroom at lunchtime and climbed over the guard of the fire that heated the room to warm herself causing her clothing to catch fire. The following year there were 180 infants and 320 older children on the school roll and “almost all the children… are the boys and girls of parents of the strictly working and artisan classes. They all appeared scrupulously clean and very tidy at the examination“.

Davie Street showing the Heriot’s School, 1876 OS Town Survey of Edinburgh. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

The school’s life with the Heriot Trust was to prove short lived. In 1886 the Edinburgh School Board agreed to purchase it for £2,368 16s 8d. The Heriot’s schools at Stockbridge (later St. Bernard’s) and Abbeyhill (later Regent Road) were also acquired at this time, the Trust having decided to dispose of all of its Outdoor Schools and move its remaining day scholars to the Hospital itself. The Trust approved the sale and transfer in January 1887, part of the transfer arrangement being that they would continued to fund the free education of its existing scholars – the School Board charged fees, unlike the Outdoor Schools – any pre-existing arrangements for free education, so long as the beneficiary continued to pass the relevant exam standards.

The Board “were not at all satisfied with the internal arrangement” of Davie Street and so spent a further £2,379 2s 9d on expansion and alterations. Their architect, Robert Wilson, added an additional wing to the south with accommodation an additional 130 pupils, increasing its capacity to 690. By re-using the additional ornamental stonework this addition appears almost seamless, beyond the plainer style of the roof line. Despite the change of administration, the “Heriot’s Hospital” tablet remained on its façade, never being replaced by the School Board’s roundel.

Davie Street showing the School Board’s public school, note the large projection of the new wing to the south. 1893 OS Town Survey of Edinburgh. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

The peace of Davie Street Public School – as it was now known – was breached in October 1889 when a wave of excitement spread throughout British schools via newspaper reports of an attempt by schoolboys in Cardiff to institute a general strike. Their demands were a half-day Wednesday, no homework, shorter hours and no corporal punishment. The action spread contagiously and by the following afternoon the boys of Davie Street had organised themselves, marching behind a banner (reported to be “a handkerchief nailed to a stick“) to Castlehill and Dalry schools in an effort to instigate risings there too. Their demands – reasonable to modern eyes – were conveyed on a scrap of paper; “strike for short hours and no home lessons and free education for the whole school“. The action rumbled on for a few days more with “strikebreaking” pupils at some schools reporting being hissed at the gates by the holdouts before it petered out. Those who were judged to have been ringleaders found themselves punished for their efforts with the tawse – a short, sharp reminder of how things had changed since the days of the reward-based Lancasterian School.

Headline, Evening Mail, 9th October 1889

Perhaps memories of the brief uprising of 1889 died hard as in October 1913, once again boys from Davie Street marched out of their school in spontaneous protest in an effort to get their compatriots in the district – at Causewayside, South Bridge and St Leonard’s Public Schools – to join them in resisting rumoured (and entirely spurious) plans to force them to attend school on Saturday mornings.

Life was harsh for many of the children in the Old Town and Southside and a particularly extreme case was reported in the Evening News in November 1908 involving children from Davie Street. Philip Lavin of 150 Dumbiedykes Road was sentenced to three months imprisonment at the Sheriff Court for ill-treatment and neglect of his five children, aged six months to 13 years. He had been repeatedly visited and warned of his conduct by the Scottish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children (SSPCC) over the course of five years. Finally, Headmaster R. James Reith wrote to the SSPCC to inform them of bruising on the face of one of Lavin’s daughters which he suspected was the result of assault. Visiting the house again, they found the childrens’ “clothing was scanty and on [their] bed the only covering was an old quilt.” The hungry children had sometimes shared just two rolls between four for their breakfast or five potatoes for their dinner. Lavin earned good money as a painter, 30s a week, but spent it on drink and gave none to his wife, Marion Hewit. She instead had to go out to work for the upkeep of herself and the children and continued to do so when she became ill until collapsing and being sent to the City Fever Hospital suffering from acute consumption (TB). She died less than a year later, on 20th October 1909; her husband however lived until the age of 76.

Boys of Davie Street School in 1910, many barefoot, waiting for tickets for a day trip to Ratho organised by the charitable Courant Fund.

In 1917 the School Board undertook an extensive reorganisation of education in the city to provide additional “supplementary education” – that for children over the age of 12 but who had failed to pass the qualification exams for Higher Grade schools. They recognised there was a demand for specialist commercial and technical education at this stage for children who soon be entering the workplace when they finished their compulsory schooling at the age of 14. It was therefore agreed to establish specialist institutes in the city and Davie Street was selected to become part of one of the city’s first specialised supplementary Technical Schools. In 1918, Davie Street closed without ceremony as a primary school and became an annexe for the nearby James Clark Technical School.

Former James Clark School with its remarkable corner tower.

Initially Davie Street provided rooms for practical subjects such as art, home economics and science while these facilities were constructed at James Clark (which had been planned for elementary education and therefore was not originally built with them). In 1924 it was then taken in hand to be properly modernised (including being converted from gas to electric lighting) and converted into specialist technical workshops for teaching the trades of brassfinishing, tinsmithing, upholstery, plumbing, tailoring and printing. In this guise it provided centralised training in these crafts for the Southside, successful completion of its printing courses could lead to bursaries for a print qualifications at Heriot Watt College and entry into one of the city’s most prized blue collar careers.

An exhibition of work in the printing and allied trades by students of Davie Street in 1957 – a bookbinding for HMS Caledonia is admired.

The specialist technical education at Davie Street was moved from the curriculum of James Clark School to those of Telford and Napier Colleges after 1966, its workshops being run-down and moved to those institutions shortly thereafter. James Clark school itself closed in 1972 as part of the citywide secondary education shake-up required to move to a fully comprehensive system; by this time its roll had declined steeply from an inter-war high of over 1,000 to just 300.

Davie Street School in 1959 from the Dumbiedykes Survey by Adam H. Malcolm © Edinburgh City Libraries L973B

Davie Street sat vacant for a number of years until it started what was to be an altogether very different chapter in its life story. In 1969 it was turned into the Theatre Arts Centre, the brainchild of Edinburgh Corporation’s drama advisor Gerard Slevin. Slevin approached English teacher Leslie Hills, a self-described “newly minted teacher“, to run this project on the basis that she had upset her school establishment by abandoning the old “chalk and talk” methods and using instead the medium of drama to engage and teach her students. On her first visit to Davie Street she found:

The paintwork was ancient; the boiler was coal-fired and the toilets indescribable. I said yes. I was 23.

Leslie Hills, describing her first visit to Davie Street School

On a shoestring budget, the school was converted to its new purpose which involved removal of a large quantity of old printing machinery, outfitting the hall as a drama studio and cleaning the toilets as best as could be done. With a drama teacher, art teacher and music teacher under Leslie, by the autumn of that year the centre was open for business: “It was an extraordinary position to be in. No-one knew what we should be doing, so we made it all up.”

Edinburgh Corporation’s Theatre Arts Centre sign (Art was a spelling mistake), rescued from Davie Street when it was replaced by a sign for Lothian Regional Council in 1975. Picture kindly provided by Leslie Hills.

The first pupils to attend came from the city’s Junior Secondary schools, those destined to be replaced by Comprehensives in the coming years. “Many came from difficult backgrounds, some from the surrounding housing soon to be flattened, where water was obtained from a tap in the yard. Many were underfed, ill-clothed for Edinburgh’s winters and, leaving school at 15, just too wee to be sent, bewildered, out to scrapyards and tyre depots with a bit of paper on which was written an address in a part of town of which they had no knowledge.“

Slum housing in Edinburgh, 1969. Marshall’s Court, Greenside, . S. G. Jackman photo, Edinburgh City Libraries, Edinburgh and Scottish Collection.

Up to 500 secondary-age children a week came through the doors of the Theatre Arts Centre from across the city, including from “List D” reformatory schools, those pushed to the very extremes of the education system. Leslie Hills takes up the story:

I talked to every class on their first day, explaining that we did not use the belt – still in use in schools – and that the rules were behave yourself and no graffiti – except in the toilets into which they were allowed to take felt-tipped pens which were in plentiful supply. The boys’ toilet became a wonder to behold – absolutely covered in intricate designs. I never worked out how they did the ceilings. The rest of the building remained pristine.

With its radical approach to learning through the mediums of drama, art and music, the laid back approach to uniform, lesson structure and timetabling and the lack of corporal punishment, the “school-in-a-theatre” was dubbed “Britain’s most unusual school” by the Daily Record. It was a fitting coincidence that Davie Street School had unwittingly been returned to its roots of education without punishment.

Drama teacher David Prince is “attacked” by his pupils at the Theatre Arts Centre in an exercise learning about the value of movement in drama. Daily Record, 2nd December 1970

The initial success of the Theatre Arts Centre gamble allowed the facilities and services on offer to be improved. Finding out from the Corporation’s painters that they didn’t need to follow the official schools’ colour palette of mushroom and cream, re-painting made use of colour. One room was colour drenched in pale green and fitted with an epidiascope and light box for projecting and copying designs for poster; An in-house theatre company – Theatre in Education – was set up who undertook outreach visits to city schools; A technician and a van was acquired to run a stage equipment lending library; The curriculum was widened to include photography, printing and film; Evening drama clubs for teenagers were run and later, Edinburgh Youth Theatre found a home here and it was a regular performance venue during the annual Festival Fringe.

The reorganisation of local authorities in 1975, the Centre became part of Lothian Regional Council and the geographical remit expanded accordingly. Leslie Hills departed in 1980. Ten years later it survived a threat to its continued existence at Davie Street when the site was short-listed as a potential location for a new medical centre for the district. It was announced in 1993 that a central arts school for Lothian Region would be created in the former Leith Academy building on Duke Street, which would have seen Davie Street closed and relocated there. This plan never came to fruition, likely as the result of Lothian Region losing control of its further education colleges later that year. Having survived these threats, it was the Local Government etc (Scotland) Act 1994 – which abolished Lothian Regional Council in 1996 – that did for the Centre. It was closed by the new, unitary City of Edinburgh Council in 1997 when the Secretary of State for Scotland, Michael Forsyth, refused to provide sufficient funding to the newly established councils. Dr Bell’s Drama Centre, the primary-age equivalent of the Theatre Arts Centre was closed at the same time. A “cheery wake in the rather battered studio” was held by staff past and present to celebrate its 28 year life, which also marked the end of 185 years of continuous educational use of the site.

Over the next three years the Council sought to dispose of the old school and it saw only intermittent use as a Fringe location. It was finally sold for redevelopment in 2000 and was converted into flats, a change which at the very least preserved its fine Jacobean-style masonry for the future.

Davie Street School in 2021, estate agent’s photo from the sale of one of its flats

The previous chapter in this series looked at Causewayside School. The following chapter covers Dean Public School.

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Mount Alvernia: the thread about the “Princesses of Poverty” who would not leave Liberton, in life or in death

Every so often houses come up in Liberton on the Edinburgh property listings for a charming-sounding place called Mount Alvernia. You don’t have to look twice to guess that this development has been converted from some sort of past ecclesiastical use. And you’d be right, it was once a monastery. But it had no monks: it was home instead to a community of nuns. Perhaps more unusually, two times the authorities of the Catholic Church tried to use legal methods to displace these “Princesses of Poverty“. And twice they failed!

Estate agent’s photo of a nice-looking housing development in Liberton, which quite obviously appears to have been converted from some sort of ecclesiastical building.

This monastery was opened in August 1897 by nuns of the Poor Clares (Colletines), a branch of the Order of Saint Clare. This order takes its name from St Clare of Assisi who founded it for women who gave up their worldly possessions to devote themselves to the spirituality of St Francis of Assisi. Mount Alvernia itself is in Sicily and its name is associated with the Franciscan order.

St Francis and St Clare, inside cover plate from “Princesses of Poverty: Saint Clare of Assisi and the Order of Poor Ladies” by Father Marianus Fiege, 1900

Six Poor Clares had come to Edinburgh in July 1895 to found a new house north of the Border. They had traveled from Baddesley Clinton in the West Midlands, where their order had established itself in England in 1850 for the first time since that country’s reformation. Two acres of ground at Liberton was acquired for their purpose, adjacent to Mount Vernon House which had recently been occupied by nuns of the Society of the Sacred Heart as a Home for Penitents and where a Roman Catholic Cemetery had been established. It was noted at the time that this site was particularly suitable owing to its proximity to the ancient estate of the Convent of St. Catherine of Sienna.

Ordnance Survey 1:25 inch map, 1914, of Edinburgh, centred on Mount Alvernia at Liberton

These Poor Clares were a closed, contemplative order who took solemn vows to lived a life of poverty. They fasted frequently and rejected the wearing of shoes. They observed continual silence and did not leave their cloister. They devoted themselves entirely to the worship of God and prayer for all people, particularly the suffering and needy. The rules of their house prohibited them being supported by endowments and instead they lived entirely upon charity. To facilitate communication between the Intern Sisters – those within the cloister – and the outside world there were a small number of Extern Sisters, who lived in quarters adjacent and to which they were not restricted. The Externs helped support the community through the baking of communion bread (St Clare and her order have a particular association with blessed loaves), producing handmade religious scrolls and through practical tasks such as marketing eggs and undertaking secretarial services.

The foundation stone of the monastery was laid by Archbishop Angus Macdonald of St Andrews and Edinburgh on 19th May 1896. The buildings were in a Collegiate Gothic style to the designs of A. E. Purdie, a London Architect, and it was built from local Craigmillar Stone faced with Dunfermline Stone.

Artist’s impression of the Monastery at Mount Alvernia from the Edinburgh Evening News, 15th May 1896

In a Presbyterian city, whose Catholic minority was notably poor, the nuns struggled to attract alms and the first 20 years of their existence saw a considerable debt being acquired. £1,384 was raised in time for their Silver Jubilee in 1920 to clear it. The money had been entirely collected by two local men, Bernard Flannagan and a Mr Higgins. However just 5 years later the community was in distress once more and the Glasgow Observer and Catholic Herald carried an urgent appeal for help, “their distress was never more pronounced“. Once more, Bernard Flannagan acted as collector on their behalf.

For 33 years, Mount Alvernia‘s resident chaplain was Rev. Father Patrick McMahon (1863-1945) and his golden jubilee of service was celebrated there in March 1938. But all was not well behind the closed doors of the cloister and an irreconcilable schism, brewing since 1934, had arisen between the five Extern Sisters (Sister Margaret Mary Clare – Agnes Burns; Sister Marie Colette Theresa – Laura Elizabeth Harrison; Sister Mary Clare – Edith Harris; Sister Mary Theresa – Catherine Morgan; and Sister Mary Joseph – Susan Higgins) and the 17 Interns, which included the Abbess and the Vicaress. The Externs Sisters refused to submit to the authority of the Abbess and had chosen Sister Mary Clare as leader, from their own ranks. The Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, Andrew McDonald, was unable to resolve the situation and took the drastic action of closing the monastery and dispersing the sisters to other houses.

Archbishop Mcdonald in 1920, when Abbot of St Benedict’s Abbey at Fort Augustus; By William Drummond Young. CC-by-SA 4.0, Blairs Museum via Wikimedia

The Diocese served notice for the community to leave in April 1938. The Intern Sisters left a week later but the Externs refused to go. The Church then had a Sheriff’s writ served evicting them from their home and cut off their electricity and gas. They were banished from their order and excommunicated. Sister Mary Clare, leader of the Externs, told the Evening News that they had been served a letter by the Church’s law agent informing them of their expulsion and stating they were no longer entitled to wear their habits. They were to return these on or before the 28th April in exchange for the sum of £10 towards replacement clothing and a pension of £1 10s per week, for just 13 weeks, to help them establish themselves in civilian life.

St Clare repelling the Saracens, plate from “Princesses of Poverty: Saint Clare of Assisi and the Order of Poor Ladies” by Father Marianus Fiege, 1900

Despite threats from the Church to withdraw even this pitiful pension the Extern Sisters remained defiant; they had made their vows and the Priest had commanded their Abbess” Receive this new spouse of Christ, keep her and guard her pure and spotless until you present her at the judgement seat of God. To Him you will have to give an account of her soul“. In short, their vows were sacred and perpetual and to leave the Monastery to return to civilian life would be breaking them. “Rome, and Rome alone, we must obey“, Sister Mary Clare told the Evening News, “Here we will live and here we will die.” The Externs intended to challenge their eviction and “trusted an answer would come from God“.

Fresco of Saint Clare and nuns of her order praying, Chapel of San Damiano, Assisi

That answer came in the form of their supporters whose number included the lawyer Doull Connolly, who acted for them and organised a defence at the Sheriff Court. A sympathetic cardinal Cardinal was written to, asking him to make an appeal to the Pope on their behalf. The Archbishop of Glasgow decided the Externs were not excommunicated in his jurisdiction and gave them the sacraments, for which transport was arranged thrice weekly. Even the local coalman slipped them a couple of bags every fortnight. While the dispute split opinion amongst Scotland’s Catholics, in Edinburgh it aroused considerable curiosity; numerous sightseers took a trip to Liberton to see Mount Alvernia for themselves, to bring gifts and to offer their support to the nuns within through the grille of the Monsastery’s doorway.

The case went to the Sheriff Court where T. J. D. Connolly acted as defence advocate. On July 5th Sheriff Substitute James Macdonald KC ruled in favour of the Extern sisters, who told the Daily Record that they hoped to be left in peace, but the Church appealed.

SUMMARY EJECTION NOT ALLOWED. Evening News headline, 6th July 1938

That appeal was heard in the Court of Session the next year. Connolly told that court the case, with 2 churchmen and 2 nuns as pursuers and 5nuns as defenders, was “unique” in its annals. On June 14th Lord Robertson held the defence was irrelevant and granted a decree for the Nuns removal.

EDINBURGH EXTERN NUNS MUST REMOVE. Evening News headline, 14th June 1939

The nuns appealed in turn and in March 1940 – on the same day that the Evening News reported 2 German bombers had been shot down in the North Sea – it also reported the case had been concluded in their favour and Lord Robertson’s decision was overturned.

LIBERTON NUNS WIN APPEAL. Evening News headline, 29th March 1940

The Externs could finally live on in piece, and alone, at Mount Alvernia. This they continued to do for over a decade until the early 1950s when a determined effort was made by Archbishop McDonald’s successor, Archbishop Gordon Gray, to heal the rift and re-open the Monastery to Interns. Two of the Extern holdouts were amongst the first Interns of the re-established Monastery, the other three agreeing to move to new homes in England at this time.

Portrait Of Cardinal Gordon Gray (1910 – 1993), Former Archbishop of St Andrews And Edinburgh

The re-established Poor Clares got on with their holy lives in peace and harmony until the decision was taken by the Abbess Mother Frances to close the monastery in 1992. Their ranks had dwindled from 22 to 13 and those who remained were of advancing age and unable to support themselves. A final Mass was given by Bishop Kevin Rafferty on 28th August. Their community was dispersed to other houses of the order, but left behind the bodies of the 24 nuns who had died during their lives at Mount Alvernia and who had been laid to rest in its burial ground.

The Funeral Procession of St Clare, plate from “Princesses of Poverty: Saint Clare of Assisi and the Order of Poor Ladies” by Father Marianus Fiege, 1900

The premises were sold for £200k to the “Pastoral and Social Charity Ltd”, whose board was bishops and archbishops of the Scottish RC Church. They provoked outrage in 1994 when they proposed disinterring the 24 nuns laid to rest at Mount Alvernia and moving them to nearby Mount Vernon cemetery

Contemporary newspaper photo of the Mount Alvernia burial ground. Edinburgh Evening News, 23rd September 1994

The removal of the nuns’ remains was to prepare the site for sale to developers – they contented that future developers would be at liberty to remove headstones or cover the grave plots. But when the petition for the warrant to disinter came before the Sheriff Court, the District Council objected and were ordered to advertise it in the press to try and trace any relatives of the nuns (which was something in which the Pastoral and Social Charity had failed in its attempts).

Legal Notice inserted in the Scotsman, 15th March 1994, of the petition to disinter the nuns buried at Mount Alvernia

Of the nuns in question were Mother Mary Joseph (Susan Higgins) and Sister Mary Clare (Edith Harris) – who were the 2 Extern sisters who had been involved in the 1930s court battle and had become Interns when the house was re-established. Relatives were duly identified, including Sister Mary Clare’s great niece, and they appealed against the petition. Their objection noted the findings of the Court of Session in 1940 that when a woman joined the order, she bound herself “to live her whole life in the convent, thereafter being laid to rest within the convent grounds“.

Richard Carson, the Director of Environmental Services for the District Council submitted that four of five of the bodies in question would be in “horrific condition” due to having been buried relatively recently, the last in 1991, and stated that the District Council was willing to take on stewardship of the burial ground as it had done for other sites in the city. After hearing from both sides, the Sheriff Peter McNeill QC threw the Church’s petition out on the grounds insufficient evidence had been provided that the sale of the site was contingent on the burial ground being cleared. He ruled that “the remains were sacred” and could only be moved if a pressing reason could be proven. Veronica Harris told the Evening News “It’s a sign of the greed of this century that people can dispose of the remains just to make a fast buck” and that it was a “great relief” that the disinterment would not go ahead.

Mount Alvernia in 1998, after six years of closure, neglect and vandalism having taken its toll.

In 1998 planning permission was granted by the District Council to AMA (New Town) Ltd to redevelop Mount Alvernia for housing on condition the burial ground be walled off and maintained. The ever tasteful Daily Record reported this under the headline “Tomb With a View”.

Mount Alvernia, viewed from the burial ground, with the modern flats on the right, chapel on the left and range of the monastery between.

“Rest in Peace. But be Quick About it. Hallowed ground now bears a sell-by date and the grave is not necessarily forever.”

Annette McCann, Scotland on Sunday, 29th January 1995

Note to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.

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#Lochend #Logan #Restalrig #StMargaret

The thread about the Salisbury Arms and the famous literary association that never was

Here’s an eye-catching headline one one of those sites that passes itself off as local news from today. “First Look at transformed Edinburgh boozer visited by Arthur Conan Doyle“.

Edinburgh Live headline, 25th June 2025. “First Look at transformed Edinburgh boozer visited by Arthur Conan Doyle”.

The piece goes on, “Once a favourite watering hole of the iconic Sir Arthur Conan Doyle“. Stop the bus! Arthur Conan Doyle was a regular in the Salisbury Arms? That’s news to me! Now, I’ll readily admit that I don’t know everything about Edinburgh, but something here feels a bit off.

There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.

The Adventure of the Copper Beeches, Arthur Conan Doyle

But let’s be fair, not everyone spends quite so much time poring over local history as I do, and not everyone will be irked enough by something that troubles them to look more into it. But I’m not everyone and I was sceptical and so in the best spirit of Sherlock Holmes I set out to do a little deduction of my own. To paraphrase the great detective, when it comes to Edinburgh history “it is my business to know what other people do not know!”

Sherlock Holmes statue in Edinburgh, erected opposite the birthplace of Conan Doyle. CC-by-SA 3.0 Kim Traynor via Wikimedia

The first indicator that something isn’t quite right is that the website of the Salisbury Arms itself doesn’t trouble to mention its famous literary association. The game is afoot! Delving a bit deeper, a quick tap of the keys in a search engine traces the Conan Doyle claim back to an advertorial piece from the Scotsman in June 2011. In this it is stated – without reference – “Apparently Sherlock Holmes author Arthur Conan Doyle used to frequent the hostelry now known as The Salisbury Arms in Dalkeith Road.” That word apparently is key here and from it we should suspect that the author was well aware that their claim was without evidence. Wind the clock forward to January 2017 and we find in the sister publication, Evening News, a repetition and reinforcement of the claim: “The most intriguing connection the Salisbury Arms has is with the fictional private detective Sherlock Holmes” it gushes, before quickly contradicting itself; “Whether Conan Doyle was ever a visitor… is unclear” and then instantly trying to get itself out of jail with “but it is thought he dropped by on a few occasions“. Once again I think our author was very aware that there was nothing to back up the claims they were making. By this point I’m willing to stake a round of drinks on the fact that my initial cynicism is well founded.

“Historic Salisbury Arms to undergo major renovation work”, Evening News, January 14th 2017.

I could stop there, but I like to be both firm and fair in my debunking and come to an argument armed with the facts, so I shan’t.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

A Scandal in Bohemia, Arthur Conan Doyle

So let us take a proper look into the history of the Salisbury Arms, after all history is probably why you are reading this in the first place! Along the way I can attempt to keep my reputation intact by offering a well evidenced counter argument, I can demonstrate the sort of readily accessible sources that you a I can turn to for investigating a case such as this and and hopefully we can all learn something more of the history of the place in question and write it down for the benefit of others (particularly writers of local news!). Looking at the building in question itself, it doesn’t need an expert eye make a sure guess that it probably began life as a Georgian villa.

The Salisbury Arms, Edinburgh, 2015. © Paul Farmer, CC-by-SA 2.0 via Geograph.

A quick search through the online Book of The Old Edinburgh Club – one of my frequent first ports of call for local history queries – brings us to Volume 24 and pages 152-197, “The Lands of Newington and Their Owners“, by W. Forbes Gray. In this piece we find that a house and plot here was seised (officially registered) to Francis Nalder, merchant, in 1812. Referring to a map of the area around this time – Kirkwood’s Town Plan of Edinburgh of 1817 is a reliable source, freely accessible from the National Library of Scotland – we see Mr. Nalder’s name appears as landowner here too.

Kirkwood’s town plan of Edinburgh, 1817. Showing “Nalder” on the site of the house which is now the Salisbury Arms. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

From Forbes Gray’s we learn that this plot was one of just many such others which were feued from the Newington Estate in the early 19th century to create a new suburb. Newington’s lands were an irregular rectangle defined by the Gibbet Loan (now Preston Street) to the north, East and West Mayfield to the south, Dalkeith Road to the east and the turnpike road south to Selkirk and Carlisle (now Minto Street) to the west. There was a large house, Newington House, in the southeastern quarter. This estate was an old one but had been split into six lots by the city back in the 16th century. Over subsequent centuries, five of the plots were acquired and combined by the Lauder of Fountainhall family, from where they passed to John Henderson of Leistoun. Henderson’s grandson bought the sixth and final plot in 1733, reuniting the estate and taking for himself the title Henderson of Newington.

1817 Kirkwood town plan of Edinburgh, highlighting the lands of Newington. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

At this time the Newington House on the above map had not yet been built and there was instead an older mansion located in the northwest corner at the end of what is now West Newington Place. It is shown on the Ordnance Survey 1849 Town Plan as Old Newington House. After Henderson the lands were acquired in 1751 by a saddler, Patrick Crichton. The financial problems of his son Alexander in the 1780s saw loans taken out, secured against the estate, which were defaulted on. One of the major creditors came to an agreement in 1803 whereby Benjamin Bell of Hunthill, surgeon, bought Newington for £5,000 thus settling the debt.

Benjamin Bell by Sir Henry Raeburn (c. 1780-90). From “Raeburn to Redpath” booklet by Bourne Fine Art, Edinburgh, via Wikimedia.

Bell, “the first Scottish scientific surgeon” and “father of the Edinburgh school of Surgery” built the new Newington House but died in 1806, before he had a chance to settle in and enjoy it. It so happens that he was the great grandfather of Joseph Bell, the surgeon and lecturer known as the inspiration from which Arthur Conan Doyle formed Sherlock Holmes. So finally we arrive at a kernel of a grain of truth in at least one aspect of our story. Bell’s eldest son, George, sold Newington House to Sir George Steuart of Grandtully in 1807 and Steuart bought up more of the land shortly thereafter to form gardens around the house, but also with a farsighted view that he could feu this land himself, and his own charter indeed allowed him to do so after a period of time had elapsed. In due course, his estate-within-an-estate would later be developed into the planned suburb of the Blacket Estate.

1817 Kirkwood Plan of Edinburgh centred on Newington House, showing land owners as Sir George Stewart (sic) of Grandtully, Bart. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

Having sold the house, George Bell and his brothers began the process of feuing the rest of their land here into plots for fashionable new suburban villas. To distinguish theirs from Steuart’s holding, they gave his district an on-trend new name which also happened to be a pun on their own: Belleville. On the 1826 feuing plan on the NLS maps site, both names are given:

“Plan of the Lands of Newington and Belleville, 1826”. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

This new name for the district stuck for a short while in the newspapers, but old habits can die hard and it soon reverted back to being just plain old Newington. But two houses kept the former name alive; Belleville Lodge on South Blacket Place (now Blacket Avenue) and Belleville at 58 Dalkeith Road – which is that house which would much later become the Salisbury Arms. The first record of that name being used in connection with the house that I can find is on the 1855 valuation roll over on Scotland’s People, with the owner and occupant being listed as William Donaldson, Grocer. By 1865 he has been replaced by Miss Mary Duncan as “William Donaldson’s Representative“. She is still the owner in 1875, but the occupant is one James M. Watters, Captain.

Belleville Lodge. A gate pier carries the name “Belleville Lodge” painted on it and also on a brass plaque, complete with a sign to the right saying “Belleville Lodge. Mansfield Care”.

Come 1885 there is once again a new owner and occupier; William Nelson of Salisbury Green. This latter house you can see on the 1817 map above of the Newington Estate is directly to the east of Belleville, it’s the baronial pile opposite which now forms part of the Pollock Halls complex. Confusingly the same valuation rolls show William also owned and occupied Salisbury Green at this time, it’s not clear why he needed both! He was a wealthy publisher of the family firm Thomas Nelson & Sons, whose vast Parkside Works lay just across the way, and who is known for restoring St. Bernard’s Well at Stockbridge and St. Margaret’s Chapel in Edinburgh Castle.

Salisbury Green house, a 3-storey mansion in the Scottish Baronial Revival style.

Ownership of Belleville never seemed to stay with one person for long. By 1895 the valuation rolls show it was Robert Inch, a well known and prosperous seed merchant who ran his business from the Timberbush in Leith. He died there in 1912, after which it was bought by its next door neighbour, Mrs Jane Binning Burn Murdoch of Arthur Lodge . Regular listeners might be familiar with the Burn Murdoch name, she was the wife of the artist and explorer WG Burn Murdoch who was so involved in helping Edinburgh Zoo acquire its first polar bears, at the same time as indulging in his passion for trophy hunting them. The house was let out and an advert at this time gives us a description of its accommodation and features:

Newspaper advert for the lease of “Belleville” house. “Entrance hall, cloak room, 3 public rooms, billiard room, 8 bedrooms, 2 dressing rooms, 2 bathrooms, laundry and ample servants’ accommodation” plus stables and garaging. The Scotsman – 19 March 1913

Mrs Burn Murdoch’s maiden name was Usher, she was a daughter of Andrew Usher of that distilling dynasty which financed and lends its name to the Usher Hall. Belleville by 1930 was in the hands and occupation of her sister, Elizabeth Usher Cunningham and in turn by 1935 it was Elizabeth’s son, Howard, who was there. Howard Usher Cunningham served with the Royal Irish Regiment during World War 1 at Gallipoli, in the Balkans and in Palestine, being awarded the Military Cross in the last theatre. He was in the fertiliser business with the family firm of J. & J. Cunningham of Leith, which was one of the five constituent companies of the Scottish Agricultural Industries conglomerate which formed in 1928. He was appointed director in 1929, rising to Managing Director in 1947. During World War 2 he was the Ministry of Supply Fertiliser Controller for the country, which earned him a knighthood.

In 1942 the house of Belleville was turned over to the Edinburgh Home for Babies and School of Mothercraft, a charitable maternity home and training establishment for both midwives and young (often single) mothers. This organisation had lost its base on Colinton Road to the Civil Defence for the duration of the war and at first had been evacuated to the countryside, but returned to the city in 1942 once the immediate threat was passed where it could better undertake its work. Usher Cunningham returned to the house briefly after the war but by 1948 it had been taken over by the Relief Society for Poles in London as the Polish House, a Polish community centre for exiles and a headquarters for organisations such as the Polish YMCA and Scottish-Polish Society.

Scotsman article, 29 January 1948, showing a picture of the dining room of 58 Dalkeith Road under the title “Polish Centre in Edinburgh”, with two columns below of description.

The Polish House was transient and soon moved on as Poles in Edinburgh either emigrated or integrated, it relocated to Drummond Place where it joined the Polish Press Agency. In 1950 the Edinburgh Corporation looked to acquire the building as a remand school but it was instead opened as the Davidson Clinic, to treat young adults and children with “anxiety illnesses“. The Clinic took its name from the Davidson Church in Eyre Place, where the idea for it had been formed by the minister. It practised what we would now call psychotherapy and had been established in the city in 1941 as a charitable institution. Under its lead doctor, GP Dr Winifred Rushforth, it took a pioneering approach to dealing with nervous and anxiety conditions.

Dr Winifred Rushforth (1885–1983) by Victoria Crowe. © Victoria Crowe. Credit: Museums & Galleries Edinburgh

The Davidson Clinic remained a charity and closely associated with the Church of Scotland for its existence. Never part of the NHS it relocated from Belleville in 1968 and was closed in 1973. Key members of this organisation, including Winifred Rushforth, would go on to find the similar Wellspring clinic. Belleville was now acquired again by the Usher family, this time by Thomas Usher & Sons, the brewing branch of the dynasty. Ushers successfully applied for a licence to turn it into a modern roadhouse type pub and restaurant. Despite local objections it opened as such in 1970 as the Commonwealth-games inspired Gold Medal Tavern. The Gold Medal found its way into the Alloa Brewery’s portfolio, who refurbished it in 1986 and renamed the restaurant to Waffles. With a trendy open plan dining area and kitchen, it offered “pizzas, pasta, hamburgers, steaks and chicken“. No mention was made of waffles, but traditional pub food could be had in the lounge bar.

Newspaper advert “We’ve pulled a fast one” on the refurbishment of the Gold Medal tavern. Edinburgh Evening News – 15 May 1986

Roll forward the clock to 1994 and the pub was acquired by the Firkin brand of Allied Domecq who renamed it The Physician & Firkin, despite it having no obvious connection to medicine. When that chain folded in 2001 it was passed to Bass who branded it as one of their yellow-liveried, sticky-floored It’s a Scream student discount pubs with the new name of The Crags. Come 2011, the pub was re-branded and repositioned once again, becoming the more upmarket Salisbury Arms.

This has all been a very long winded way to say that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died in 1930 and there was not a pub on the site of the Salisbury Arms until 1970! The original claim is demonstrable nonsense – he definitely never drank in, never mind frequented, this establishment. Furthermore, the association of the Bell family with the house ended in 1807 when it was sold to its first owner, some 30 years before the birth of Joseph Bell. So the chance that he or Conan Doyle have any further connection with it is slim to nil.

So why is any of this important? Am I just showing off about being right about something? Shouldn’t I be magnanimous and attribute this to an innocent journalistic error? Well, you’re probably reading this page because you have an interest in Edinburgh and local history, so I will try and explain why I think that it matters and why you too should be bothered.

Arthur Conan Doyle in 1914, photograph by Walter Benington. Via Wikimedia

The first problem is that despite the best efforts of their owning companies to try and destroy all trust in them over the last 20 or so years, faith is still put by many in local newspapers as they trade on past reputations and a lack of alternatives. They and their websites are still held as being reliable places to find things out and they still command a wide local reach; people will read what they write and there’s a good chance they will accept it. Why shouldn’t they? The Evening News even has a strapline at the top of every page which says “News you can trust since 1873“, it invites you to believe it. So when it publishes historical facts without substantiation, they will inevitably become accepted as facts. The irony is not lost on me that a lot of what you will read on this very website has been arrived at by trawling through previous generations of these very local newspapers. I too have to trust that what was being printed in the pages of the Evening News or the Scotsman at the time was an accurate and factual record.

But this shouldn’t be a problem I hear you say, people have the sum of the world’s knowledge at their fingertips these days and can just check a search engine to verify a fact. So let’s do just that and perform a quick experiment by doing what many people do these days to adjudicate a point: let’s ask Google “which pub did Arthur Conan Doyle drink in?”.

Oh, so it was The Salisbury Arms. Mea culpa, if it’s on Google it must be true, right? But give the result a second glance, that’s not actually a search result. That’s an answer automatically generated by Google’s AI Overview and presented above and before the actual search results. It’s what some might call machine generated slop, an approximation of what looks like a plausible answer arrived at by a statistical analysis of a very large data set. It is the year 2025 and the problem of the Evening News presenting theory as fact is no longer confined to the reach of its own readership. Local news websites are now constantly crawled and trawled as the training material for the Large Language Models that are commonly referred to as AI. Local news is the factual foodstuff, chewed, digested, reconstituted and regurgitated by the LLM. And as the old saying goes, if you put garbage in you’ll get garbage out.

Give the above result a third glance and you see a little vague link symbol at the end of the word soup of that first paragraph. Click that link and it will suggest to you the source from which it came to its conclusions. So I did this and what should we see but two “references”, the oldest of which is only a day old and is the very same article which got me started! The second is a copy-and-paste effort of the first, barely hours old on the internet at this time.

And here is the big problem I’ve been trying to get at. We’ve just got a complete worked example of Google inventing itself a new fact about an important figure in Edinburgh local history, and people will believe it, because it is Google and that is were a huge number of people turn to for information, and because it is substantiated by links to local news websites, which many people still put trust in. That fact is now out of the bag and once it’s out, it is very hard to put it back in. Check in on the above search in a few months, weeks, or even days and you will undoubtedly see the fact has replicated itself across multiple other sources like a virus. And those sources will now in turn be consumed once again by Large Language Models, which will spit out the same result in future with ever more confidence. We’re all going to have to get used to accepting a lot less of what is presented to us fact and doing a lot more of our own verification if we want to find out the actual answer…

Ouroboros, the serpent consuming its own tail, a symbol for eternal cyclic renewal

If you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site – including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget to find further stories to bring you – by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.

These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur.

NO AI TRAINING: Any use of the contents of this website to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

#ConanDoyle #House #Newington #pub #pubs #Southside #Usher #Written2025

The thread about the Salisbury Arms and the famous literary association that never was

Here’s an eye-catching headline one one of those sites that passes itself off as local news from today. “First Look at transformed Edinburgh boozer visited by Arthur Conan Doyle“.

Edinburgh Live headline, 25th June 2025. “First Look at transformed Edinburgh boozer visited by Arthur Conan Doyle”.

The piece goes on, “Once a favourite watering hole of the iconic Sir Arthur Conan Doyle“. Stop the bus! Arthur Conan Doyle was a regular in the Salisbury Arms? That’s news to me! Now, I’ll readily admit that I don’t know everything about Edinburgh, but something here feels a bit off.

There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.

The Adventure of the Copper Beeches, Arthur Conan Doyle

But let’s be fair, not everyone spends quite so much time poring over local history as I do, and not everyone will be irked enough by something that troubles them to look more into it. But I’m not everyone and I was sceptical and so in the best spirit of Sherlock Holmes I set out to do a little deduction of my own. To paraphrase the great detective, when it comes to Edinburgh history “it is my business to know what other people do not know!”

Sherlock Holmes statue in Edinburgh, erected opposite the birthplace of Conan Doyle. CC-by-SA 3.0 Kim Traynor via Wikimedia

The first indicator that something isn’t quite right is that the website of the Salisbury Arms itself doesn’t trouble to mention its famous literary association. The game is afoot! Delving a bit deeper, a quick tap of the keys in a search engine traces the Conan Doyle claim back to an advertorial piece from the Scotsman in June 2011. In this it is stated – without reference – “Apparently Sherlock Holmes author Arthur Conan Doyle used to frequent the hostelry now known as The Salisbury Arms in Dalkeith Road.” That word apparently is key here and from it we should suspect that the author was well aware that their claim was without evidence. Wind the clock forward to January 2017 and we find in the sister publication, Evening News, a repetition and reinforcement of the claim: “The most intriguing connection the Salisbury Arms has is with the fictional private detective Sherlock Holmes” it gushes, before quickly contradicting itself; “Whether Conan Doyle was ever a visitor… is unclear” and then instantly trying to get itself out of jail with “but it is thought he dropped by on a few occasions“. Once again I think our author was very aware that there was nothing to back up the claims they were making. By this point I’m willing to stake a round of drinks on the fact that my initial cynicism is well founded.

“Historic Salisbury Arms to undergo major renovation work”, Evening News, January 14th 2017.

I could stop there, but I like to be both firm and fair in my debunking and come to an argument armed with the facts, so I shan’t.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

A Scandal in Bohemia, Arthur Conan Doyle

So let us take a proper look into the history of the Salisbury Arms, after all history is probably why you are reading this in the first place! Along the way I can attempt to keep my reputation intact by offering a well evidenced counter argument, I can demonstrate the sort of readily accessible sources that you a I can turn to for investigating a case such as this and and hopefully we can all learn something more of the history of the place in question and write it down for the benefit of others (particularly writers of local news!). Looking at the building in question itself, it doesn’t need an expert eye make a sure guess that it probably began life as a Georgian villa.

The Salisbury Arms, Edinburgh, 2015. © Paul Farmer, CC-by-SA 2.0 via Geograph.

A quick search through the online Book of The Old Edinburgh Club – one of my frequent first ports of call for local history queries – brings us to Volume 24 and pages 152-197, “The Lands of Newington and Their Owners“, by W. Forbes Gray. In this piece we find that a house and plot here was seised (officially registered) to Francis Nalder, merchant, in 1812. Referring to a map of the area around this time – Kirkwood’s Town Plan of Edinburgh of 1817 is a reliable source, freely accessible from the National Library of Scotland – we see Mr. Nalder’s name appears as landowner here too.

Kirkwood’s town plan of Edinburgh, 1817. Showing “Nalder” on the site of the house which is now the Salisbury Arms. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

From Forbes Gray’s we learn that this plot was one of just many such others which were feued from the Newington Estate in the early 19th century to create a new suburb. Newington’s lands were an irregular rectangle defined by the Gibbet Loan (now Preston Street) to the north, East and West Mayfield to the south, Dalkeith Road to the east and the turnpike road south to Selkirk and Carlisle (now Minto Street) to the west. There was a large house, Newington House, in the southeastern quarter. This estate was an old one but had been split into six lots by the city back in the 16th century. Over subsequent centuries, five of the plots were acquired and combined by the Lauder of Fountainhall family, from where they passed to John Henderson of Leistoun. Henderson’s grandson bought the sixth and final plot in 1733, reuniting the estate and taking for himself the title Henderson of Newington.

1817 Kirkwood town plan of Edinburgh, highlighting the lands of Newington. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

At this time the Newington House on the above map had not yet been built and there was instead an older mansion located in the northwest corner at the end of what is now West Newington Place. It is shown on the Ordnance Survey 1849 Town Plan as Old Newington House. After Henderson the lands were acquired in 1751 by a saddler, Patrick Crichton. The financial problems of his son Alexander in the 1780s saw loans taken out, secured against the estate, which were defaulted on. One of the major creditors came to an agreement in 1803 whereby Benjamin Bell of Hunthill, surgeon, bought Newington for £5,000 thus settling the debt.

Benjamin Bell by Sir Henry Raeburn (c. 1780-90). From “Raeburn to Redpath” booklet by Bourne Fine Art, Edinburgh, via Wikimedia.

Bell, “the first Scottish scientific surgeon” and “father of the Edinburgh school of Surgery” built the new Newington House but died in 1806, before he had a chance to settle in and enjoy it. It so happens that he was the great grandfather of Joseph Bell, the surgeon and lecturer known as the inspiration from which Arthur Conan Doyle formed Sherlock Holmes. So finally we arrive at a kernel of a grain of truth in at least one aspect of our story. Bell’s eldest son, George, sold Newington House to Sir George Steuart of Grandtully in 1807 and Steuart bought up more of the land shortly thereafter to form gardens around the house, but also with a farsighted view that he could feu this land himself, and his own charter indeed allowed him to do so after a period of time had elapsed. In due course, his estate-within-an-estate would later be developed into the planned suburb of the Blacket Estate.

1817 Kirkwood Plan of Edinburgh centred on Newington House, showing land owners as Sir George Stewart (sic) of Grandtully, Bart. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

Having sold the house, George Bell and his brothers began the process of feuing the rest of their land here into plots for fashionable new suburban villas. To distinguish theirs from Steuart’s holding, they gave his district an on-trend new name which also happened to be a pun on their own: Belleville. On the 1826 feuing plan on the NLS maps site, both names are given:

“Plan of the Lands of Newington and Belleville, 1826”. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

This new name for the district stuck for a short while in the newspapers, but old habits can die hard and it soon reverted back to being just plain old Newington. But two houses kept the former name alive; Belleville Lodge on South Blacket Place (now Blacket Avenue) and Belleville at 58 Dalkeith Road – which is that house which would much later become the Salisbury Arms. The first record of that name being used in connection with the house that I can find is on the 1855 valuation roll over on Scotland’s People, with the owner and occupant being listed as William Donaldson, Grocer. By 1865 he has been replaced by Miss Mary Duncan as “William Donaldson’s Representative“. She is still the owner in 1875, but the occupant is one James M. Watters, Captain.

Belleville Lodge. A gate pier carries the name “Belleville Lodge” painted on it and also on a brass plaque, complete with a sign to the right saying “Belleville Lodge. Mansfield Care”.

Come 1885 there is once again a new owner and occupier; William Nelson of Salisbury Green. This latter house you can see on the 1817 map above of the Newington Estate is directly to the east of Belleville, it’s the baronial pile opposite which now forms part of the Pollock Halls complex. Confusingly the same valuation rolls show William also owned and occupied Salisbury Green at this time, it’s not clear why he needed both! He was a wealthy publisher of the family firm Thomas Nelson & Sons, whose vast Parkside Works lay just across the way, and who is known for restoring St. Bernard’s Well at Stockbridge and St. Margaret’s Chapel in Edinburgh Castle.

Salisbury Green house, a 3-storey mansion in the Scottish Baronial Revival style.

Ownership of Belleville never seemed to stay with one person for long. By 1895 the valuation rolls show it was Robert Inch, a well known and prosperous seed merchant who ran his business from the Timberbush in Leith. He died there in 1912, after which it was bought by its next door neighbour, Mrs Jane Binning Burn Murdoch of Arthur Lodge . Regular listeners might be familiar with the Burn Murdoch name, she was the wife of the artist and explorer WG Burn Murdoch who was so involved in helping Edinburgh Zoo acquire its first polar bears, at the same time as indulging in his passion for trophy hunting them. The house was let out and an advert at this time gives us a description of its accommodation and features:

Newspaper advert for the lease of “Belleville” house. “Entrance hall, cloak room, 3 public rooms, billiard room, 8 bedrooms, 2 dressing rooms, 2 bathrooms, laundry and ample servants’ accommodation” plus stables and garaging. The Scotsman – 19 March 1913

Mrs Burn Murdoch’s maiden name was Usher, she was a daughter of Andrew Usher of that distilling dynasty which financed and lends its name to the Usher Hall. Belleville by 1930 was in the hands and occupation of her sister, Elizabeth Usher Cunningham and in turn by 1935 it was Elizabeth’s son, Howard, who was there. Howard Usher Cunningham served with the Royal Irish Regiment during World War 1 at Gallipoli, in the Balkans and in Palestine, being awarded the Military Cross in the last theatre. He was in the fertiliser business with the family firm of J. & J. Cunningham of Leith, which was one of the five constituent companies of the Scottish Agricultural Industries conglomerate which formed in 1928. He was appointed director in 1929, rising to Managing Director in 1947. During World War 2 he was the Ministry of Supply Fertiliser Controller for the country, which earned him a knighthood.

In 1942 the house of Belleville was turned over to the Edinburgh Home for Babies and School of Mothercraft, a charitable maternity home and training establishment for both midwives and young (often single) mothers. This organisation had lost its base on Colinton Road to the Civil Defence for the duration of the war and at first had been evacuated to the countryside, but returned to the city in 1942 once the immediate threat was passed where it could better undertake its work. Usher Cunningham returned to the house briefly after the war but by 1948 it had been taken over by the Relief Society for Poles in London as the Polish House, a Polish community centre for exiles and a headquarters for organisations such as the Polish YMCA and Scottish-Polish Society.

Scotsman article, 29 January 1948, showing a picture of the dining room of 58 Dalkeith Road under the title “Polish Centre in Edinburgh”, with two columns below of description.

The Polish House was transient and soon moved on as Poles in Edinburgh either emigrated or integrated, it relocated to Drummond Place where it joined the Polish Press Agency. In 1950 the Edinburgh Corporation looked to acquire the building as a remand school but it was instead opened as the Davidson Clinic, to treat young adults and children with “anxiety illnesses“. The Clinic took its name from the Davidson Church in Eyre Place, where the idea for it had been formed by the minister. It practised what we would now call psychotherapy and had been established in the city in 1941 as a charitable institution. Under its lead doctor, GP Dr Winifred Rushforth, it took a pioneering approach to dealing with nervous and anxiety conditions.

Dr Winifred Rushforth (1885–1983) by Victoria Crowe. © Victoria Crowe. Credit: Museums & Galleries Edinburgh

The Davidson Clinic remained a charity and closely associated with the Church of Scotland for its existence. Never part of the NHS it relocated from Belleville in 1968 and was closed in 1973. Key members of this organisation, including Winifred Rushforth, would go on to find the similar Wellspring clinic. Belleville was now acquired again by the Usher family, this time by Thomas Usher & Sons, the brewing branch of the dynasty. Ushers successfully applied for a licence to turn it into a modern roadhouse type pub and restaurant. Despite local objections it opened as such in 1970 as the Commonwealth-games inspired Gold Medal Tavern. The Gold Medal found its way into the Alloa Brewery’s portfolio, who refurbished it in 1986 and renamed the restaurant to Waffles. With a trendy open plan dining area and kitchen, it offered “pizzas, pasta, hamburgers, steaks and chicken“. No mention was made of waffles, but traditional pub food could be had in the lounge bar.

Newspaper advert “We’ve pulled a fast one” on the refurbishment of the Gold Medal tavern. Edinburgh Evening News – 15 May 1986

Roll forward the clock to 1994 and the pub was acquired by the Firkin brand of Allied Domecq who renamed it The Physician & Firkin, despite it having no obvious connection to medicine. When that chain folded in 2001 it was passed to Bass who branded it as one of their yellow-liveried, sticky-floored It’s a Scream student discount pubs with the new name of The Crags. Come 2011, the pub was re-branded and repositioned once again, becoming the more upmarket Salisbury Arms.

This has all been a very long winded way to say that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died in 1930 and there was not a pub on the site of the Salisbury Arms until 1970! The original claim is demonstrable nonsense – he definitely never drank in, never mind frequented, this establishment. Furthermore, the association of the Bell family with the house ended in 1807 when it was sold to its first owner, some 30 years before the birth of Joseph Bell. So the chance that he or Conan Doyle have any further connection with it is slim to nil.

So why is any of this important? Am I just showing off about being right about something? Shouldn’t I be magnanimous and attribute this to an innocent journalistic error? Well, you’re probably reading this page because you have an interest in Edinburgh and local history, so I will try and explain why I think that it matters and why you too should be bothered.

Arthur Conan Doyle in 1914, photograph by Walter Benington. Via Wikimedia

The first problem is that despite the best efforts of their owning companies to try and destroy all trust in them over the last 20 or so years, faith is still put by many in local newspapers as they trade on past reputations and a lack of alternatives. They and their websites are still held as being reliable places to find things out and they still command a wide local reach; people will read what they write and there’s a good chance they will accept it. Why shouldn’t they? The Evening News even has a strapline at the top of every page which says “News you can trust since 1873“, it invites you to believe it. So when it publishes historical facts without substantiation, they will inevitably become accepted as facts. The irony is not lost on me that a lot of what you will read on this very website has been arrived at by trawling through previous generations of these very local newspapers. I too have to trust that what was being printed in the pages of the Evening News or the Scotsman at the time was an accurate and factual record.

But this shouldn’t be a problem I hear you say, people have the sum of the world’s knowledge at their fingertips these days and can just check a search engine to verify a fact. So let’s do just that and perform a quick experiment by doing what many people do these days to adjudicate a point: let’s ask Google “which pub did Arthur Conan Doyle drink in?”.

Oh, so it was The Salisbury Arms. Mea culpa, if it’s on Google it must be true, right? But give the result a second glance, that’s not actually a search result. That’s an answer automatically generated by Google’s AI Overview and presented above and before the actual search results. It’s what some might call machine generated slop, an approximation of what looks like a plausible answer arrived at by a statistical analysis of a very large data set. It is the year 2025 and the problem of the Evening News presenting theory as fact is no longer confined to the reach of its own readership. Local news websites are now constantly crawled and trawled as the training material for the Large Language Models that are commonly referred to as AI. Local news is the factual foodstuff, chewed, digested, reconstituted and regurgitated by the LLM. And as the old saying goes, if you put garbage in you’ll get garbage out.

Give the above result a third glance and you see a little vague link symbol at the end of the word soup of that first paragraph. Click that link and it will suggest to you the source from which it came to its conclusions. So I did this and what should we see but two “references”, the oldest of which is only a day old and is the very same article which got me started! The second is a copy-and-paste effort of the first, barely hours old on the internet at this time.

And here is the big problem I’ve been trying to get at. We’ve just got a complete worked example of Google inventing itself a new fact about an important figure in Edinburgh local history, and people will believe it, because it is Google and that is were a huge number of people turn to for information, and because it is substantiated by links to local news websites, which many people still put trust in. That fact is now out of the bag and once it’s out, it is very hard to put it back in. Check in on the above search in a few months, weeks, or even days and you will undoubtedly see the fact has replicated itself across multiple other sources like a virus. And those sources will now in turn be consumed once again by Large Language Models, which will spit out the same result in future with ever more confidence. We’re all going to have to get used to accepting a lot less of what is presented to us fact and doing a lot more of our own verification if we want to find out the actual answer…

Ouroboros, the serpent consuming its own tail, a symbol for eternal cyclic renewal

If you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site – including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget to find further stories to bring you – by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.

These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur.

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The thread about the Beechmount Institute, home of the Edinburgh Radium Bomb

A couple of things happened recently. A fire at the former Corstorphine Hospital prompted me to read up and write about the history of that establishment and it was also the annual Christian Aid bumper booksale in Edinburgh, at which I picked up an excellent history of the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh1 (amongst many other things.) These circumstances converged to pique my interest in Beechmount, a grand mansion house which was, for a short time at least, the exotic and atomic sounding National Radium Centre and a pioneer in the field of radiotherapy.

Beechmount, estate agent’s photo. © 2025 Scarlett Land & Development

Beechmount, set amongst 8 acres of woodland, was built in 1900 in an Italianate style to designs by Messrs McArthy & Watson as the private residence of Sir George and Lady Mary Anne Anderson. The land was feud from the Beechwood Mains estate at Murrayfield and its name was a simple amalgam of the neighbouring properties of Beechwood and Belmont.

1905 Ordnance Survey 1:25 inch map of Edinburghshire, centred on Beechmount (left), Beechwood (centre) and Belmont (right). Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

Sir George was treasurer of the Bank of Scotland from 1898 to 1917, which explains how the coat of arms of that institution came to be found above the house’s main door and grand fireplace. He was the first Scottish “banker knight“, his title conferred for services to his industry. After his retirement in 1917, the Andersons spent their retirement at Beechmount as respected members of Edinburgh society. Sir George died there on December 1st 1923, aged 78. Lady Anne survived him before she too passed away in the house on 26th May 1926, aged 80. Her husband had intended that the house be left to his bank as an official residence for its treasurer but Lady Anne instead bequeathed it to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. She recommended it be used as a convalescent home for servicemen injured during World War I but gave the hospital managers final discretion as to its use. In addition, £5,000 was left to them to help adapt the property to its new purpose.

Sir George Anderson, 1911 photographic portrait by Bassano & Vandyk. © National Portrait Gallery, London

And that may have been that for the Beechmount story had it not been for the rapid development of a new field of medicine. In 1926, the Infirmary had been able to purchase 500mg of the radioactive element Radium – a substantial proportion of the entire global supply of it at that time – as the result of a donation of £5,000. It began to experiment in its use for the treatment of “malignant disease“; cancer. Prior to this, the only known treatment was surgical removal of tumours and the new branch is what we now call Radiotherapy. To begin with, Radium treatments were undertaken in the main buildings of the Infirmary at Lauriston Place by introducing tiny amounts of the element directly into tumours using needles, different coloured threads attached to them indicating the radioactive strength. However it soon became clear that a specialised unit dedicated to the therapy would be desirable and in 1928 it was decided that Lady Anderson’s bequest should be fitted out as such; the Beechmount Radium Institute.

The medical promise of Radium was great but so too were the costs, dangers and difficulties associated with its use. As a result, in 1929 the government established the Radium Trust to source and hold supplies of the wonder material for the nation and the National Radium Commission to oversee its regulation and distribution. The Commission did not want to deal purely with hospitals and so in 1930 a joint partnership between the Royal Infirmary and the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Edinburgh was set up to combine their teaching and research in the field in order that they could mutually benefit from the national supply. In the meantime £11,000 was spent on the Beechmount project and the new facility, with 36 in-patient beds, was opened in October 1932. To begin with patients continued to be treated at the Infirmary and were sent to the new annexe for their pre- and post-treatment convalescent care, however the entire process was soon centralised at the Institute.

The Beechmount Radium Institute, photograph in the Nursing Times, March 1937

The facility was overseen by the respected surgeon John James McIntosh (J.J.M.) Shaw, a military doctor, pioneer in reconstructive plastic surgery and member of both the Radium Trust and Commission. Its first matron was Margaret Colville Marshall, later “Lady Superintendent” of the Infirmary and awarded the OBE for this service. From his base at Beechmount, J.J.M. oversaw the establishment of the Cancer Control Organisation for Edinburgh and Southeast Scotland in 1934, a group of influential (and wealthy) members of society to help organising towards the running costs of the Institute. That same year the Radium Commission approved the Infirmary’s proposal that Beechmount become the National Radium Centre for southeast Scotland, the first of five such centres proposed for the country.

Beechmount on a 1939 Post Office map of Edinburgh, incorrectly labelled as the “East of Scotland Radium Research Institute”. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland

With the support of the Commission an additional 80omg of Radium was acquired and combined with the existing supply to form a mass unit of the material that was called a “Radium Bomb“. This made history as the first such Bomb outside of London and meant that treatments could be made indirectly, focussing the emitted radiation towards the tumour from a few inches away, rather than introducing it directly on needles. This new method was far more efficient and effective and was far safer for both the patient and the medical staff. The Commission also provided funding to pay for the running costs of the Bomb and to safely maintain and house it.

Radium Bomb from Westminster Hospital, London, in the early 1930s, built by E. Rock Carling. The gram of Radium is housed in the egg-shaped, lead-shielded container on the left. It is controlled from a distance by the operator on the right, who can position the head and then open a shutter in the “Bomb” housing to expose the tumour to radiation for a precise amount of time. CC-by-SA 4.0, from the Science Museum’s Wellcome Trust Collection.

In 1936, J.J.M. reported that “treatment of malignant disease in certain situations such as the throat by means of the radium mass unit or ‘bomb’ has surpassed anything previously known“. He was joined at this time by Dr Margaret (Peggy) Tod as Honorary Associate Assistant Surgeon. Tod stayed for only a year before moving on to become the Deputy Director of the Holt Radium Institute in Manchester, but made “an outstanding contribution to the pioneering work at Beechmount“. The Infirmary’s capacity to administer radiotherapy increased exponentially as a result of dedicating Beechmount to it; in 1939 it reported over 15,000 treatments had been administered, up from only 907 just five years previously.

Margaret Colville Marshall, 1895-1995, obituary photograph.

From 1937, the matron was Jean Ritchie and she served in this post until 1939 when the Institute was closed “for the duration” and re-purposed as a convalescent Auxiliary Hospital; this scheme was directly funded by central government and allowed patients to be removed from the main Infirmary thus freeing up capacity there for dedicated military use or for civilians injured as a result of air raids. The Radium Bomb was removed to the Infirmary and buried at the bottom of a 40 foot deep well shaft to avoid it resulting in a “dirty bomb” in the event it was hit by an air raid. Sadly, Dr Shaw died on wartime active service with the Royal Army Medical Corps in Cairo in September 1940, aged 54, having contracted dysentery while serving as the Consultant Surgeon to the Army GHQ.

Colonel J. J. M. Shaw in his Royal Army Medical Corps uniform. Picture uploaded to Ancestry by Martin Bainbridge.

After the war, Radiotherapy in Edinburgh was concentrated at the Western General Hospital and Beechmount was not returned to that use. Instead it remained as a 46 bed convalescent home, operated in tandem with the Corstorphine Home and attached to the Royal Infirmary. In 1974, reorganisation of the medical bureaucracy saw Beechmount detached from the Infirmary and grouped in with other small district hospitals in the Lothians to provide specialist geriatric convalescent care.

One long-standing problem of Beechmount was that the building was accessible from the main road only by a very steep set of stairs or a driveway with multiple hairpin bends. In 1969 an ambulance driver did not correctly apply the brakes of his vehicle resulting in it careering 50 yards down the embankment before progress was arrested by a mature tree. Fortunately the occupants, Mrs Ella Hamersley and Mr Charles Baker, suffered only minor injuries. For the benefit of less mobile visitors to the hospital, members of the Corstorphine Rotary Club used their own cars to provide a shuttle service of rides up and down the gradient during visiting hours.

Beechmount House, estate agent’s photo. The modern wing at the back was that built for staff accommodation when it was converted for medical use © 2025 Scarlett Land & Development

In 1987 the Lothian Health Board denied that it had plans to either close Beechmount Hospital or convert it into a unit for the specialised treatment of patients with HIV/AIDS. However the following year it proposed the closure and sale of the hospital amid a widespread rationalisation and cost cutting plan. The Board cited the fact that the facility was costing £360,000 a year to run, its opponents countered that the running costs of convalescent hospital beds was only a third of that at major hospitals like the Royal Infirmary or the Western General. But the site was potentially very valuable to developers and with the support of the Secretary of State for Scotland, in what the Daily Record dubbed the “Sick Sale of the Century“, Scotland’s health boards were backed from the top to dispose of a swathe of surplus property on the open market to raise money for their capital budgets. Beechmount was closed in 1989 and the house and grounds were to be sold the following year for £1.8 million. The sale fell through however, as did a scheme to convert it into a Hotel. In 1993 the Health Board intended to build a new dental hospital at Beechmount but found it could not afford the renovation costs of £6 million. The premises were in the interim leased to the Scottish Wildlife Trust who used it for offices and returned to the market and finally sold by the Health Board in 1996, the former staff accommodation being converted into apartments and returned to residential use. It was on the market again in 2018 for offers over £4.5 million but although it eventually sold, it still appears to be without a purpose.

1. Story of a Great Hospital. The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh 1729-1929, by A. Logan Turner. ↩︎

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These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur

#BankOfScotland #Corstorphine #Health #Hospital #Hospitals #House #Infirmary #Murrayfield #PublicHealth #Radiotherapy #Radium #RoyalInfirmary #Written2025

The thread about the Corstorphine Convalescent Home; “To the Glory of God, for the Welfare of the Poor”

Corstorphine Hospital may have been shut for over a decade, but it (briefly) made the news earlier this week as a result of a fire in the abandoned building. I had a front-row seat as I happened to cycle past on my way to work; by which time it was fortunately under the control of the Fire Brigade before it had a chance to have properly taken hold.

An ominous cloud of smoke rising from the former Corstorphine Hospital on 14th May 2025. Photo © Self

The building was first opened on 2nd August 1867 as the Convalescent Home for the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. Five acres of the Meadowhouse Farm had been feud from landowner Sir William Hanmer Dick-Cunyngham bt. the previous year, allowing the institution to be set back from the road on a gentle, south-facing slope for the best sunlight and vistas across to the Pentland Hills.

1893 OS Map of Edinburghshire, centred on Corstorphine Convalescent Home

It was a fairly plain building to designs by Messrs Peddie & Kinnear. It originally had 44 beds in two wings, 26 for men and 18 for women, with a service block in the centre that extended to the rear. It was intended to accommodate patients from the Infirmary who were recovering after operations and treatment, for periods of around 3 weeks. It did not however deal with infectious diseases cases, as these were dealt with by separate hospitals. The extended natures of most stays, along with the fact that patients may be paying for the privilege, meant that the standard of accommodation was good; a mix of private rooms and small wards with two or three beds. Space per “inmate” (as the patients were termed) was also very generous in the name of airborne disease control. The decorative stone was brought from Dunsmore Quarry near Stirling with the infill from nearby Hailes Quarry. Heating was by open fires and there was as yet no piped water supply in the district of Corstorphine and so a well was sunk in the grounds.

Scanned elevation drawing of the original Corstorphine Convalescent Home. © Courtesy of HES (Records of Dick Peddie and McKay, architects, Edinburgh, Scotland)

The new Home allowed the variety of makeshift – and often inappropriate – convalescent houses in the city to be closed and all work centred on a modern building; well staffed by medical professionals, in a pleasant setting on the outskirts of the noise, smells and diseases of the city. It was funded to the tune of £12,000 by an anonymous philanthropic gentleman who did not want his name attached to it. It later transpired that this was William Seton Brown of Prestonpans, a wealthy London-based merchant who had made his money in Bombay and Shanghai. He came from a missionary family in East Lothian and his younger brothers, Alexander and Robert Ebenezer, were doctors who had died early in life in their 20s and 30s.

Brown family grave marker in Grange Cemetery.
“Also his sons: ALEXANDER BROWN, MD, Born May 29 1815, Died Nov 15 1839; and
ROBERT EBENEZER BROWN, MD, Born Oct 1822, Died Apr 10 1849″

The inscription above the doorway of the Home read, in Latin, “To the glory of God, for the welfare of the poor, and in memory of most affectionate brothers, the surviving brother caused this house of healing to be built“. This overlooked somewhat that the fourth and oldest brother and also a medical doctor – John Taylor Brown – outlived them all! In its early years the supply of fresh water was an obvious problem as the Home required 4,000 gallons a day, which clearly was a rather ridiculous proposition to try and source from a well. It took until 1878 for the Edinburgh & District Water Trust to pipe a supply in, which Corstorphine village also benefited from. By 1881 the Home had 50 beds, with an average occupancy of 37. 660 patients were being treated per year, with an average stay of 20 days at a cost of 13s 11d per head, per week. The institution was very efficiently run with only a 1.3% management overhead and it’s annual income of £4,491 exceeded expenditure.

In 1892 the Home was closed for a year and a half to extend it to a capacity of 100 beds and provide general improvements. This was made possible by a bequest from local engineer James “Steam Hammer” Nasmyth and saw the corner towers heightened and extension blocks added to each wing and the addition of south-facing balconies at 1st floor level. The original architects were employed, by now known as Kinnear & Peddie.

Coloured postcard of the “Convalescent Home, Corstorphine” showing a Victorian hospital building set back from a lawn. There are numerous deckchairs in the shade of the balcony and some patients can be seen sitting in them. via Edinburgh City Libraries

For some, the quiet and regimented life of the Convalescent Home proved relaxing and recuperative. But it wasn’t to everyone’s taste: many found it an overbearing straightjacket and discharged themselves against doctors orders just to escape. Yet others were told firmly to leave on account of their lasciviousness and drunkenness; while it catered for both men and women, the sexes were kept strictly apart.

Black and white postcard of Corstorphine Home in 1912. via Edinburgh City Libraries

In the year 1912, 1,323 patients had stayed at the Home with 925 of those staying for more than 3 weeks. It was found that very few had to return to the Infirmary after their time in Corstorphine, proving the utility of such institutions in freeing up primary hospital beds and aiding in recovery. From 1923 onwards, Corstorphine was joined by the Astley Ainslie Institution in providing convalescent care for the Infirmary. This modern facility was to pioneer long term care, medical supervision and rehabilitation. Little changed at the Corstorphine Home, which remained focussed on the traditional shorter stay recuperation for patients before they returned to their lives. A nod to modernisation came in 1927 when wireless receivers were installed and £80 was raised to provide headphones for patients to listen to the programming. The following year – 1928 – 1,612 patients were treated and the Astley Ainslie fully opened.

Little else changed at the Corstorphine Home in the interwar period, but as the Infirmary found itself treating increasing numbers of older children, small numbers found their way to the Convalescent Home which opened a children’s ward. Those treated by the Royal Hospital For Sick Children were lucky to be sent to its seaside Home in Gullane.

Christmas 1932, Santa Claus hands out presents to the younger patients in the Home

During WW2, like many such institutions it became an Auxiliary Hospital for service personnel. Initially the City was told by the Government that 300 of its 1,000 hospital beds were to be reserved for the military, reduced to 200 later that year. As a public, but charitable, institution, the Home was brought into the fold of the new National Health Service in 1947, remaining attached to the Infirmary. By the 1950s however it was recognised as being hopelessly out of date, described as “resembling a poor law institution of the earlier part of the century“. In addition, its wooden floors were found to be suffering from rot: something had to be done.

1950s postcard of Corstorphine Convalescent House taken from the road, looking past the gates and up across the lawns and gardens. A painted signboard can be seen reads “Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh Convalescent House”. via Edinburgh City Libraries

Various options were considered and eventually the institution was closed, had its floors reconstructed in reinforced concrete and was thoroughly modernised and refitted by the Regional Health Board into a General Hospital. Corstorphine Hospital, as it would now be know, had 112 beds in large, open wards and its balconies were now enclosed by glass curtain walls. A new nurses’ house was built in the grounds, freeing up internal space, and when it reopened in 1962 it was now certified to provide nursing training. A big change was a move to pre-ordered catering, with patients selecting their food in advance from a menu, rather than the old “take it or leave it” system which often saw it left, to the detriment of patients health. By 1974 changing practices saw it detached from the Infirmary and grouped in with other small district hospitals in the Lothians to provide specialist geriatric convalescent and rehabilitation care.

Corstorphine Hospital against blue skies, showing the boxed-in balconies added in the 1960s rebuild. Photo taken 2013. CC-by-SA 2.0, Leslie Barrie via Geograph

A threat to the Hospital came in 1990 when it was proposed to close the hospital and potentially use the site for a new Sick Children’s Hospital. It weathered this storm but changing patterns for the elderly in the following decades, which was increasingly provided in patients homes or pushed into the private sector, saw it slowly run down. In 1999 a modern nursing home, Murraypark, was built in the grounds and in 200 the old nurses’ home was demolished and replaced with 30 residential care flats by a housing association. Closure for the hospital finally came in 2014, its founder’s message of “To the Glory of God, for the Welfare of the Poor” long forgotten, with Murraypark following in 2016. Plans to demolish the site and replace it with a “care village” came to nothing and in 2019 a plan by Michael Laird Architects was approved to renovate it into 32 flats, with extensions and additions in the grounds for 44 more flats.

Architect’s CGI model showing planned additions and extensions in the grounds of Corstorphine Hospital. Via Scottish Construction Now.

Neighbouring Edinburgh Zoo objected to this on the grounds of it being adjacent to the enclosures of their prized pandas (which would later be moved, and later yet moved all the way back to China).
The added complexities of Covid and the economics of the construction industry has meant that nothing has yet come of the housing plans and the building has now lain abandoned for over a decade. That hasn’t stopped the Urbexers getting in though, and their videos show the interior has been thoroughly vandalised.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9W2JjCMJeE

If you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site (including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget) by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.

These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur

#Corstorphine #Edinburgh #Health #Hospital #Hospitals #Infirmary #NationalHealthService #NHS #PublicHealth #Written2025

The thread about the Corstorphine Convalescent Home; “To the Glory of God, for the Welfare of the Poor”

Corstorphine Hospital may have been shut for over a decade, but it (briefly) made the news earlier this week as a result of a fire in the abandoned building. I had a front-row seat as I happened to cycle past on my way to work; by which time it was fortunately under the control of the Fire Brigade before it had a chance to have properly taken hold.

An ominous cloud of smoke rising from the former Corstorphine Hospital on 14th May 2025. Photo © Self

The building was first opened on 2nd August 1867 as the Convalescent Home for the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. Five acres of the Meadowhouse Farm had been feud from landowner Sir William Hanmer Dick-Cunyngham bt. the previous year, allowing the institution to be set back from the road on a gentle, south-facing slope for the best sunlight and vistas across to the Pentland Hills.

1893 OS Map of Edinburghshire, centred on Corstorphine Convalescent Home

It was a fairly plain building to designs by Messrs Peddie & Kinnear. It originally had 44 beds in two wings, 26 for men and 18 for women, with a service block in the centre that extended to the rear. It was intended to accommodate patients from the Infirmary who were recovering after operations and treatment, for periods of around 3 weeks. It did not however deal with infectious diseases cases, as these were dealt with by separate hospitals. The extended natures of most stays, along with the fact that patients may be paying for the privilege, meant that the standard of accommodation was good; a mix of private rooms and small wards with two or three beds. Space per “inmate” (as the patients were termed) was also very generous in the name of airborne disease control. The decorative stone was brought from Dunsmore Quarry near Stirling with the infill from nearby Hailes Quarry. Heating was by open fires and there was as yet no piped water supply in the district of Corstorphine and so a well was sunk in the grounds.

Scanned elevation drawing of the original Corstorphine Convalescent Home. © Courtesy of HES (Records of Dick Peddie and McKay, architects, Edinburgh, Scotland)

The new Home allowed the variety of makeshift – and often inappropriate – convalescent houses in the city to be closed and all work centred on a modern building; well staffed by medical professionals, in a pleasant setting on the outskirts of the noise, smells and diseases of the city. It was funded to the tune of £12,000 by an anonymous philanthropic gentleman who did not want his name attached to it. It later transpired that this was William Seton Brown of Prestonpans, a wealthy London-based merchant who had made his money in Bombay and Shanghai. He came from a missionary family in East Lothian and his younger brothers, Alexander and Robert Ebenezer, were doctors who had died early in life in their 20s and 30s.

Brown family grave marker in Grange Cemetery.
“Also his sons: ALEXANDER BROWN, MD, Born May 29 1815, Died Nov 15 1839; and
ROBERT EBENEZER BROWN, MD, Born Oct 1822, Died Apr 10 1849″

The inscription above the doorway of the Home read, in Latin, “To the glory of God, for the welfare of the poor, and in memory of most affectionate brothers, the surviving brother caused this house of healing to be built“. This overlooked somewhat that the fourth and oldest brother and also a medical doctor – John Taylor Brown – outlived them all! In its early years the supply of fresh water was an obvious problem as the Home required 4,000 gallons a day, which clearly was a rather ridiculous proposition to try and source from a well. It took until 1878 for the Edinburgh & District Water Trust to pipe a supply in, which Corstorphine village also benefited from. By 1881 the Home had 50 beds, with an average occupancy of 37. 660 patients were being treated per year, with an average stay of 20 days at a cost of 13s 11d per head, per week. The institution was very efficiently run with only a 1.3% management overhead and it’s annual income of £4,491 exceeded expenditure.

In 1892 the Home was closed for a year and a half to extend it to a capacity of 100 beds and provide general improvements. This was made possible by a bequest from local engineer James “Steam Hammer” Nasmyth and saw the corner towers heightened and extension blocks added to each wing and the addition of south-facing balconies at 1st floor level. The original architects were employed, by now known as Kinnear & Peddie.

Coloured postcard of the “Convalescent Home, Corstorphine” showing a Victorian hospital building set back from a lawn. There are numerous deckchairs in the shade of the balcony and some patients can be seen sitting in them. via Edinburgh City Libraries

For some, the quiet and regimented life of the Convalescent Home proved relaxing and recuperative. But it wasn’t to everyone’s taste: many found it an overbearing straightjacket and discharged themselves against doctors orders just to escape. Yet others were told firmly to leave on account of their lasciviousness and drunkenness; while it catered for both men and women, the sexes were kept strictly apart.

Black and white postcard of Corstorphine Home in 1912. via Edinburgh City Libraries

In the year 1912, 1,323 patients had stayed at the Home with 925 of those staying for more than 3 weeks. It was found that very few had to return to the Infirmary after their time in Corstorphine, proving the utility of such institutions in freeing up primary hospital beds and aiding in recovery. From 1923 onwards, Corstorphine was joined by the Astley Ainslie Institution in providing convalescent care for the Infirmary. This modern facility was to pioneer long term care, medical supervision and rehabilitation. Little changed at the Corstorphine Home, which remained focussed on the traditional shorter stay recuperation for patients before they returned to their lives. A nod to modernisation came in 1927 when wireless receivers were installed and £80 was raised to provide headphones for patients to listen to the programming. The following year – 1928 – 1,612 patients were treated and the Astley Ainslie fully opened.

Little else changed at the Corstorphine Home in the interwar period, but as the Infirmary found itself treating increasing numbers of older children, small numbers found their way to the Convalescent Home which opened a children’s ward. Those treated by the Royal Hospital For Sick Children were lucky to be sent to its seaside Home in Gullane.

Christmas 1932, Santa Claus hands out presents to the younger patients in the Home

During WW2, like many such institutions it became an Auxiliary Hospital for service personnel. Initially the City was told by the Government that 300 of its 1,000 hospital beds were to be reserved for the military, reduced to 200 later that year. As a public, but charitable, institution, the Home was brought into the fold of the new National Health Service in 1947, remaining attached to the Infirmary. By the 1950s however it was recognised as being hopelessly out of date, described as “resembling a poor law institution of the earlier part of the century“. In addition, its wooden floors were found to be suffering from rot: something had to be done.

1950s postcard of Corstorphine Convalescent House taken from the road, looking past the gates and up across the lawns and gardens. A painted signboard can be seen reads “Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh Convalescent House”. via Edinburgh City Libraries

Various options were considered and eventually the institution was closed, had its floors reconstructed in reinforced concrete and was thoroughly modernised and refitted by the Regional Health Board into a General Hospital. Corstorphine Hospital, as it would now be know, had 112 beds in large, open wards and its balconies were now enclosed by glass curtain walls. A new nurses’ house was built in the grounds, freeing up internal space, and when it reopened in 1962 it was now certified to provide nursing training. A big change was a move to pre-ordered catering, with patients selecting their food in advance from a menu, rather than the old “take it or leave it” system which often saw it left, to the detriment of patients health. By 1974 changing practices saw it detached from the Infirmary and grouped in with other small district hospitals in the Lothians to provide specialist geriatric convalescent and rehabilitation care.

Corstorphine Hospital against blue skies, showing the boxed-in balconies added in the 1960s rebuild. Photo taken 2013. CC-by-SA 2.0, Leslie Barrie via Geograph

A threat to the Hospital came in 1990 when it was proposed to close the hospital and potentially use the site for a new Sick Children’s Hospital. It weathered this storm but changing patterns for the elderly in the following decades, which was increasingly provided in patients homes or pushed into the private sector, saw it slowly run down. In 1999 a modern nursing home, Murraypark, was built in the grounds and in 200 the old nurses’ home was demolished and replaced with 30 residential care flats by a housing association. Closure for the hospital finally came in 2014, its founder’s message of “To the Glory of God, for the Welfare of the Poor” long forgotten, with Murraypark following in 2016. Plans to demolish the site and replace it with a “care village” came to nothing and in 2019 a plan by Michael Laird Architects was approved to renovate it into 32 flats, with extensions and additions in the grounds for 44 more flats.

Architect’s CGI model showing planned additions and extensions in the grounds of Corstorphine Hospital. Via Scottish Construction Now.

Neighbouring Edinburgh Zoo objected to this on the grounds of it being adjacent to the enclosures of their prized pandas (which would later be moved, and later yet moved all the way back to China).
The added complexities of Covid and the economics of the construction industry has meant that nothing has yet come of the housing plans and the building has now lain abandoned for over a decade. That hasn’t stopped the Urbexers getting in though, and their videos show the interior has been thoroughly vandalised.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9W2JjCMJeE

If you have found this useful, informative or amusing, perhaps you would like to help contribute towards the running costs of this site (including keeping it ad-free and my book-buying budget) by supporting me on ko-fi. Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends.

These threads © 2017-2025, Andy Arthur

#Corstorphine #Edinburgh #Health #Hospital #Hospitals #Infirmary #NationalHealthService #NHS #PublicHealth #Written2025

The thread about Esta Henry; the life and times of the Queen of the High Street

On this day (January 15th) in 1963, a small silver airliner with 45 people on board took off from Sao Paulo in Brazil en route for Rio de Janeiro. Moments later it plunged into the ground in the city’s suburbs, taking with it 13 lives. The last victim to be identified was that of Esta Henry, a renowned and somewhat eccentric Edinburgh antiques dealer; her husband Paul was at her side and perished too. Thus ended the final chapter in the colourful life of the lady the papers called the Queen of the High Street. Her surprising story now follows.

Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Convair 340 aircraft, registration PP-CDW, the plane that crashed in January 1963. CC-by Smithsonian Institution

She was born Esther Louis on July 3rd 1882 in Sunderland, County Durham, to Louie Louis and his wife Eveline (née Jackson). Her parents were Jewish, her father a 1st generation Prussian immigrant and her mother 2nd generation to Dutch and German parents. Like many Jews in Britain at this time, to integrate and protect themselves somewhat from anti-Semitism, they altered their names; Louie and Evelina were thus better known as John and Eva. He worked variously as a cobbler, a clothier and an auctioneer and the family moved frequently with his work between Sunderland and Scotland. The family moved to 2 Jane Street in Leith in 1884 where Louie opened an auction room in the Kirkgate. Alas tragedy was to strike the following year. When Esta was just 2 her father died from fever and pneumonia leaving his wife with 7 hungry mouths to feed and another on the way.

Esta’s immediate family tree.

Evelina and her entourage of children gravitated back to Wearside where she remarried in 1889 to Charles Goldman, a pawnbroker. Four half-siblings to Esta would follow and at the time of the 1891 census the enlarged family stayed in a small but prim end-terraced house at 4 Sorley Street in Sunderland. In her own telling of her story at this age the 9 year old Esta ran off to variously Edinburgh or Leith and sold door-to-door by barrow or bicycle to eke out a living, but we should take this with a very large pinch of salt as the records contradict the story and she made a habit of tweaking and embellishing tales of her life to suit circumstances. In 1901 they were at 12 Rutland Street in Sunderland, living above the family pawnbrokers. The 18 year old Esta was described as a General Dealer in the census; she was running a corner shop.

Rutland Street, Sunderland, 1929. Number 12, the Goldman shop and house is at the end of the row with the canopy, if you look very closes the pawnbroker’s sign is in the Goldman name. via Sunderland Antiquarian Society

But Esta did not stay put for much longer, by the next year we find her living at 156 Canongate in Edinburgh. Shortly thereafter she married a 25 year old jeweller, Jack H. Henry of 30 Milton Street. But like her Father, Esta’s new husband was using an alias; he was actually born Joseph Henry Abrovich in Łódź, Poland. It suited him to keep details of his past deliberately obscure; he spent his life giving different dates (between 1869-79) and places of birth in official documents and was most frequently recorded as John but sometimes also Jacob. But he married Esta as Jack. His mysteriousness was necessary as he was leading a double life; he was actually a talented concert violinist, a member of the touring orchestra of Polish piano impresario Ignacy Paderewski (who would rise to become Prime Minister of his country). Jack had skipped town in Dublin when on tour in the 1890s in order to avoid returning home to compulsory military service for the Russian Empire. It was also a difficult time for the Polish Jews in general as they faced the Russian Pogroms and waves were emigrating west. Thus he ended up in Scotland; possibly via Glasgow where there were already Abrovichs resident.

“Jack H. Henry.” Juliette Bird, via Ancestry

Esta and Jack settled at the tenement at 170 Canongate and soon opened a jewellery shop below at number 168. They moved into the back of the shop and began to raise a family together. Louis (Lou) was born in 1903, Philip (Philly) in 1904, Herbert (Bertie) in 1906 and Rosa (Rose) in 1908. While the Canongate was a down at heel neighbourhood at the time, one with much slum housing and a largely itinerant population that included many of the city’s poor and immigrants, they were doing well for themselves and advertised for a servant – “apply Mrs Henry” – in the newspapers.

Canongate in the late 19th century. On the left is the tower and clock of the Tolbooth, on the right the distinctive obelisk-topped gate piers of Moray House. The Henry shop and home is the lighter coloured tenement on the right hand side of the street. Beyond is the projecting gable of Huntly House; it is a neighbourhood steeped in Scottish history. Postcard, unknown artist. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

As they prospered, raising 3 children in the back of a shop ceased to be a necessity and they moved to a smart new, end-of-terrace, middle class villa at 1 Lismore Avenue in Willowbrae. It was here in 1918 that their ranks were joined by the birth of Henrietta (Bunty). 1914 saw them relocate the shope up the Royal Mile to number 51 High Street, next to the well know building known as John Knox’s House. This was the ground floor of Moubray House, one of the oldest surviving residential buildings in the city, where Daniel Defoe had once lodged. It had recently been restored by the Cockburn Association and placed in the hands of a trust. Despite raising 4 children, Esta was clearly becoming more involved in the affairs of business as classified adverts are in the name of both her and Jack. By 1920 she is styling herself “Mrs Henry, Antique Dealer” in these.

“Unidentified Man and Children”, Alexander Wilson Hill, c. 1933. This the shop at 51 High Street and it is probably Jack Henry standing outside. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

The 1921 census finds the family have moved on and up in the housing world again, now at a very large villa at 15 Mayfield Terrace in Newington. Louis Henry was following his father into the jewellery trade and Philip was training to become a dentist. Life was good but it was about to get better. In 1923 the Scottish newspapers reported the surprise visit of Queen Mary to the Henrys’ shop, where she spent an hour and bought many items, particularly Chinese curios. She was “greatly interested with both the collection and the premises” and shook hands with Esta and Jack as she left, promising to return. Her Majesty was true to her word and returned exactly one year later, buying “a score of articles” including a Louis XIV fan that had once belonged to Queen Victoria. She signed the visitors’ book and said that her purchases the previous year had been gifted to the West Kensington Museum.

Queen Mary leaving Henry’s on one of her many visits. Postcard, unknown artist. Via Canmore, SC 2649474 © Courtesy HES

The Queen was back again a year later, with over a dozen items bought, including a portrait believed to have been the property of Napoleon. The Henrys were invited to deliver the items in person to Holyroodhouse that afternoon and join the Queen for tea. They learned that some of the purchases were to stay there at the palace as part of its collection. The Queen thereafter returned almost every year on her visits to Holyrood, the newspapers reporting the purchase of items in 1927 and 1930 for Buckingham Palace and her personal collection. Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, Princes Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and her sister Queen Margaret would carry on this royal tradition in later years and a whole section of wall in the shop was reserved for the display of their proudly framed cheques.

As the Roaring Twenties came to a close, Esta’s public profile was ascendant but Jack seems to have begun to step back somewhat from the limelight and into the shadows of the shop. In 1928 she stood for election to the Parish Council in the Canongate ward. Although she came second, there were two seats up for grabs and she was duly returned. Her election notices are the first time in print I could find where she is referring to herself as Esta, rather than just Mrs Henry. Her election was notable as she was the first Jewish woman to be elected to a public office in Scotland and also the press referred to her as Councillor Mrs Esta Henry, other married female councillors were referred to by their husband’s name, e.g Councillor Mrs Adam Millar. This is a public demonstration that she was very much her own woman.

Candidate picture of Esta Henry, Evening News, 7th November 1928

The following year civic Parish Councils in Scotland – which existed largely for the purposes of poor relief – were abolished and merged into the Town Councils. Esta stood as an independent for this latter body in 1929 but came 4th behind two Socialists and a Moderate candidate. She would stand again for the Town Council in 1931, 1933 and 1935. She made very clear in her election speeches, which were reported in the press, that her priorities were housing, housewives, child welfare and the treatment of the sick and poor. Women and children were always central to her campaigns and she was known to mobilise squads of them in the Canongate to carry her election materials and to parade around the polling stations. But despite her strenuous campaign efforts on a sensible platform, her public profile and her local popularity, as an independent female candidate she stood little realistic chance of election. Edinburgh was run by the very pale, male and stale Moderates who largely owned the Council’s seats – many of which they didn’t even need to contest – and it was only in a handful of wards where the Socialists could challenge them (to find out more about the political groupings of 20th century Edinburgh and how the election system worked, you can bookmark this thread to read later).

In between election campaigns and royal visits, in 1933 the Henrys commissioned a magnificent L-plan house in a Dutch Cape Colonial style that also incorporated the latest in Moderne tastes. This was Marchdyke at 50 Pentland Terrace on the outskirts of the city’s growing suburbs and it totally eclipsed the monotonous rows of middle class bungalows that were much in favour all around it. Completed in 1935 this 4,000 square foot, 5 bedroom residence featured a Tudorbethan dining room, copious lounge and parlour, a terrazzo bathroom in a Roman style and in the basement a large garage for Jack’s cars, a wine cellar and antiques store. While many of the windows were in an ultra-fashionable fish scale style, the stained glass of the master staircase incorporated original 16th century Swiss and German panes from their collection.

Marchdyke, now known as Huntersmoon. Wilson Property Group, 2022 Property Listing – click here to see an archived copy with the full album of photos.

In the 1935 Town Council election, Esta had come third behind the Socialist Party candidate and another from the Protestant Action Society (PA). This party were extreme anti-Catholics who stood on a platform of “No Popery”. Their leader was the rabble-rouser John Cormack and his political stock was rising at the time. In 1934 his party got just 6% of the popular vote in the Edinburgh municipal elections and 1 seat; in 1935 they got 21% and 3 seats. The exact order of following events are not clear but at the 1936 election Esta was already intending to stand once again on her usual independent platform. John Cormack made it be known in the press that he was inclined to lend his support to her in the Canongate (where many Catholic Irish and Italians lived). Perhaps it was a case of “if you can’t beat them, join them“, but with just a week to go before polling, Esta Henry made the shock announcement that she was now standing as a Protestant Action candidate – “the Only Party who do Not Want R. C. Votes“. So late was this change that even on the eve of election some of the papers still reported her as an independent. She topped the ballot, beating PA’s primary candidate, and was duly elected as a Town Councillor at the 5th attempt. It was a good year for PA, they got 31% of the popular vote and won 6 seats. Indeed it was their apogee and they soon slumped into bitter infighting and electoral obscurity, leaving just John Cormack to solider on for decades as their only councillor.

Election adverts, Evening News, 31st October 1936

It’s never been clear just how committed Esta was to her new found political home – she certainly threw herself into public meetings on its behalf for a while, it being reported that she would stroll up and down the aisle, brandishing her umbrella at the audience. Realistically she may just have been desperate to get elected and chose the only other party than the Progressives (as the Moderates had re-branded) or Socialists with any chance of winning a seat. John Cormack was strongly criticised from within his own ranks for allowing a Jewish woman to stand on his platform – indeed much later in 1952 he organised pickets against her for suggesting public entertainments on Sundays at public meetings. She did not linger too long under his party whip and had resigned before the 1938 elections. She may have been made very uneasy with the association after a tumultuous public meeting in October 1937 in the Canongate Tolbooth. At this, her male PA colleague refused to answer questions directly and instead railed against Catholics to the boos and heckles of the crowd. Esta tried to make clear that she was there to fight the Socialists in politics but the audience deemed her guilty by association and turned on her too. Thereafter, she dedicated herself thereafter to public service for the Canongate in her own name. She would rise to become Convenor of the Baths and Washhouses Committee, a member of the Cleansing and Lighting Committee, the Streets and Buildings Committee and in 1941 was made JP (a Justice of the Peace, a lay magistrate in the lowest level of municipal courts).

Esta Henry commands the floor at a political meeting. Evening News, 8th February 1940

Esta found that her official role as a councillor fitted well alongside her personal philanthropic activities and she long described herself publicly as a Social Worker in the Canongate (although she frequently embellished the timescales somewhat). In 1931 she had formed the Edinburgh United Independent Association in the Canongate to run youth projects and raise money for the city’s Royal Infirmary hospital. Her attitudes were quite progressive and she recognised the need and value for activities and exercise for her district’s youth to keep them from being led astray and getting into trouble and for their general health. She was heavily involved in the Canon Club for Boys and Girls and formed an amateur dramatic society there.

The youth of the Canongate ward is my special care… I want to mother the young people – I have done it all my days – and to impress them with the same spirit that I have myself… Never to let go, to hold on to the good things of life, because they will be rewarded in the end, the same as I have been.

Esta Henry, 1936

She also put her money where her mouth was and provided trophies for local clubs. In 1936 she presented the first of many Esta Henry Cups to the men of the Trinity College and Moray Knox Club on Cranston Street, an organisation formed for unemployed men. It was for the man who scored highest in their games league of dominoes, billiards, draughts and other pastimes with which they occupied their enforced idleness. Another such cup was presented to the local Caledonian Football Club. In November 1937, the Lord Provost gave her a leave of absence from her duties to travel officially to South Africa, where she was to spend two and a half months investigating working class housing and town planning on behalf of the city. He provided her with letters of introduction but they probably weren’t necessary, she apparently owned a fruit farm in the country and her son Phillie had settled there as a dentist! On her return she reported back that she had “travelled many hundreds of miles by air” but that it turned out things in Scotland were far more advanced and better organised for the poor than they were in South Africa! At this time she was also becoming increasingly involved with the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, becoming a local committee member, and in 1939 she and the Lady Provost threw a Christmas dinner for its members in the Canongate Tolbooth.

Esta Henry (2nd left, in the beret) and the Lady Provost give a Christmas Dinner to the elderly of the Canongate in the Tolbooth. Evening News, December 22nd 1939

The year 1939 also brought the clouds of war to the High Street and municipal elections were suspended for the duration. As an incumbent councillor at the end of her 3 year term, Esta would have faced re-election in November that year. She now found herself with an extra six uncontested years added to her term of office and intended to make the most of this chance. She applied her single-minded determination, boundless energy and never-ending appetite for meetings and committees to the task at hand. And so it was that Councillor Esta Henry went to war. Interviewed shortly after the outbreak, she told the People’s Journal that there was no need to conscript women to the war effort as she had not met a woman in Edinburgh “who is not prepared to do whatsoever she is called upon to do“.

People’s Journal, 16th September 1939

One of her first acts, on behalf of the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, was to campaign for government allowances for women dependent on the wages of their sons where these men had now been called up. In the Canongate she joined the local ARP (Air Raid Precautions civil defence force), turned her shop basement into an air raid shelter (her name is against it in the Valuation Rolls) and established a corps of 40 local women to act as fire pickets. Later, the Esta Henry Ambulance Section first aiders were also formed. She was soon putting on social events to help finance these activities and found herself placed in charge of the Entertainments Committee of the Lady Provost’s Comforts Fund. This latter organisation started out with the simple of aim of knitting kilt socks for soldiers of the Highland Regiments, as had been done in the 1914-18 conflict. Esta organised bridge parties to raise funds for buying the wool and offered up her house of Marchdyke as a suitable venue. In the Canongate she formed the local women in to work parties in the Tolbooth meeting hall, and arranged free entertainments to keep them amused as they knitted the socks. Soon she was organising mass balls; in February 1940 some 600 dancers packed out the Plaza dancehall in Morningside in a charity gala. At the Eldorado dancehall in Leith though it wasn’t dancing that she put on but boxing, a sport new to her but one that she had fallen in love with. There was nothing that she would not turn her attention to in the name of raising funds; charity auctions, raising pigs and Warship Week where she matched every £1 bond bought at a public rally with £1 of her own.

Esta Henry feeding pigs she was raising for charity sale. Evening News, 26th April 1940

Increasingly in the city centre on her ceaseless war work, getting to and from Marchdyke must have been proving an inconvenience as in 1941 she took possession of the flat in Moubray House above the shop and fitted it out as her own residence. She was also keen to demonstrate that old houses in the High Street could be rehabilitated for use without demolishing them. At the end of that year she paid for 800 local children to go to the cinema as a Hogmanay treat, a special programme being put on for them at the New Palace on the High Street. At the end of this screening she had new years resolutions projected onto the screen and had her audience promise en masse to be good children while their fathers were away and to help contribute to the war effort. 1942 saw the institution of the city Corporation’s Holidays at Home programme; municipal entertainments to keep people and children occupied over the summer holidays and try and reduce the temptation to travel. Esta organised outdoor public dances at the Ross Bandstand in Princes Street Gardens which were put on for 2 hours every Monday to Friday afternoon, admission 6d on the gate. She herself led off the first dance with the Lord Provost and was a regular attendee, encouraging and cajoling shy young men to get themselves a partner and join in.

Wartime dancing at the Ross Bandstand in 1945. Evening News photo, from “Living Memories” by Jennifer Veitch

There was more dancing organised by Esta Henry in 1943, as well as cycle racing at Meadowbank, mass picnics for mothers and children and – as Baths & Washhouses Committee Convenor – she arranged for Portobello outdoor swimming pool to be re-opened (some of its machinery had been removed for war use and the rest had fallen into disrepair) so that charity swimming and water polo galas could be held (the awards being more Esta Henry Cups). This also meant children and youths could go swimming in the holidays again – she was well aware that with many fathers away on service and mothers occupied with war work at home, juvenile delinquency as a result of bored children being left to their own devices was a real problem. At the end of that year she spoke at a meeting to form the East Edinburgh Anti-Fascist Committe when it was announced that British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Moseley had been released from jail.

In 1944 she instituted a scheme whereby service personnel in the city and groups of school children were invited to the City Chambers to attend meetings of the Town Councils as her guest. They watched the proceedings and afterwards could question her and other members about the mechanics of local government; she wanted to show how the Home Front was functioning, to connect people with the municipal authorities and to raise awareness of the acute difficulties faced by it at this time. That summer she pressed the Corporation to make the city’s now unnecessary civil defence resources available to house evacuee children from London in the face of the new V1 and later V2 terror bombing. Although the idea garnered wide support it ultimately came to nothing and she would latter press the city to instead give away its accumulated surplus of bunk beds, mattresses and blankets for free to those in need.

With the end of the war finally coming into sight she now turned her attention to the post war prospects. With the Rev. Selby Weight of Canongate Kirk she held public meetings for the Canongate Welcome Home Service Fund to plan for the reintegration of demobbed service personnel and provide comforts and necessities for them and their families. She joined the local Women for Westminster branch to try and get a woman MP elected for the city and repeatedly went on the record that providing for youths and children had to be central to the city’s postwar planning and foresaw the coming housing crisis in the Old Town (it had of course always been there to an extent, but it was about to get very acute). “My slogan is houses and more houses – housing priority!” she said, but she was also clear that it had to be done by reconstruction of existing communities, not by swinging the wrecking ball and scattering them to all the corners of the city. She also took a great interest in Portobello and joined a local campaign to improve the district after the war. Always one to put her money where her mouth was, at her own expense she commissioned plans and artists’ impressions for a scheme to turn “Edinburgh’s ugly sister” into a fashionable new sea-side resort and Garden City. This wasn’t just pie-in-the-sky thinking, she successfully proposed it to the city authorities who had it approved by the Lord Provost’s Committee and included in Sir Patrick Abercrombie’s 1949 “Plan for the City and Royal Burgh of Edinburgh” (you will find it on page 69 in glorious technicolour but with little additional detail). The realities of postwar economics and political priorities meant however that it would never get beyond the pages of that work.

Artist’s impression of Esta Henry’s scheme for post-war Portobello. Evening News, September 18th 1945

As the war drew to its close Esta found time to join yet one more committee, that of the League of Angry Wives. These were Scottish women who had married American servicemen and as “G.I. brides” wanted the right to join their husbands in that country. A resolution was passed and representations were sent directly to President Truman – by letter – and the First Lady – by telegram. A week later, Esta henry defended her seat, which she had now held for 9 years, at the ballot box but the winds of political change blew hard and she was comprehensively defeated by Labour candidates. This was despite her being presented with a pair of boxing gloves by her supporters and urged to “go on fighting“. After further defeats at the 1946 and 1947 elections she stepped back finally from politics, but not from life!

Esta Henry addresses the League of Angry Wives, Daily Record, October 29th 1945

In 1946 and 1947 she was a key organiser with the Scottish Housewives Association in an Edinburgh and Fife-based campaign against bread rationing. This culminated in her and Janet Neish of Kirkcaldy chasing the Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade out of the North British Hotel and across the street to his car as he sought to avoid the combined fury of their sharp tongues! Never one to turn down a committee, she was also elected as the President of the Edinburgh branch of that organisation. 1947 had however started on a sad note for her as Jack Henry finally succumbed to long-term heart disease, leaving her a widow. It was around this time that the house at Marchdyke was sold. But Esta showed no signs of retiring from life to mourn and threw herself instead to yet another new activity; women’s football. She became the director of the Edinburgh Lady Dynamos, a team formed from core members of successful pre-war teams when the women’s game had enjoyed a brief spell of public popularity. Donating another Esta Henry Trophy to the cause it was likely that she paid for their kits too and she could be relied upon to turn her formidable oratory power at the authorities when they refused to allow the women to play in public grounds.

Edinburgh Lady Dynamos football team, late 1940s. CC-by-SA-NC 0084-003, via Edinburgh Collected.
Back row L-R is Esta Henry, Kitty Russell, Betty Rae, Agnes Whitelaw, Theresa Mulvie, goalkeeper Jessie Baillie, Nan Laurie, Babs McWhinney and Walter Caesar. Front row L-R is Eleanor Wilson, Betty Davidson (?), Linda Clements, Mary Leslie, Bet Adamson.

She had long been a local celebrity but in the year 1953, Esta Henry’s reputation went national on two accounts. Around the 27th of December 1952, a well dressed man entered her shop on the High Street and introduced himself as a Belgian art dealer, Paul Eugene Dillin. The pair quickly struck up a rapport and he soon confided in her that his identity was a front; he was actually a stateless Romanian Jew by the name of Pinchas Haimovici and had spent two and a half years in hiding in the Netherlands during the war. As he refused to sign a national oath pledging himself to Communism he was exiled from his country of birth and had no papers. It was at the recommendation of the renowned sculptor Benno Schotz, a prominent member of the Scottish Jewish community and whose wife came from the same village as him, that he had come to Edinburgh seeking art. Esta fell in love with the man then and there, despite an age gap of 21 years between them, and proposed to him on the condition that he took the name Henry. When he accepted she threw his fake passport on the fire and urged him to turn himself in and seek asylum so that they could be legally wed.

Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

Esta perhaps imagined naïvely that her reputation and connections would make it a mere formality and booked the couple a honeymoon trip to Madeira. However when the police were invited to the shop they instead charged Pinchas with offences for landing illegally in the country on false papers under the Aliens Act 1920 and he was sent to Saughton Prison. On December 31st he pled guilty at the Sheriff Court in Edinburgh and was remanded for sentencing, which was deferred to give his solicitor a chance to arrange an application for Israeli papers and asylum so that he could travel there instead of being deported. After the hearing, Esta told the waiting reporters that she still intended to marry her “Prince Paul” (Paul Haemovitz was another alias he had used) but that she was going to go on the Honeymoon trip to Maderia anyway by herself as the stress of events would otherwise give her a stroke; the reporter noted that she was smoking at the time and confided she had smoked 100 already that day. The case rumbled on and on, the Israelis were being slow with the papers as apparently there was another Pinchas Haimovici on an Interpol watch-list, despite this being a common name in Romania, and he had to prove it was not him. The Sheriff in Edinburgh grew tired of the repeated delays and on March 13th 1953 he ordered Pinchas’ release. But no sooner had he left the courtroom than he found himself re-arrested; the Home Secretary Sir David Maxwell Fyfe had finally signed a deportation order for him and he was sent straight back to Saughton. Esta told a waiting reporter from the Daily Mirror that if he was to be deported to Romania then she would join him there; “I’m only seventy, and fit enough to crash any of Stalin’s curtains”.

Pinchas petitioned the High Court in Edinburgh to avoid deportation and his case was heard on April 10th. As a declared anti-communist he told the court that he faced “torture and death” if returned to Romania. He also asked leave from court to marry Esta (who waved the papers she had ready to the court), but this request and his protests over his captivity fell on deaf ears and the case was adjourned. Back to Saughton Prison he went were Esta, with her lawyer Lionel Daiches, continued to visit him and made a habit of finding her way uninvited into the Governor’s office to protest more directly. The case was now being reported across the national and regional British newspapers and had become quite embarrassing for the Government. And so it was that the Home Secretary cancelled his previous order and on Friday 24th April 1953 Pinchas Haimovici was released and met by Esta with a pony and trap to drive him home and a brass band she had hired to serenade his freedom. The couple announced that they were to be married on the Monday morning and after a brief registry office ceremony, so they were. Esta insisted that they returned immediately to the shop to re-open for business but outside they were met by an immense crowd of well-wishers who lifted her into the air as they cheered for her and her husband. She lost her shoes in the process and the police had to attend to find the couple a path through the throng.

Esta and Pinchas are met by jubilant crowds of well-wishers in Hunter Square after their marriage. Daily Mirror, April 28th 1953

The crowd followed them all the way back to the shop where they posed for the press and thanked their well-wishers while Esta fumbled through the 20 different keys she kept for the various locks on the premises. They were back behind the counter and at work within an hour of their ceremony starting. The next day they took a taxi out to Saughton Prison and thanked the warders with wedding cake and champagne, Pinchas let the press know that they had treated him very kindly. A few days later he formally changed his name to Paul Henry in line with Esta’s prenuptial wishes.

Pinchas and Esta re-open the shop after wedding, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

To celebrate their union and to thank Benno Schotz for helping bring them together they commissioned him to produce a brass bust of them. Schotz insisted that Pinchas should be holding something in his hand and, knowing that Esta was immensely fond of rings, designed an Adam & Eve ring for the purpose. The finished work was unveiled to mark their first wedding anniversary as the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy on Princes Street.

Unveiling the bust with Benno Schotz, 23rd April 1954. Paul is holding the ring in his hand.

Returning to the events of 1953, it was while her Prince Paul was still incarcerated that the other event took place that garnered national reporting for Esta; she was robbed! Perhaps she had been distracted by the events surrounding Paul’s case, but she allowed herself to be taken in by a group of well-organised confidence tricksters posing as American buyers. Having taken the time and effort to establish her routines and build up a rapport with her, they arranged a distraction and took their chance to steal jewellery that she valued at £20,000 from a lock box, £320 and $600 in cash and the pass books for her life savings. Esta told the press that amongst the items stolen was an amethyst fob which had once been part of the Hungarian crown jewels. Bits and pieces of the loot turned up in sale rooms afterwards and she was forced to buy them back at half of what the other dealer had paid for them; she was not impressed. The police eventually caught up with her trio of robbers due to their amateurish attempts to pass her stolen valuables off to on an antique dealer for far less than their actual worth. Roy Fontaine got 4 years for theft, Arthur Wooton 3 years for reset and George Ross-Wham had already been jailed on a separate offence by the time his sentencing came up. Fontaine was a career jewel thief, confidence trickster and blackmailer but Esta had found him charming and visited him in jail. She left money for him to try and start up a better life after he was released. This he tried, but it was not to be. It turned out that she may have gotten off lightly from Fontaine’s gang; he was actually the Glaswegian Archibald Hall who gained notoriety some 20 years later as a serial killer who the press dubbed the Monster Butler. His modus operandi was robbing and killing wealthy elderly and high-profile clients that he had worked his charm on to gain work as a butler. He was sentenced to life without parole in 1978.

Archibald Hall being taken to Jail, Daily Record, May 1978

Esta Henry would have one last high-profile adventure before settling down to a quieter married life keeping shop with Paul. In 1954 the Egyptian Junta let it be known that they were auctioning off part of the personal collection of art and objets accumulated by the now deposed King Farouk at the state’s expense. She told the press she was determined to bag herself a bargain and flew to Cairo to the auction at the Koubbeh Palace; they were there at Turnhouse Airport to wave her off. In Egypt, when the Sotheby’s auctioneer initially announced the lots only in French and Arabic she interrupted to protest – “English was good enough for Shakespeare, it should be good enough for these people”. He yielded to her request and began to also announce the lots in English. She next stopped proceedings to ask an Egyptian army major to bring her some tea; tea was brought. When asked not to smoke she refused and instead asked for one of King Farouk’s diamond-studded, gold ashtrays – an auction lot – be brought to her.

Esta Henry, glasses in hand, berates the auctioneer yet again. The other bidders seem much amused. Sphere, 20th March 1954

She eventually brought the proceedings into complete farce by repeatedly protesting when, at the behest of the Egyptian organisers, multiple auction lots were withdrawn, joint lots were split up and opening bids were significantly above the catalogue reserve price. The other bidders, and indeed the Sotheby’s auctioneers, were actually on her side – they too were less than impressed with how the sale was being conducted. When she eventually walked out, labelling the Egyptians “a bunch of twisters”, a number of fellow dealers followed her out. She was chased into the car park by the auctioneer and a senior Egyptian officer who begged her to return. Realising she had made her point, she acquiesced, and went back into the sale room where she publicly hugged and kissed the astonished auctioneer. She now stopped making a nuisance of herself and got down to the business of buying, eventually spending some £15,000 (c. £360,000 in 2025). She allowed herself one last moment of pantomime when, outbid on a 16th century Scottish clock, did jump up, grab the item from the auctioneer’s desk and announce to all that it was Scottish, she was Scottish and “I am going to have it!”. Her delighted fellow buyers let her have it. When she returned home, the gossip columnists and society magazines were waiting and she told them she was left with only the 2/6d in her pocket having spent the rest in Egypt. Her treasures arrived at the end of the following month, and she was met by both the press and by Customs to assess the haul.

Esta and Paul Henry demonstrate one of the Egyptian auction items to a customs officer and the press. Sunday Post, 2nd May 1954

Esta and Paul Henry spent a happy decade together behind the counter at 51 High Street surrounded by the antiques and art that had brought them together. Esta through numerous exhibitions at Moubray House and contributed rare pieces to others. She began to form plans to perhaps leave the house and the best parts of her collection to the nation. In 1960 a fellow Edinburgh antique dealer told the press that they probably had the best collection in the country inside their shop. For their 10th wedding anniversary the couple decided to take a long overdue honeymoon and booked a round the world trip, perhaps to acquire yet more pieces or perhaps with a view to scouting out somewhere warm to retire to.

Copy of Esta Henry’s entry card into Brazil, issued by the Consul General in London on 10th December 1962

It was for this reason that they were in Sao Paulo, en route to Rio de Janiero on January 15th when Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Flight 144 came down shortly after takeoff, killing them both. The long reign of the Queen of the High Street was over and the Brazilian authorities had her buried together with her Prince in Sao Paulo. Back home her vast collection of treasure that formed the bulk of her estate was split up and sold off. Her shop became home to a succession of trinket and tourist businesses but her flat above fared better, remaining in the care of the Cockburn association before being restored by a wealthy American benefactor and in 2012 gifted to the nation under the care of Historic Environment Scotland.

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The thread about Esta Henry; the life and times of the Queen of the High Street

On this day (January 15th) in 1963, a small silver airliner with 45 people on board took off from Sao Paulo in Brazil en route for Rio de Janeiro. Moments later it plunged into the ground in the city’s suburbs, taking with it 13 lives. The last victim to be identified was that of Esta Henry, a renowned and somewhat eccentric Edinburgh antiques dealer; her husband Paul was at her side and perished too. Thus ended the final chapter in the colourful life of the lady the papers called the Queen of the High Street. Her surprising story now follows.

Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Convair 340 aircraft, registration PP-CDW, the plane that crashed in January 1963. CC-by Smithsonian Institution

She was born Esther Louis on July 3rd 1882 in Sunderland, County Durham, to Louie Louis and his wife Eveline (née Jackson). Her parents were Jewish, her father a 1st generation Prussian immigrant and her mother 2nd generation to Dutch and German parents. Like many Jews in Britain at this time, to integrate and protect themselves somewhat from anti-Semitism, they altered their names; Louie and Evelina were thus better known as John and Eva. He worked variously as a cobbler, a clothier and an auctioneer and the family moved frequently with his work between Sunderland and Scotland. The family moved to 2 Jane Street in Leith in 1884 where Louie opened an auction room in the Kirkgate. Alas tragedy was to strike the following year. When Esta was just 2 her father died from fever and pneumonia leaving his wife with 7 hungry mouths to feed and another on the way.

Esta’s immediate family tree.

Evelina and her entourage of children gravitated back to Wearside where she remarried in 1889 to Charles Goldman, a pawnbroker. Four half-siblings to Esta would follow and at the time of the 1891 census the enlarged family stayed in a small but prim end-terraced house at 4 Sorley Street in Sunderland. In her own telling of her story at this age the 9 year old Esta ran off to variously Edinburgh or Leith and sold door-to-door by barrow or bicycle to eke out a living, but we should take this with a very large pinch of salt as the records contradict the story and she made a habit of tweaking and embellishing tales of her life to suit circumstances. In 1901 they were at 12 Rutland Street in Sunderland, living above the family pawnbrokers. The 18 year old Esta was described as a General Dealer in the census; she was running a corner shop.

Rutland Street, Sunderland, 1929. Number 12, the Goldman shop and house is at the end of the row with the canopy, if you look very closes the pawnbroker’s sign is in the Goldman name. via Sunderland Antiquarian Society

But Esta did not stay put for much longer, by the next year we find her living at 156 Canongate in Edinburgh. Shortly thereafter she married a 25 year old jeweller, Jack H. Henry of 30 Milton Street. But like her Father, Esta’s new husband was using an alias; he was actually born Joseph Henry Abrovich in Łódź, Poland. It suited him to keep details of his past deliberately obscure; he spent his life giving different dates (between 1869-79) and places of birth in official documents and was most frequently recorded as John but sometimes also Jacob. But he married Esta as Jack. His mysteriousness was necessary as he was leading a double life; he was actually a talented concert violinist, a member of the touring orchestra of Polish piano impresario Ignacy Paderewski (who would rise to become Prime Minister of his country). Jack had skipped town in Dublin when on tour in the 1890s in order to avoid returning home to compulsory military service for the Russian Empire. It was also a difficult time for the Polish Jews in general as they faced the Russian Pogroms and waves were emigrating west. Thus he ended up in Scotland; possibly via Glasgow where there were already Abrovichs resident.

“Jack H. Henry.” Juliette Bird, via Ancestry

Esta and Jack settled at the tenement at 170 Canongate and soon opened a jewellery shop below at number 168. They moved into the back of the shop and began to raise a family together. Louis (Lou) was born in 1903, Philip (Philly) in 1904, Herbert (Bertie) in 1906 and Rosa (Rose) in 1908. While the Canongate was a down at heel neighbourhood at the time, one with much slum housing and a largely itinerant population that included many of the city’s poor and immigrants, they were doing well for themselves and advertised for a servant – “apply Mrs Henry” – in the newspapers.

Canongate in the late 19th century. On the left is the tower and clock of the Tolbooth, on the right the distinctive obelisk-topped gate piers of Moray House. The Henry shop and home is the lighter coloured tenement on the right hand side of the street. Beyond is the projecting gable of Huntly House; it is a neighbourhood steeped in Scottish history. Postcard, unknown artist. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

As they prospered, raising 3 children in the back of a shop ceased to be a necessity and they moved to a smart new, end-of-terrace, middle class villa at 1 Lismore Avenue in Willowbrae. It was here in 1918 that their ranks were joined by the birth of Henrietta (Bunty). 1914 saw them relocate the shope up the Royal Mile to number 51 High Street, next to the well know building known as John Knox’s House. This was the ground floor of Moubray House, one of the oldest surviving residential buildings in the city, where Daniel Defoe had once lodged. It had recently been restored by the Cockburn Association and placed in the hands of a trust. Despite raising 4 children, Esta was clearly becoming more involved in the affairs of business as classified adverts are in the name of both her and Jack. By 1920 she is styling herself “Mrs Henry, Antique Dealer” in these.

“Unidentified Man and Children”, Alexander Wilson Hill, c. 1933. This the shop at 51 High Street and it is probably Jack Henry standing outside. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

The 1921 census finds the family have moved on and up in the housing world again, now at a very large villa at 15 Mayfield Terrace in Newington. Louis Henry was following his father into the jewellery trade and Philip was training to become a dentist. Life was good but it was about to get better. In 1923 the Scottish newspapers reported the surprise visit of Queen Mary to the Henrys’ shop, where she spent an hour and bought many items, particularly Chinese curios. She was “greatly interested with both the collection and the premises” and shook hands with Esta and Jack as she left, promising to return. Her Majesty was true to her word and returned exactly one year later, buying “a score of articles” including a Louis XIV fan that had once belonged to Queen Victoria. She signed the visitors’ book and said that her purchases the previous year had been gifted to the West Kensington Museum.

Queen Mary leaving Henry’s on one of her many visits. Postcard, unknown artist. Via Canmore, SC 2649474 © Courtesy HES

The Queen was back again a year later, with over a dozen items bought, including a portrait believed to have been the property of Napoleon. The Henrys were invited to deliver the items in person to Holyroodhouse that afternoon and join the Queen for tea. They learned that some of the purchases were to stay there at the palace as part of its collection. The Queen thereafter returned almost every year on her visits to Holyrood, the newspapers reporting the purchase of items in 1927 and 1930 for Buckingham Palace and her personal collection. Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, Princes Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and her sister Queen Margaret would carry on this royal tradition in later years and a whole section of wall in the shop was reserved for the display of their proudly framed cheques.

As the Roaring Twenties came to a close, Esta’s public profile was ascendant but Jack seems to have begun to step back somewhat from the limelight and into the shadows of the shop. In 1928 she stood for election to the Parish Council in the Canongate ward. Although she came second, there were two seats up for grabs and she was duly returned. Her election notices are the first time in print I could find where she is referring to herself as Esta, rather than just Mrs Henry. Her election was notable as she was the first Jewish woman to be elected to a public office in Scotland and also the press referred to her as Councillor Mrs Esta Henry, other married female councillors were referred to by their husband’s name, e.g Councillor Mrs Adam Millar. This is a public demonstration that she was very much her own woman.

Candidate picture of Esta Henry, Evening News, 7th November 1928

The following year civic Parish Councils in Scotland – which existed largely for the purposes of poor relief – were abolished and merged into the Town Councils. Esta stood as an independent for this latter body in 1929 but came 4th behind two Socialists and a Moderate candidate. She would stand again for the Town Council in 1931, 1933 and 1935. She made very clear in her election speeches, which were reported in the press, that her priorities were housing, housewives, child welfare and the treatment of the sick and poor. Women and children were always central to her campaigns and she was known to mobilise squads of them in the Canongate to carry her election materials and to parade around the polling stations. But despite her strenuous campaign efforts on a sensible platform, her public profile and her local popularity, as an independent female candidate she stood little realistic chance of election. Edinburgh was run by the very pale, male and stale Moderates who largely owned the Council’s seats – many of which they didn’t even need to contest – and it was only in a handful of wards where the Socialists could challenge them (to find out more about the political groupings of 20th century Edinburgh and how the election system worked, you can bookmark this thread to read later).

In between election campaigns and royal visits, in 1933 the Henrys commissioned a magnificent L-plan house in a Dutch Cape Colonial style that also incorporated the latest in Moderne tastes. This was Marchdyke at 50 Pentland Terrace on the outskirts of the city’s growing suburbs and it totally eclipsed the monotonous rows of middle class bungalows that were much in favour all around it. Completed in 1935 this 4,000 square foot, 5 bedroom residence featured a Tudorbethan dining room, copious lounge and parlour, a terrazzo bathroom in a Roman style and in the basement a large garage for Jack’s cars, a wine cellar and antiques store. While many of the windows were in an ultra-fashionable fish scale style, the stained glass of the master staircase incorporated original 16th century Swiss and German panes from their collection.

Marchdyke, now known as Huntersmoon. Wilson Property Group, 2022 Property Listing – click here to see an archived copy with the full album of photos.

In the 1935 Town Council election, Esta had come third behind the Socialist Party candidate and another from the Protestant Action Society (PA). This party were extreme anti-Catholics who stood on a platform of “No Popery”. Their leader was the rabble-rouser John Cormack and his political stock was rising at the time. In 1934 his party got just 6% of the popular vote in the Edinburgh municipal elections and 1 seat; in 1935 they got 21% and 3 seats. The exact order of following events are not clear but at the 1936 election Esta was already intending to stand once again on her usual independent platform. John Cormack made it be known in the press that he was inclined to lend his support to her in the Canongate (where many Catholic Irish and Italians lived). Perhaps it was a case of “if you can’t beat them, join them“, but with just a week to go before polling, Esta Henry made the shock announcement that she was now standing as a Protestant Action candidate – “the Only Party who do Not Want R. C. Votes“. So late was this change that even on the eve of election some of the papers still reported her as an independent. She topped the ballot, beating PA’s primary candidate, and was duly elected as a Town Councillor at the 5th attempt. It was a good year for PA, they got 31% of the popular vote and won 6 seats. Indeed it was their apogee and they soon slumped into bitter infighting and electoral obscurity, leaving just John Cormack to solider on for decades as their only councillor.

Election adverts, Evening News, 31st October 1936

It’s never been clear just how committed Esta was to her new found political home – she certainly threw herself into public meetings on its behalf for a while, it being reported that she would stroll up and down the aisle, brandishing her umbrella at the audience. Realistically she may just have been desperate to get elected and chose the only other party than the Progressives (as the Moderates had re-branded) or Socialists with any chance of winning a seat. John Cormack was strongly criticised from within his own ranks for allowing a Jewish woman to stand on his platform – indeed much later in 1952 he organised pickets against her for suggesting public entertainments on Sundays at public meetings. She did not linger too long under his party whip and had resigned before the 1938 elections. She may have been made very uneasy with the association after a tumultuous public meeting in October 1937 in the Canongate Tolbooth. At this, her male PA colleague refused to answer questions directly and instead railed against Catholics to the boos and heckles of the crowd. Esta tried to make clear that she was there to fight the Socialists in politics but the audience deemed her guilty by association and turned on her too. Thereafter, she dedicated herself thereafter to public service for the Canongate in her own name. She would rise to become Convenor of the Baths and Washhouses Committee, a member of the Cleansing and Lighting Committee, the Streets and Buildings Committee and in 1941 was made JP (a Justice of the Peace, a lay magistrate in the lowest level of municipal courts).

Esta Henry commands the floor at a political meeting. Evening News, 8th February 1940

Esta found that her official role as a councillor fitted well alongside her personal philanthropic activities and she long described herself publicly as a Social Worker in the Canongate (although she frequently embellished the timescales somewhat). In 1931 she had formed the Edinburgh United Independent Association in the Canongate to run youth projects and raise money for the city’s Royal Infirmary hospital. Her attitudes were quite progressive and she recognised the need and value for activities and exercise for her district’s youth to keep them from being led astray and getting into trouble and for their general health. She was heavily involved in the Canon Club for Boys and Girls and formed an amateur dramatic society there.

The youth of the Canongate ward is my special care… I want to mother the young people – I have done it all my days – and to impress them with the same spirit that I have myself… Never to let go, to hold on to the good things of life, because they will be rewarded in the end, the same as I have been.

Esta Henry, 1936

She also put her money where her mouth was and provided trophies for local clubs. In 1936 she presented the first of many Esta Henry Cups to the men of the Trinity College and Moray Knox Club on Cranston Street, an organisation formed for unemployed men. It was for the man who scored highest in their games league of dominoes, billiards, draughts and other pastimes with which they occupied their enforced idleness. Another such cup was presented to the local Caledonian Football Club. In November 1937, the Lord Provost gave her a leave of absence from her duties to travel officially to South Africa, where she was to spend two and a half months investigating working class housing and town planning on behalf of the city. He provided her with letters of introduction but they probably weren’t necessary, she apparently owned a fruit farm in the country and her son Phillie had settled there as a dentist! On her return she reported back that she had “travelled many hundreds of miles by air” but that it turned out things in Scotland were far more advanced and better organised for the poor than they were in South Africa! At this time she was also becoming increasingly involved with the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, becoming a local committee member, and in 1939 she and the Lady Provost threw a Christmas dinner for its members in the Canongate Tolbooth.

Esta Henry (2nd left, in the beret) and the Lady Provost give a Christmas Dinner to the elderly of the Canongate in the Tolbooth. Evening News, December 22nd 1939

The year 1939 also brought the clouds of war to the High Street and municipal elections were suspended for the duration. As an incumbent councillor at the end of her 3 year term, Esta would have faced re-election in November that year. She now found herself with an extra six uncontested years added to her term of office and intended to make the most of this chance. She applied her single-minded determination, boundless energy and never-ending appetite for meetings and committees to the task at hand. And so it was that Councillor Esta Henry went to war. Interviewed shortly after the outbreak, she told the People’s Journal that there was no need to conscript women to the war effort as she had not met a woman in Edinburgh “who is not prepared to do whatsoever she is called upon to do“.

People’s Journal, 16th September 1939

One of her first acts, on behalf of the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, was to campaign for government allowances for women dependent on the wages of their sons where these men had now been called up. In the Canongate she joined the local ARP (Air Raid Precautions civil defence force), turned her shop basement into an air raid shelter (her name is against it in the Valuation Rolls) and established a corps of 40 local women to act as fire pickets. Later, the Esta Henry Ambulance Section first aiders were also formed. She was soon putting on social events to help finance these activities and found herself placed in charge of the Entertainments Committee of the Lady Provost’s Comforts Fund. This latter organisation started out with the simple of aim of knitting kilt socks for soldiers of the Highland Regiments, as had been done in the 1914-18 conflict. Esta organised bridge parties to raise funds for buying the wool and offered up her house of Marchdyke as a suitable venue. In the Canongate she formed the local women in to work parties in the Tolbooth meeting hall, and arranged free entertainments to keep them amused as they knitted the socks. Soon she was organising mass balls; in February 1940 some 600 dancers packed out the Plaza dancehall in Morningside in a charity gala. At the Eldorado dancehall in Leith though it wasn’t dancing that she put on but boxing, a sport new to her but one that she had fallen in love with. There was nothing that she would not turn her attention to in the name of raising funds; charity auctions, raising pigs and Warship Week where she matched every £1 bond bought at a public rally with £1 of her own.

Esta Henry feeding pigs she was raising for charity sale. Evening News, 26th April 1940

Increasingly in the city centre on her ceaseless war work, getting to and from Marchdyke must have been proving an inconvenience as in 1941 she took possession of the flat in Moubray House above the shop and fitted it out as her own residence. She was also keen to demonstrate that old houses in the High Street could be rehabilitated for use without demolishing them. At the end of that year she paid for 800 local children to go to the cinema as a Hogmanay treat, a special programme being put on for them at the New Palace on the High Street. At the end of this screening she had new years resolutions projected onto the screen and had her audience promise en masse to be good children while their fathers were away and to help contribute to the war effort. 1942 saw the institution of the city Corporation’s Holidays at Home programme; municipal entertainments to keep people and children occupied over the summer holidays and try and reduce the temptation to travel. Esta organised outdoor public dances at the Ross Bandstand in Princes Street Gardens which were put on for 2 hours every Monday to Friday afternoon, admission 6d on the gate. She herself led off the first dance with the Lord Provost and was a regular attendee, encouraging and cajoling shy young men to get themselves a partner and join in.

Wartime dancing at the Ross Bandstand in 1945. Evening News photo, from “Living Memories” by Jennifer Veitch

There was more dancing organised by Esta Henry in 1943, as well as cycle racing at Meadowbank, mass picnics for mothers and children and – as Baths & Washhouses Committee Convenor – she arranged for Portobello outdoor swimming pool to be re-opened (some of its machinery had been removed for war use and the rest had fallen into disrepair) so that charity swimming and water polo galas could be held (the awards being more Esta Henry Cups). This also meant children and youths could go swimming in the holidays again – she was well aware that with many fathers away on service and mothers occupied with war work at home, juvenile delinquency as a result of bored children being left to their own devices was a real problem. At the end of that year she spoke at a meeting to form the East Edinburgh Anti-Fascist Committe when it was announced that British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Moseley had been released from jail.

In 1944 she instituted a scheme whereby service personnel in the city and groups of school children were invited to the City Chambers to attend meetings of the Town Councils as her guest. They watched the proceedings and afterwards could question her and other members about the mechanics of local government; she wanted to show how the Home Front was functioning, to connect people with the municipal authorities and to raise awareness of the acute difficulties faced by it at this time. That summer she pressed the Corporation to make the city’s now unnecessary civil defence resources available to house evacuee children from London in the face of the new V1 and later V2 terror bombing. Although the idea garnered wide support it ultimately came to nothing and she would latter press the city to instead give away its accumulated surplus of bunk beds, mattresses and blankets for free to those in need.

With the end of the war finally coming into sight she now turned her attention to the post war prospects. With the Rev. Selby Weight of Canongate Kirk she held public meetings for the Canongate Welcome Home Service Fund to plan for the reintegration of demobbed service personnel and provide comforts and necessities for them and their families. She joined the local Women for Westminster branch to try and get a woman MP elected for the city and repeatedly went on the record that providing for youths and children had to be central to the city’s postwar planning and foresaw the coming housing crisis in the Old Town (it had of course always been there to an extent, but it was about to get very acute). “My slogan is houses and more houses – housing priority!” she said, but she was also clear that it had to be done by reconstruction of existing communities, not by swinging the wrecking ball and scattering them to all the corners of the city. She also took a great interest in Portobello and joined a local campaign to improve the district after the war. Always one to put her money where her mouth was, at her own expense she commissioned plans and artists’ impressions for a scheme to turn “Edinburgh’s ugly sister” into a fashionable new sea-side resort and Garden City. This wasn’t just pie-in-the-sky thinking, she successfully proposed it to the city authorities who had it approved by the Lord Provost’s Committee and included in Sir Patrick Abercrombie’s 1949 “Plan for the City and Royal Burgh of Edinburgh” (you will find it on page 69 in glorious technicolour but with little additional detail). The realities of postwar economics and political priorities meant however that it would never get beyond the pages of that work.

Artist’s impression of Esta Henry’s scheme for post-war Portobello. Evening News, September 18th 1945

As the war drew to its close Esta found time to join yet one more committee, that of the League of Angry Wives. These were Scottish women who had married American servicemen and as “G.I. brides” wanted the right to join their husbands in that country. A resolution was passed and representations were sent directly to President Truman – by letter – and the First Lady – by telegram. A week later, Esta henry defended her seat, which she had now held for 9 years, at the ballot box but the winds of political change blew hard and she was comprehensively defeated by Labour candidates. This was despite her being presented with a pair of boxing gloves by her supporters and urged to “go on fighting“. After further defeats at the 1946 and 1947 elections she stepped back finally from politics, but not from life!

Esta Henry addresses the League of Angry Wives, Daily Record, October 29th 1945

In 1946 and 1947 she was a key organiser with the Scottish Housewives Association in an Edinburgh and Fife-based campaign against bread rationing. This culminated in her and Janet Neish of Kirkcaldy chasing the Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade out of the North British Hotel and across the street to his car as he sought to avoid the combined fury of their sharp tongues! Never one to turn down a committee, she was also elected as the President of the Edinburgh branch of that organisation. 1947 had however started on a sad note for her as Jack Henry finally succumbed to long-term heart disease, leaving her a widow. It was around this time that the house at Marchdyke was sold. But Esta showed no signs of retiring from life to mourn and threw herself instead to yet another new activity; women’s football. She became the director of the Edinburgh Lady Dynamos, a team formed from core members of successful pre-war teams when the women’s game had enjoyed a brief spell of public popularity. Donating another Esta Henry Trophy to the cause it was likely that she paid for their kits too and she could be relied upon to turn her formidable oratory power at the authorities when they refused to allow the women to play in public grounds.

Edinburgh Lady Dynamos football team, late 1940s. CC-by-SA-NC 0084-003, via Edinburgh Collected.
Back row L-R is Esta Henry, Kitty Russell, Betty Rae, Agnes Whitelaw, Theresa Mulvie, goalkeeper Jessie Baillie, Nan Laurie, Babs McWhinney and Walter Caesar. Front row L-R is Eleanor Wilson, Betty Davidson (?), Linda Clements, Mary Leslie, Bet Adamson.

She had long been a local celebrity but in the year 1953, Esta Henry’s reputation went national on two accounts. Around the 27th of December 1952, a well dressed man entered her shop on the High Street and introduced himself as a Belgian art dealer, Paul Eugene Dillin. The pair quickly struck up a rapport and he soon confided in her that his identity was a front; he was actually a stateless Romanian Jew by the name of Pinchas Haimovici and had spent two and a half years in hiding in the Netherlands during the war. As he refused to sign a national oath pledging himself to Communism he was exiled from his country of birth and had no papers. It was at the recommendation of the renowned sculptor Benno Schotz, a prominent member of the Scottish Jewish community and whose wife came from the same village as him, that he had come to Edinburgh seeking art. Esta fell in love with the man then and there, despite an age gap of 21 years between them, and proposed to him on the condition that he took the name Henry. When he accepted she threw his fake passport on the fire and urged him to turn himself in and seek asylum so that they could be legally wed.

Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

Esta perhaps imagined naïvely that her reputation and connections would make it a mere formality and booked the couple a honeymoon trip to Madeira. However when the police were invited to the shop they instead charged Pinchas with offences for landing illegally in the country on false papers under the Aliens Act 1920 and he was sent to Saughton Prison. On December 31st he pled guilty at the Sheriff Court in Edinburgh and was remanded for sentencing, which was deferred to give his solicitor a chance to arrange an application for Israeli papers and asylum so that he could travel there instead of being deported. After the hearing, Esta told the waiting reporters that she still intended to marry her “Prince Paul” (Paul Haemovitz was another alias he had used) but that she was going to go on the Honeymoon trip to Maderia anyway by herself as the stress of events would otherwise give her a stroke; the reporter noted that she was smoking at the time and confided she had smoked 100 already that day. The case rumbled on and on, the Israelis were being slow with the papers as apparently there was another Pinchas Haimovici on an Interpol watch-list, despite this being a common name in Romania, and he had to prove it was not him. The Sheriff in Edinburgh grew tired of the repeated delays and on March 13th 1953 he ordered Pinchas’ release. But no sooner had he left the courtroom than he found himself re-arrested; the Home Secretary Sir David Maxwell Fyfe had finally signed a deportation order for him and he was sent straight back to Saughton. Esta told a waiting reporter from the Daily Mirror that if he was to be deported to Romania then she would join him there; “I’m only seventy, and fit enough to crash any of Stalin’s curtains”.

Pinchas petitioned the High Court in Edinburgh to avoid deportation and his case was heard on April 10th. As a declared anti-communist he told the court that he faced “torture and death” if returned to Romania. He also asked leave from court to marry Esta (who waved the papers she had ready to the court), but this request and his protests over his captivity fell on deaf ears and the case was adjourned. Back to Saughton Prison he went were Esta, with her lawyer Lionel Daiches, continued to visit him and made a habit of finding her way uninvited into the Governor’s office to protest more directly. The case was now being reported across the national and regional British newspapers and had become quite embarrassing for the Government. And so it was that the Home Secretary cancelled his previous order and on Friday 24th April 1953 Pinchas Haimovici was released and met by Esta with a pony and trap to drive him home and a brass band she had hired to serenade his freedom. The couple announced that they were to be married on the Monday morning and after a brief registry office ceremony, so they were. Esta insisted that they returned immediately to the shop to re-open for business but outside they were met by an immense crowd of well-wishers who lifted her into the air as they cheered for her and her husband. She lost her shoes in the process and the police had to attend to find the couple a path through the throng.

Esta and Pinchas are met by jubilant crowds of well-wishers in Hunter Square after their marriage. Daily Mirror, April 28th 1953

The crowd followed them all the way back to the shop where they posed for the press and thanked their well-wishers while Esta fumbled through the 20 different keys she kept for the various locks on the premises. They were back behind the counter and at work within an hour of their ceremony starting. The next day they took a taxi out to Saughton Prison and thanked the warders with wedding cake and champagne, Pinchas let the press know that they had treated him very kindly. A few days later he formally changed his name to Paul Henry in line with Esta’s prenuptial wishes.

Pinchas and Esta re-open the shop after wedding, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

To celebrate their union and to thank Benno Schotz for helping bring them together they commissioned him to produce a brass bust of them. Schotz insisted that Pinchas should be holding something in his hand and, knowing that Esta was immensely fond of rings, designed an Adam & Eve ring for the purpose. The finished work was unveiled to mark their first wedding anniversary as the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy on Princes Street.

Unveiling the bust with Benno Schotz, 23rd April 1954. Paul is holding the ring in his hand.

Returning to the events of 1953, it was while her Prince Paul was still incarcerated that the other event took place that garnered national reporting for Esta; she was robbed! Perhaps she had been distracted by the events surrounding Paul’s case, but she allowed herself to be taken in by a group of well-organised confidence tricksters posing as American buyers. Having taken the time and effort to establish her routines and build up a rapport with her, they arranged a distraction and took their chance to steal jewellery that she valued at £20,000 from a lock box, £320 and $600 in cash and the pass books for her life savings. Esta told the press that amongst the items stolen was an amethyst fob which had once been part of the Hungarian crown jewels. Bits and pieces of the loot turned up in sale rooms afterwards and she was forced to buy them back at half of what the other dealer had paid for them; she was not impressed. The police eventually caught up with her trio of robbers due to their amateurish attempts to pass her stolen valuables off to on an antique dealer for far less than their actual worth. Roy Fontaine got 4 years for theft, Arthur Wooton 3 years for reset and George Ross-Wham had already been jailed on a separate offence by the time his sentencing came up. Fontaine was a career jewel thief, confidence trickster and blackmailer but Esta had found him charming and visited him in jail. She left money for him to try and start up a better life after he was released. This he tried, but it was not to be. It turned out that she may have gotten off lightly from Fontaine’s gang; he was actually the Glaswegian Archibald Hall who gained notoriety some 20 years later as a serial killer who the press dubbed the Monster Butler. His modus operandi was robbing and killing wealthy elderly and high-profile clients that he had worked his charm on to gain work as a butler. He was sentenced to life without parole in 1978.

Archibald Hall being taken to Jail, Daily Record, May 1978

Esta Henry would have one last high-profile adventure before settling down to a quieter married life keeping shop with Paul. In 1954 the Egyptian Junta let it be known that they were auctioning off part of the personal collection of art and objets accumulated by the now deposed King Farouk at the state’s expense. She told the press she was determined to bag herself a bargain and flew to Cairo to the auction at the Koubbeh Palace; they were there at Turnhouse Airport to wave her off. In Egypt, when the Sotheby’s auctioneer initially announced the lots only in French and Arabic she interrupted to protest – “English was good enough for Shakespeare, it should be good enough for these people”. He yielded to her request and began to also announce the lots in English. She next stopped proceedings to ask an Egyptian army major to bring her some tea; tea was brought. When asked not to smoke she refused and instead asked for one of King Farouk’s diamond-studded, gold ashtrays – an auction lot – be brought to her.

Esta Henry, glasses in hand, berates the auctioneer yet again. The other bidders seem much amused. Sphere, 20th March 1954

She eventually brought the proceedings into complete farce by repeatedly protesting when, at the behest of the Egyptian organisers, multiple auction lots were withdrawn, joint lots were split up and opening bids were significantly above the catalogue reserve price. The other bidders, and indeed the Sotheby’s auctioneers, were actually on her side – they too were less than impressed with how the sale was being conducted. When she eventually walked out, labelling the Egyptians “a bunch of twisters”, a number of fellow dealers followed her out. She was chased into the car park by the auctioneer and a senior Egyptian officer who begged her to return. Realising she had made her point, she acquiesced, and went back into the sale room where she publicly hugged and kissed the astonished auctioneer. She now stopped making a nuisance of herself and got down to the business of buying, eventually spending some £15,000 (c. £360,000 in 2025). She allowed herself one last moment of pantomime when, outbid on a 16th century Scottish clock, did jump up, grab the item from the auctioneer’s desk and announce to all that it was Scottish, she was Scottish and “I am going to have it!”. Her delighted fellow buyers let her have it. When she returned home, the gossip columnists and society magazines were waiting and she told them she was left with only the 2/6d in her pocket having spent the rest in Egypt. Her treasures arrived at the end of the following month, and she was met by both the press and by Customs to assess the haul.

Esta and Paul Henry demonstrate one of the Egyptian auction items to a customs officer and the press. Sunday Post, 2nd May 1954

Esta and Paul Henry spent a happy decade together behind the counter at 51 High Street surrounded by the antiques and art that had brought them together. Esta through numerous exhibitions at Moubray House and contributed rare pieces to others. She began to form plans to perhaps leave the house and the best parts of her collection to the nation. In 1960 a fellow Edinburgh antique dealer told the press that they probably had the best collection in the country inside their shop. For their 10th wedding anniversary the couple decided to take a long overdue honeymoon and booked a round the world trip, perhaps to acquire yet more pieces or perhaps with a view to scouting out somewhere warm to retire to.

Copy of Esta Henry’s entry card into Brazil, issued by the Consul General in London on 10th December 1962

It was for this reason that they were in Sao Paulo, en route to Rio de Janiero on January 15th when Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Flight 144 came down shortly after takeoff, killing them both. The long reign of the Queen of the High Street was over and the Brazilian authorities had her buried together with her Prince in Sao Paulo. Back home her vast collection of treasure that formed the bulk of her estate was split up and sold off. Her shop became home to a succession of trinket and tourist businesses but her flat above fared better, remaining in the care of the Cockburn association before being restored by a wealthy American benefactor and in 2012 gifted to the nation under the care of Historic Environment Scotland.

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The thread about Esta Henry; the life and times of the Queen of the High Street

On this day (January 15th) in 1963, a small silver airliner with 45 people on board took off from Sao Paulo in Brazil en route for Rio de Janeiro. Moments later it plunged into the ground in the city’s suburbs, taking with it 13 lives. The last victim to be identified was that of Esta Henry, a renowned and somewhat eccentric Edinburgh antiques dealer; her husband Paul was at her side and perished too. Thus ended the final chapter in the colourful life of the lady the papers called the Queen of the High Street. Her surprising story now follows.

Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Convair 340 aircraft, registration PP-CDW, the plane that crashed in January 1963. CC-by Smithsonian Institution

She was born Esther Louis on July 3rd 1882 in Sunderland, County Durham, to Louie Louis and his wife Eveline (née Jackson). Her parents were Jewish, her father a 1st generation Prussian immigrant and her mother 2nd generation to Dutch and German parents. Like many Jews in Britain at this time, to integrate and protect themselves somewhat from anti-Semitism, they altered their names; Louie and Evelina were thus better known as John and Eva. He worked variously as a cobbler, a clothier and an auctioneer and the family moved frequently with his work between Sunderland and Scotland. The family moved to 2 Jane Street in Leith in 1884 where Louie opened an auction room in the Kirkgate. Alas tragedy was to strike the following year. When Esta was just 2 her father died from fever and pneumonia leaving his wife with 7 hungry mouths to feed and another on the way.

Esta’s immediate family tree.

Evelina and her entourage of children gravitated back to Wearside where she remarried in 1889 to Charles Goldman, a pawnbroker. Four half-siblings to Esta would follow and at the time of the 1891 census the enlarged family stayed in a small but prim end-terraced house at 4 Sorley Street in Sunderland. In her own telling of her story at this age the 9 year old Esta ran off to variously Edinburgh or Leith and sold door-to-door by barrow or bicycle to eke out a living, but we should take this with a very large pinch of salt as the records contradict the story and she made a habit of tweaking and embellishing tales of her life to suit circumstances. In 1901 they were at 12 Rutland Street in Sunderland, living above the family pawnbrokers. The 18 year old Esta was described as a General Dealer in the census; she was running a corner shop.

Rutland Street, Sunderland, 1929. Number 12, the Goldman shop and house is at the end of the row with the canopy, if you look very closes the pawnbroker’s sign is in the Goldman name. via Sunderland Antiquarian Society

But Esta did not stay put for much longer, by the next year we find her living at 156 Canongate in Edinburgh. Shortly thereafter she married a 25 year old jeweller, Jack H. Henry of 30 Milton Street. But like her Father, Esta’s new husband was using an alias; he was actually born Joseph Henry Abrovich in Łódź, Poland. It suited him to keep details of his past deliberately obscure; he spent his life giving different dates (between 1869-79) and places of birth in official documents and was most frequently recorded as John but sometimes also Jacob. But he married Esta as Jack. His mysteriousness was necessary as he was leading a double life; he was actually a talented concert violinist, a member of the touring orchestra of Polish piano impresario Ignacy Paderewski (who would rise to become Prime Minister of his country). Jack had skipped town in Dublin when on tour in the 1890s in order to avoid returning home to compulsory military service for the Russian Empire. It was also a difficult time for the Polish Jews in general as they faced the Russian Pogroms and waves were emigrating west. Thus he ended up in Scotland; possibly via Glasgow where there were already Abrovichs resident.

“Jack H. Henry.” Juliette Bird, via Ancestry

Esta and Jack settled at the tenement at 170 Canongate and soon opened a jewellery shop below at number 168. They moved into the back of the shop and began to raise a family together. Louis (Lou) was born in 1903, Philip (Philly) in 1904, Herbert (Bertie) in 1906 and Rosa (Rose) in 1908. While the Canongate was a down at heel neighbourhood at the time, one with much slum housing and a largely itinerant population that included many of the city’s poor and immigrants, they were doing well for themselves and advertised for a servant – “apply Mrs Henry” – in the newspapers.

Canongate in the late 19th century. On the left is the tower and clock of the Tolbooth, on the right the distinctive obelisk-topped gate piers of Moray House. The Henry shop and home is the lighter coloured tenement on the right hand side of the street. Beyond is the projecting gable of Huntly House; it is a neighbourhood steeped in Scottish history. Postcard, unknown artist. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

As they prospered, raising 3 children in the back of a shop ceased to be a necessity and they moved to a smart new, end-of-terrace, middle class villa at 1 Lismore Avenue in Willowbrae. It was here in 1918 that their ranks were joined by the birth of Henrietta (Bunty). 1914 saw them relocate the shope up the Royal Mile to number 51 High Street, next to the well know building known as John Knox’s House. This was the ground floor of Moubray House, one of the oldest surviving residential buildings in the city, where Daniel Defoe had once lodged. It had recently been restored by the Cockburn Association and placed in the hands of a trust. Despite raising 4 children, Esta was clearly becoming more involved in the affairs of business as classified adverts are in the name of both her and Jack. By 1920 she is styling herself “Mrs Henry, Antique Dealer” in these.

“Unidentified Man and Children”, Alexander Wilson Hill, c. 1933. This the shop at 51 High Street and it is probably Jack Henry standing outside. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

The 1921 census finds the family have moved on and up in the housing world again, now at a very large villa at 15 Mayfield Terrace in Newington. Louis Henry was following his father into the jewellery trade and Philip was training to become a dentist. Life was good but it was about to get better. In 1923 the Scottish newspapers reported the surprise visit of Queen Mary to the Henrys’ shop, where she spent an hour and bought many items, particularly Chinese curios. She was “greatly interested with both the collection and the premises” and shook hands with Esta and Jack as she left, promising to return. Her Majesty was true to her word and returned exactly one year later, buying “a score of articles” including a Louis XIV fan that had once belonged to Queen Victoria. She signed the visitors’ book and said that her purchases the previous year had been gifted to the West Kensington Museum.

Queen Mary leaving Henry’s on one of her many visits. Postcard, unknown artist. Via Canmore, SC 2649474 © Courtesy HES

The Queen was back again a year later, with over a dozen items bought, including a portrait believed to have been the property of Napoleon. The Henrys were invited to deliver the items in person to Holyroodhouse that afternoon and join the Queen for tea. They learned that some of the purchases were to stay there at the palace as part of its collection. The Queen thereafter returned almost every year on her visits to Holyrood, the newspapers reporting the purchase of items in 1927 and 1930 for Buckingham Palace and her personal collection. Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, Princes Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and her sister Queen Margaret would carry on this royal tradition in later years and a whole section of wall in the shop was reserved for the display of their proudly framed cheques.

As the Roaring Twenties came to a close, Esta’s public profile was ascendant but Jack seems to have begun to step back somewhat from the limelight and into the shadows of the shop. In 1928 she stood for election to the Parish Council in the Canongate ward. Although she came second, there were two seats up for grabs and she was duly returned. Her election notices are the first time in print I could find where she is referring to herself as Esta, rather than just Mrs Henry. Her election was notable as she was the first Jewish woman to be elected to a public office in Scotland and also the press referred to her as Councillor Mrs Esta Henry, other married female councillors were referred to by their husband’s name, e.g Councillor Mrs Adam Millar. This is a public demonstration that she was very much her own woman.

Candidate picture of Esta Henry, Evening News, 7th November 1928

The following year civic Parish Councils in Scotland – which existed largely for the purposes of poor relief – were abolished and merged into the Town Councils. Esta stood as an independent for this latter body in 1929 but came 4th behind two Socialists and a Moderate candidate. She would stand again for the Town Council in 1931, 1933 and 1935. She made very clear in her election speeches, which were reported in the press, that her priorities were housing, housewives, child welfare and the treatment of the sick and poor. Women and children were always central to her campaigns and she was known to mobilise squads of them in the Canongate to carry her election materials and to parade around the polling stations. But despite her strenuous campaign efforts on a sensible platform, her public profile and her local popularity, as an independent female candidate she stood little realistic chance of election. Edinburgh was run by the very pale, male and stale Moderates who largely owned the Council’s seats – many of which they didn’t even need to contest – and it was only in a handful of wards where the Socialists could challenge them (to find out more about the political groupings of 20th century Edinburgh and how the election system worked, you can bookmark this thread to read later).

In between election campaigns and royal visits, in 1933 the Henrys commissioned a magnificent L-plan house in a Dutch Cape Colonial style that also incorporated the latest in Moderne tastes. This was Marchdyke at 50 Pentland Terrace on the outskirts of the city’s growing suburbs and it totally eclipsed the monotonous rows of middle class bungalows that were much in favour all around it. Completed in 1935 this 4,000 square foot, 5 bedroom residence featured a Tudorbethan dining room, copious lounge and parlour, a terrazzo bathroom in a Roman style and in the basement a large garage for Jack’s cars, a wine cellar and antiques store. While many of the windows were in an ultra-fashionable fish scale style, the stained glass of the master staircase incorporated original 16th century Swiss and German panes from their collection.

Marchdyke, now known as Huntersmoon. Wilson Property Group, 2022 Property Listing – click here to see an archived copy with the full album of photos.

In the 1935 Town Council election, Esta had come third behind the Socialist Party candidate and another from the Protestant Action Society (PA). This party were extreme anti-Catholics who stood on a platform of “No Popery”. Their leader was the rabble-rouser John Cormack and his political stock was rising at the time. In 1934 his party got just 6% of the popular vote in the Edinburgh municipal elections and 1 seat; in 1935 they got 21% and 3 seats. The exact order of following events are not clear but at the 1936 election Esta was already intending to stand once again on her usual independent platform. John Cormack made it be known in the press that he was inclined to lend his support to her in the Canongate (where many Catholic Irish and Italians lived). Perhaps it was a case of “if you can’t beat them, join them“, but with just a week to go before polling, Esta Henry made the shock announcement that she was now standing as a Protestant Action candidate – “the Only Party who do Not Want R. C. Votes“. So late was this change that even on the eve of election some of the papers still reported her as an independent. She topped the ballot, beating PA’s primary candidate, and was duly elected as a Town Councillor at the 5th attempt. It was a good year for PA, they got 31% of the popular vote and won 6 seats. Indeed it was their apogee and they soon slumped into bitter infighting and electoral obscurity, leaving just John Cormack to solider on for decades as their only councillor.

Election adverts, Evening News, 31st October 1936

It’s never been clear just how committed Esta was to her new found political home – she certainly threw herself into public meetings on its behalf for a while, it being reported that she would stroll up and down the aisle, brandishing her umbrella at the audience. Realistically she may just have been desperate to get elected and chose the only other party than the Progressives (as the Moderates had re-branded) or Socialists with any chance of winning a seat. John Cormack was strongly criticised from within his own ranks for allowing a Jewish woman to stand on his platform – indeed much later in 1952 he organised pickets against her for suggesting public entertainments on Sundays at public meetings. She did not linger too long under his party whip and had resigned before the 1938 elections. She may have been made very uneasy with the association after a tumultuous public meeting in October 1937 in the Canongate Tolbooth. At this, her male PA colleague refused to answer questions directly and instead railed against Catholics to the boos and heckles of the crowd. Esta tried to make clear that she was there to fight the Socialists in politics but the audience deemed her guilty by association and turned on her too. Thereafter, she dedicated herself thereafter to public service for the Canongate in her own name. She would rise to become Convenor of the Baths and Washhouses Committee, a member of the Cleansing and Lighting Committee, the Streets and Buildings Committee and in 1941 was made JP (a Justice of the Peace, a lay magistrate in the lowest level of municipal courts).

Esta Henry commands the floor at a political meeting. Evening News, 8th February 1940

Esta found that her official role as a councillor fitted well alongside her personal philanthropic activities and she long described herself publicly as a Social Worker in the Canongate (although she frequently embellished the timescales somewhat). In 1931 she had formed the Edinburgh United Independent Association in the Canongate to run youth projects and raise money for the city’s Royal Infirmary hospital. Her attitudes were quite progressive and she recognised the need and value for activities and exercise for her district’s youth to keep them from being led astray and getting into trouble and for their general health. She was heavily involved in the Canon Club for Boys and Girls and formed an amateur dramatic society there.

The youth of the Canongate ward is my special care… I want to mother the young people – I have done it all my days – and to impress them with the same spirit that I have myself… Never to let go, to hold on to the good things of life, because they will be rewarded in the end, the same as I have been.

Esta Henry, 1936

She also put her money where her mouth was and provided trophies for local clubs. In 1936 she presented the first of many Esta Henry Cups to the men of the Trinity College and Moray Knox Club on Cranston Street, an organisation formed for unemployed men. It was for the man who scored highest in their games league of dominoes, billiards, draughts and other pastimes with which they occupied their enforced idleness. Another such cup was presented to the local Caledonian Football Club. In November 1937, the Lord Provost gave her a leave of absence from her duties to travel officially to South Africa, where she was to spend two and a half months investigating working class housing and town planning on behalf of the city. He provided her with letters of introduction but they probably weren’t necessary, she apparently owned a fruit farm in the country and her son Phillie had settled there as a dentist! On her return she reported back that she had “travelled many hundreds of miles by air” but that it turned out things in Scotland were far more advanced and better organised for the poor than they were in South Africa! At this time she was also becoming increasingly involved with the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, becoming a local committee member, and in 1939 she and the Lady Provost threw a Christmas dinner for its members in the Canongate Tolbooth.

Esta Henry (2nd left, in the beret) and the Lady Provost give a Christmas Dinner to the elderly of the Canongate in the Tolbooth. Evening News, December 22nd 1939

The year 1939 also brought the clouds of war to the High Street and municipal elections were suspended for the duration. As an incumbent councillor at the end of her 3 year term, Esta would have faced re-election in November that year. She now found herself with an extra six uncontested years added to her term of office and intended to make the most of this chance. She applied her single-minded determination, boundless energy and never-ending appetite for meetings and committees to the task at hand. And so it was that Councillor Esta Henry went to war. Interviewed shortly after the outbreak, she told the People’s Journal that there was no need to conscript women to the war effort as she had not met a woman in Edinburgh “who is not prepared to do whatsoever she is called upon to do“.

People’s Journal, 16th September 1939

One of her first acts, on behalf of the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, was to campaign for government allowances for women dependent on the wages of their sons where these men had now been called up. In the Canongate she joined the local ARP (Air Raid Precautions civil defence force), turned her shop basement into an air raid shelter (her name is against it in the Valuation Rolls) and established a corps of 40 local women to act as fire pickets. Later, the Esta Henry Ambulance Section first aiders were also formed. She was soon putting on social events to help finance these activities and found herself placed in charge of the Entertainments Committee of the Lady Provost’s Comforts Fund. This latter organisation started out with the simple of aim of knitting kilt socks for soldiers of the Highland Regiments, as had been done in the 1914-18 conflict. Esta organised bridge parties to raise funds for buying the wool and offered up her house of Marchdyke as a suitable venue. In the Canongate she formed the local women in to work parties in the Tolbooth meeting hall, and arranged free entertainments to keep them amused as they knitted the socks. Soon she was organising mass balls; in February 1940 some 600 dancers packed out the Plaza dancehall in Morningside in a charity gala. At the Eldorado dancehall in Leith though it wasn’t dancing that she put on but boxing, a sport new to her but one that she had fallen in love with. There was nothing that she would not turn her attention to in the name of raising funds; charity auctions, raising pigs and Warship Week where she matched every £1 bond bought at a public rally with £1 of her own.

Esta Henry feeding pigs she was raising for charity sale. Evening News, 26th April 1940

Increasingly in the city centre on her ceaseless war work, getting to and from Marchdyke must have been proving an inconvenience as in 1941 she took possession of the flat in Moubray House above the shop and fitted it out as her own residence. She was also keen to demonstrate that old houses in the High Street could be rehabilitated for use without demolishing them. At the end of that year she paid for 800 local children to go to the cinema as a Hogmanay treat, a special programme being put on for them at the New Palace on the High Street. At the end of this screening she had new years resolutions projected onto the screen and had her audience promise en masse to be good children while their fathers were away and to help contribute to the war effort. 1942 saw the institution of the city Corporation’s Holidays at Home programme; municipal entertainments to keep people and children occupied over the summer holidays and try and reduce the temptation to travel. Esta organised outdoor public dances at the Ross Bandstand in Princes Street Gardens which were put on for 2 hours every Monday to Friday afternoon, admission 6d on the gate. She herself led off the first dance with the Lord Provost and was a regular attendee, encouraging and cajoling shy young men to get themselves a partner and join in.

Wartime dancing at the Ross Bandstand in 1945. Evening News photo, from “Living Memories” by Jennifer Veitch

There was more dancing organised by Esta Henry in 1943, as well as cycle racing at Meadowbank, mass picnics for mothers and children and – as Baths & Washhouses Committee Convenor – she arranged for Portobello outdoor swimming pool to be re-opened (some of its machinery had been removed for war use and the rest had fallen into disrepair) so that charity swimming and water polo galas could be held (the awards being more Esta Henry Cups). This also meant children and youths could go swimming in the holidays again – she was well aware that with many fathers away on service and mothers occupied with war work at home, juvenile delinquency as a result of bored children being left to their own devices was a real problem. At the end of that year she spoke at a meeting to form the East Edinburgh Anti-Fascist Committe when it was announced that British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Moseley had been released from jail.

In 1944 she instituted a scheme whereby service personnel in the city and groups of school children were invited to the City Chambers to attend meetings of the Town Councils as her guest. They watched the proceedings and afterwards could question her and other members about the mechanics of local government; she wanted to show how the Home Front was functioning, to connect people with the municipal authorities and to raise awareness of the acute difficulties faced by it at this time. That summer she pressed the Corporation to make the city’s now unnecessary civil defence resources available to house evacuee children from London in the face of the new V1 and later V2 terror bombing. Although the idea garnered wide support it ultimately came to nothing and she would latter press the city to instead give away its accumulated surplus of bunk beds, mattresses and blankets for free to those in need.

With the end of the war finally coming into sight she now turned her attention to the post war prospects. With the Rev. Selby Weight of Canongate Kirk she held public meetings for the Canongate Welcome Home Service Fund to plan for the reintegration of demobbed service personnel and provide comforts and necessities for them and their families. She joined the local Women for Westminster branch to try and get a woman MP elected for the city and repeatedly went on the record that providing for youths and children had to be central to the city’s postwar planning and foresaw the coming housing crisis in the Old Town (it had of course always been there to an extent, but it was about to get very acute). “My slogan is houses and more houses – housing priority!” she said, but she was also clear that it had to be done by reconstruction of existing communities, not by swinging the wrecking ball and scattering them to all the corners of the city. She also took a great interest in Portobello and joined a local campaign to improve the district after the war. Always one to put her money where her mouth was, at her own expense she commissioned plans and artists’ impressions for a scheme to turn “Edinburgh’s ugly sister” into a fashionable new sea-side resort and Garden City. This wasn’t just pie-in-the-sky thinking, she successfully proposed it to the city authorities who had it approved by the Lord Provost’s Committee and included in Sir Patrick Abercrombie’s 1949 “Plan for the City and Royal Burgh of Edinburgh” (you will find it on page 69 in glorious technicolour but with little additional detail). The realities of postwar economics and political priorities meant however that it would never get beyond the pages of that work.

Artist’s impression of Esta Henry’s scheme for post-war Portobello. Evening News, September 18th 1945

As the war drew to its close Esta found time to join yet one more committee, that of the League of Angry Wives. These were Scottish women who had married American servicemen and as “G.I. brides” wanted the right to join their husbands in that country. A resolution was passed and representations were sent directly to President Truman – by letter – and the First Lady – by telegram. A week later, Esta henry defended her seat, which she had now held for 9 years, at the ballot box but the winds of political change blew hard and she was comprehensively defeated by Labour candidates. This was despite her being presented with a pair of boxing gloves by her supporters and urged to “go on fighting“. After further defeats at the 1946 and 1947 elections she stepped back finally from politics, but not from life!

Esta Henry addresses the League of Angry Wives, Daily Record, October 29th 1945

In 1946 and 1947 she was a key organiser with the Scottish Housewives Association in an Edinburgh and Fife-based campaign against bread rationing. This culminated in her and Janet Neish of Kirkcaldy chasing the Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade out of the North British Hotel and across the street to his car as he sought to avoid the combined fury of their sharp tongues! Never one to turn down a committee, she was also elected as the President of the Edinburgh branch of that organisation. 1947 had however started on a sad note for her as Jack Henry finally succumbed to long-term heart disease, leaving her a widow. It was around this time that the house at Marchdyke was sold. But Esta showed no signs of retiring from life to mourn and threw herself instead to yet another new activity; women’s football. She became the director of the Edinburgh Lady Dynamos, a team formed from core members of successful pre-war teams when the women’s game had enjoyed a brief spell of public popularity. Donating another Esta Henry Trophy to the cause it was likely that she paid for their kits too and she could be relied upon to turn her formidable oratory power at the authorities when they refused to allow the women to play in public grounds.

Edinburgh Lady Dynamos football team, late 1940s. CC-by-SA-NC 0084-003, via Edinburgh Collected.
Back row L-R is Esta Henry, Kitty Russell, Betty Rae, Agnes Whitelaw, Theresa Mulvie, goalkeeper Jessie Baillie, Nan Laurie, Babs McWhinney and Walter Caesar. Front row L-R is Eleanor Wilson, Betty Davidson (?), Linda Clements, Mary Leslie, Bet Adamson.

She had long been a local celebrity but in the year 1953, Esta Henry’s reputation went national on two accounts. Around the 27th of December 1952, a well dressed man entered her shop on the High Street and introduced himself as a Belgian art dealer, Paul Eugene Dillin. The pair quickly struck up a rapport and he soon confided in her that his identity was a front; he was actually a stateless Romanian Jew by the name of Pinchas Haimovici and had spent two and a half years in hiding in the Netherlands during the war. As he refused to sign a national oath pledging himself to Communism he was exiled from his country of birth and had no papers. It was at the recommendation of the renowned sculptor Benno Schotz, a prominent member of the Scottish Jewish community and whose wife came from the same village as him, that he had come to Edinburgh seeking art. Esta fell in love with the man then and there, despite an age gap of 21 years between them, and proposed to him on the condition that he took the name Henry. When he accepted she threw his fake passport on the fire and urged him to turn himself in and seek asylum so that they could be legally wed.

Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

Esta perhaps imagined naïvely that her reputation and connections would make it a mere formality and booked the couple a honeymoon trip to Madeira. However when the police were invited to the shop they instead charged Pinchas with offences for landing illegally in the country on false papers under the Aliens Act 1920 and he was sent to Saughton Prison. On December 31st he pled guilty at the Sheriff Court in Edinburgh and was remanded for sentencing, which was deferred to give his solicitor a chance to arrange an application for Israeli papers and asylum so that he could travel there instead of being deported. After the hearing, Esta told the waiting reporters that she still intended to marry her “Prince Paul” (Paul Haemovitz was another alias he had used) but that she was going to go on the Honeymoon trip to Maderia anyway by herself as the stress of events would otherwise give her a stroke; the reporter noted that she was smoking at the time and confided she had smoked 100 already that day. The case rumbled on and on, the Israelis were being slow with the papers as apparently there was another Pinchas Haimovici on an Interpol watch-list, despite this being a common name in Romania, and he had to prove it was not him. The Sheriff in Edinburgh grew tired of the repeated delays and on March 13th 1953 he ordered Pinchas’ release. But no sooner had he left the courtroom than he found himself re-arrested; the Home Secretary Sir David Maxwell Fyfe had finally signed a deportation order for him and he was sent straight back to Saughton. Esta told a waiting reporter from the Daily Mirror that if he was to be deported to Romania then she would join him there; “I’m only seventy, and fit enough to crash any of Stalin’s curtains”.

Pinchas petitioned the High Court in Edinburgh to avoid deportation and his case was heard on April 10th. As a declared anti-communist he told the court that he faced “torture and death” if returned to Romania. He also asked leave from court to marry Esta (who waved the papers she had ready to the court), but this request and his protests over his captivity fell on deaf ears and the case was adjourned. Back to Saughton Prison he went were Esta, with her lawyer Lionel Daiches, continued to visit him and made a habit of finding her way uninvited into the Governor’s office to protest more directly. The case was now being reported across the national and regional British newspapers and had become quite embarrassing for the Government. And so it was that the Home Secretary cancelled his previous order and on Friday 24th April 1953 Pinchas Haimovici was released and met by Esta with a pony and trap to drive him home and a brass band she had hired to serenade his freedom. The couple announced that they were to be married on the Monday morning and after a brief registry office ceremony, so they were. Esta insisted that they returned immediately to the shop to re-open for business but outside they were met by an immense crowd of well-wishers who lifted her into the air as they cheered for her and her husband. She lost her shoes in the process and the police had to attend to find the couple a path through the throng.

Esta and Pinchas are met by jubilant crowds of well-wishers in Hunter Square after their marriage. Daily Mirror, April 28th 1953

The crowd followed them all the way back to the shop where they posed for the press and thanked their well-wishers while Esta fumbled through the 20 different keys she kept for the various locks on the premises. They were back behind the counter and at work within an hour of their ceremony starting. The next day they took a taxi out to Saughton Prison and thanked the warders with wedding cake and champagne, Pinchas let the press know that they had treated him very kindly. A few days later he formally changed his name to Paul Henry in line with Esta’s prenuptial wishes.

Pinchas and Esta re-open the shop after wedding, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

To celebrate their union and to thank Benno Schotz for helping bring them together they commissioned him to produce a brass bust of them. Schotz insisted that Pinchas should be holding something in his hand and, knowing that Esta was immensely fond of rings, designed an Adam & Eve ring for the purpose. The finished work was unveiled to mark their first wedding anniversary as the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy on Princes Street.

Unveiling the bust with Benno Schotz, 23rd April 1954. Paul is holding the ring in his hand.

Returning to the events of 1953, it was while her Prince Paul was still incarcerated that the other event took place that garnered national reporting for Esta; she was robbed! Perhaps she had been distracted by the events surrounding Paul’s case, but she allowed herself to be taken in by a group of well-organised confidence tricksters posing as American buyers. Having taken the time and effort to establish her routines and build up a rapport with her, they arranged a distraction and took their chance to steal jewellery that she valued at £20,000 from a lock box, £320 and $600 in cash and the pass books for her life savings. Esta told the press that amongst the items stolen was an amethyst fob which had once been part of the Hungarian crown jewels. Bits and pieces of the loot turned up in sale rooms afterwards and she was forced to buy them back at half of what the other dealer had paid for them; she was not impressed. The police eventually caught up with her trio of robbers due to their amateurish attempts to pass her stolen valuables off to on an antique dealer for far less than their actual worth. Roy Fontaine got 4 years for theft, Arthur Wooton 3 years for reset and George Ross-Wham had already been jailed on a separate offence by the time his sentencing came up. Fontaine was a career jewel thief, confidence trickster and blackmailer but Esta had found him charming and visited him in jail. She left money for him to try and start up a better life after he was released. This he tried, but it was not to be. It turned out that she may have gotten off lightly from Fontaine’s gang; he was actually the Glaswegian Archibald Hall who gained notoriety some 20 years later as a serial killer who the press dubbed the Monster Butler. His modus operandi was robbing and killing wealthy elderly and high-profile clients that he had worked his charm on to gain work as a butler. He was sentenced to life without parole in 1978.

Archibald Hall being taken to Jail, Daily Record, May 1978

Esta Henry would have one last high-profile adventure before settling down to a quieter married life keeping shop with Paul. In 1954 the Egyptian Junta let it be known that they were auctioning off part of the personal collection of art and objets accumulated by the now deposed King Farouk at the state’s expense. She told the press she was determined to bag herself a bargain and flew to Cairo to the auction at the Koubbeh Palace; they were there at Turnhouse Airport to wave her off. In Egypt, when the Sotheby’s auctioneer initially announced the lots only in French and Arabic she interrupted to protest – “English was good enough for Shakespeare, it should be good enough for these people”. He yielded to her request and began to also announce the lots in English. She next stopped proceedings to ask an Egyptian army major to bring her some tea; tea was brought. When asked not to smoke she refused and instead asked for one of King Farouk’s diamond-studded, gold ashtrays – an auction lot – be brought to her.

Esta Henry, glasses in hand, berates the auctioneer yet again. The other bidders seem much amused. Sphere, 20th March 1954

She eventually brought the proceedings into complete farce by repeatedly protesting when, at the behest of the Egyptian organisers, multiple auction lots were withdrawn, joint lots were split up and opening bids were significantly above the catalogue reserve price. The other bidders, and indeed the Sotheby’s auctioneers, were actually on her side – they too were less than impressed with how the sale was being conducted. When she eventually walked out, labelling the Egyptians “a bunch of twisters”, a number of fellow dealers followed her out. She was chased into the car park by the auctioneer and a senior Egyptian officer who begged her to return. Realising she had made her point, she acquiesced, and went back into the sale room where she publicly hugged and kissed the astonished auctioneer. She now stopped making a nuisance of herself and got down to the business of buying, eventually spending some £15,000 (c. £360,000 in 2025). She allowed herself one last moment of pantomime when, outbid on a 16th century Scottish clock, did jump up, grab the item from the auctioneer’s desk and announce to all that it was Scottish, she was Scottish and “I am going to have it!”. Her delighted fellow buyers let her have it. When she returned home, the gossip columnists and society magazines were waiting and she told them she was left with only the 2/6d in her pocket having spent the rest in Egypt. Her treasures arrived at the end of the following month, and she was met by both the press and by Customs to assess the haul.

Esta and Paul Henry demonstrate one of the Egyptian auction items to a customs officer and the press. Sunday Post, 2nd May 1954

Esta and Paul Henry spent a happy decade together behind the counter at 51 High Street surrounded by the antiques and art that had brought them together. Esta through numerous exhibitions at Moubray House and contributed rare pieces to others. She began to form plans to perhaps leave the house and the best parts of her collection to the nation. In 1960 a fellow Edinburgh antique dealer told the press that they probably had the best collection in the country inside their shop. For their 10th wedding anniversary the couple decided to take a long overdue honeymoon and booked a round the world trip, perhaps to acquire yet more pieces or perhaps with a view to scouting out somewhere warm to retire to.

Copy of Esta Henry’s entry card into Brazil, issued by the Consul General in London on 10th December 1962

It was for this reason that they were in Sao Paulo, en route to Rio de Janiero on January 15th when Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Flight 144 came down shortly after takeoff, killing them both. The long reign of the Queen of the High Street was over and the Brazilian authorities had her buried together with her Prince in Sao Paulo. Back home her vast collection of treasure that formed the bulk of her estate was split up and sold off. Her shop became home to a succession of trinket and tourist businesses but her flat above fared better, remaining in the care of the Cockburn association before being restored by a wealthy American benefactor and in 2012 gifted to the nation under the care of Historic Environment Scotland.

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The thread about Esta Henry; the life and times of the Queen of the High Street

On this day (January 15th) in 1963, a small silver airliner with 45 people on board took off from Sao Paulo in Brazil en route for Rio de Janeiro. Moments later it plunged into the ground in the city’s suburbs, taking with it 13 lives. The last victim to be identified was that of Esta Henry, a renowned and somewhat eccentric Edinburgh antiques dealer; her husband Paul was at her side and perished too. Thus ended the final chapter in the colourful life of the lady the papers called the Queen of the High Street. Her surprising story now follows.

Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Convair 340 aircraft, registration PP-CDW, the plane that crashed in January 1963. CC-by Smithsonian Institution

She was born Esther Louis on July 3rd 1882 in Sunderland, County Durham, to Louie Louis and his wife Eveline (née Jackson). Her parents were Jewish, her father a 1st generation Prussian immigrant and her mother 2nd generation to Dutch and German parents. Like many Jews in Britain at this time, to integrate and protect themselves somewhat from anti-Semitism, they altered their names; Louie and Evelina were thus better known as John and Eva. He worked variously as a cobbler, a clothier and an auctioneer and the family moved frequently with his work between Sunderland and Scotland. The family moved to 2 Jane Street in Leith in 1884 where Louie opened an auction room in the Kirkgate. Alas tragedy was to strike the following year. When Esta was just 2 her father died from fever and pneumonia leaving his wife with 7 hungry mouths to feed and another on the way.

Esta’s immediate family tree.

Evelina and her entourage of children gravitated back to Wearside where she remarried in 1889 to Charles Goldman, a pawnbroker. Four half-siblings to Esta would follow and at the time of the 1891 census the enlarged family stayed in a small but prim end-terraced house at 4 Sorley Street in Sunderland. In her own telling of her story at this age the 9 year old Esta ran off to variously Edinburgh or Leith and sold door-to-door by barrow or bicycle to eke out a living, but we should take this with a very large pinch of salt as the records contradict the story and she made a habit of tweaking and embellishing tales of her life to suit circumstances. In 1901 they were at 12 Rutland Street in Sunderland, living above the family pawnbrokers. The 18 year old Esta was described as a General Dealer in the census; she was running a corner shop.

Rutland Street, Sunderland, 1929. Number 12, the Goldman shop and house is at the end of the row with the canopy, if you look very closes the pawnbroker’s sign is in the Goldman name. via Sunderland Antiquarian Society

But Esta did not stay put for much longer, by the next year we find her living at 156 Canongate in Edinburgh. Shortly thereafter she married a 25 year old jeweller, Jack H. Henry of 30 Milton Street. But like her Father, Esta’s new husband was using an alias; he was actually born Joseph Henry Abrovich in Łódź, Poland. It suited him to keep details of his past deliberately obscure; he spent his life giving different dates (between 1869-79) and places of birth in official documents and was most frequently recorded as John but sometimes also Jacob. But he married Esta as Jack. His mysteriousness was necessary as he was leading a double life; he was actually a talented concert violinist, a member of the touring orchestra of Polish piano impresario Ignacy Paderewski (who would rise to become Prime Minister of his country). Jack had skipped town in Dublin when on tour in the 1890s in order to avoid returning home to compulsory military service for the Russian Empire. It was also a difficult time for the Polish Jews in general as they faced the Russian Pogroms and waves were emigrating west. Thus he ended up in Scotland; possibly via Glasgow where there were already Abrovichs resident.

“Jack H. Henry.” Juliette Bird, via Ancestry

Esta and Jack settled at the tenement at 170 Canongate and soon opened a jewellery shop below at number 168. They moved into the back of the shop and began to raise a family together. Louis (Lou) was born in 1903, Philip (Philly) in 1904, Herbert (Bertie) in 1906 and Rosa (Rose) in 1908. While the Canongate was a down at heel neighbourhood at the time, one with much slum housing and a largely itinerant population that included many of the city’s poor and immigrants, they were doing well for themselves and advertised for a servant – “apply Mrs Henry” – in the newspapers.

Canongate in the late 19th century. On the left is the tower and clock of the Tolbooth, on the right the distinctive obelisk-topped gate piers of Moray House. The Henry shop and home is the lighter coloured tenement on the right hand side of the street. Beyond is the projecting gable of Huntly House; it is a neighbourhood steeped in Scottish history. Postcard, unknown artist. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

As they prospered, raising 3 children in the back of a shop ceased to be a necessity and they moved to a smart new, end-of-terrace, middle class villa at 1 Lismore Avenue in Willowbrae. It was here in 1918 that their ranks were joined by the birth of Henrietta (Bunty). 1914 saw them relocate the shope up the Royal Mile to number 51 High Street, next to the well know building known as John Knox’s House. This was the ground floor of Moubray House, one of the oldest surviving residential buildings in the city, where Daniel Defoe had once lodged. It had recently been restored by the Cockburn Association and placed in the hands of a trust. Despite raising 4 children, Esta was clearly becoming more involved in the affairs of business as classified adverts are in the name of both her and Jack. By 1920 she is styling herself “Mrs Henry, Antique Dealer” in these.

“Unidentified Man and Children”, Alexander Wilson Hill, c. 1933. This the shop at 51 High Street and it is probably Jack Henry standing outside. CC-by-NC National Galleries Scotland

The 1921 census finds the family have moved on and up in the housing world again, now at a very large villa at 15 Mayfield Terrace in Newington. Louis Henry was following his father into the jewellery trade and Philip was training to become a dentist. Life was good but it was about to get better. In 1923 the Scottish newspapers reported the surprise visit of Queen Mary to the Henrys’ shop, where she spent an hour and bought many items, particularly Chinese curios. She was “greatly interested with both the collection and the premises” and shook hands with Esta and Jack as she left, promising to return. Her Majesty was true to her word and returned exactly one year later, buying “a score of articles” including a Louis XIV fan that had once belonged to Queen Victoria. She signed the visitors’ book and said that her purchases the previous year had been gifted to the West Kensington Museum.

Queen Mary leaving Henry’s on one of her many visits. Postcard, unknown artist. Via Canmore, SC 2649474 © Courtesy HES

The Queen was back again a year later, with over a dozen items bought, including a portrait believed to have been the property of Napoleon. The Henrys were invited to deliver the items in person to Holyroodhouse that afternoon and join the Queen for tea. They learned that some of the purchases were to stay there at the palace as part of its collection. The Queen thereafter returned almost every year on her visits to Holyrood, the newspapers reporting the purchase of items in 1927 and 1930 for Buckingham Palace and her personal collection. Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, Princes Elizabeth (later Queen Elizabeth II) and her sister Queen Margaret would carry on this royal tradition in later years and a whole section of wall in the shop was reserved for the display of their proudly framed cheques.

As the Roaring Twenties came to a close, Esta’s public profile was ascendant but Jack seems to have begun to step back somewhat from the limelight and into the shadows of the shop. In 1928 she stood for election to the Parish Council in the Canongate ward. Although she came second, there were two seats up for grabs and she was duly returned. Her election notices are the first time in print I could find where she is referring to herself as Esta, rather than just Mrs Henry. Her election was notable as she was the first Jewish woman to be elected to a public office in Scotland and also the press referred to her as Councillor Mrs Esta Henry, other married female councillors were referred to by their husband’s name, e.g Councillor Mrs Adam Millar. This is a public demonstration that she was very much her own woman.

Candidate picture of Esta Henry, Evening News, 7th November 1928

The following year civic Parish Councils in Scotland – which existed largely for the purposes of poor relief – were abolished and merged into the Town Councils. Esta stood as an independent for this latter body in 1929 but came 4th behind two Socialists and a Moderate candidate. She would stand again for the Town Council in 1931, 1933 and 1935. She made very clear in her election speeches, which were reported in the press, that her priorities were housing, housewives, child welfare and the treatment of the sick and poor. Women and children were always central to her campaigns and she was known to mobilise squads of them in the Canongate to carry her election materials and to parade around the polling stations. But despite her strenuous campaign efforts on a sensible platform, her public profile and her local popularity, as an independent female candidate she stood little realistic chance of election. Edinburgh was run by the very pale, male and stale Moderates who largely owned the Council’s seats – many of which they didn’t even need to contest – and it was only in a handful of wards where the Socialists could challenge them (to find out more about the political groupings of 20th century Edinburgh and how the election system worked, you can bookmark this thread to read later).

In between election campaigns and royal visits, in 1933 the Henrys commissioned a magnificent L-plan house in a Dutch Cape Colonial style that also incorporated the latest in Moderne tastes. This was Marchdyke at 50 Pentland Terrace on the outskirts of the city’s growing suburbs and it totally eclipsed the monotonous rows of middle class bungalows that were much in favour all around it. Completed in 1935 this 4,000 square foot, 5 bedroom residence featured a Tudorbethan dining room, copious lounge and parlour, a terrazzo bathroom in a Roman style and in the basement a large garage for Jack’s cars, a wine cellar and antiques store. While many of the windows were in an ultra-fashionable fish scale style, the stained glass of the master staircase incorporated original 16th century Swiss and German panes from their collection.

Marchdyke, now known as Huntersmoon. Wilson Property Group, 2022 Property Listing – click here to see an archived copy with the full album of photos.

In the 1935 Town Council election, Esta had come third behind the Socialist Party candidate and another from the Protestant Action Society (PA). This party were extreme anti-Catholics who stood on a platform of “No Popery”. Their leader was the rabble-rouser John Cormack and his political stock was rising at the time. In 1934 his party got just 6% of the popular vote in the Edinburgh municipal elections and 1 seat; in 1935 they got 21% and 3 seats. The exact order of following events are not clear but at the 1936 election Esta was already intending to stand once again on her usual independent platform. John Cormack made it be known in the press that he was inclined to lend his support to her in the Canongate (where many Catholic Irish and Italians lived). Perhaps it was a case of “if you can’t beat them, join them“, but with just a week to go before polling, Esta Henry made the shock announcement that she was now standing as a Protestant Action candidate – “the Only Party who do Not Want R. C. Votes“. So late was this change that even on the eve of election some of the papers still reported her as an independent. She topped the ballot, beating PA’s primary candidate, and was duly elected as a Town Councillor at the 5th attempt. It was a good year for PA, they got 31% of the popular vote and won 6 seats. Indeed it was their apogee and they soon slumped into bitter infighting and electoral obscurity, leaving just John Cormack to solider on for decades as their only councillor.

Election adverts, Evening News, 31st October 1936

It’s never been clear just how committed Esta was to her new found political home – she certainly threw herself into public meetings on its behalf for a while, it being reported that she would stroll up and down the aisle, brandishing her umbrella at the audience. Realistically she may just have been desperate to get elected and chose the only other party than the Progressives (as the Moderates had re-branded) or Socialists with any chance of winning a seat. John Cormack was strongly criticised from within his own ranks for allowing a Jewish woman to stand on his platform – indeed much later in 1952 he organised pickets against her for suggesting public entertainments on Sundays at public meetings. She did not linger too long under his party whip and had resigned before the 1938 elections. She may have been made very uneasy with the association after a tumultuous public meeting in October 1937 in the Canongate Tolbooth. At this, her male PA colleague refused to answer questions directly and instead railed against Catholics to the boos and heckles of the crowd. Esta tried to make clear that she was there to fight the Socialists in politics but the audience deemed her guilty by association and turned on her too. Thereafter, she dedicated herself thereafter to public service for the Canongate in her own name. She would rise to become Convenor of the Baths and Washhouses Committee, a member of the Cleansing and Lighting Committee, the Streets and Buildings Committee and in 1941 was made JP (a Justice of the Peace, a lay magistrate in the lowest level of municipal courts).

Esta Henry commands the floor at a political meeting. Evening News, 8th February 1940

Esta found that her official role as a councillor fitted well alongside her personal philanthropic activities and she long described herself publicly as a Social Worker in the Canongate (although she frequently embellished the timescales somewhat). In 1931 she had formed the Edinburgh United Independent Association in the Canongate to run youth projects and raise money for the city’s Royal Infirmary hospital. Her attitudes were quite progressive and she recognised the need and value for activities and exercise for her district’s youth to keep them from being led astray and getting into trouble and for their general health. She was heavily involved in the Canon Club for Boys and Girls and formed an amateur dramatic society there.

The youth of the Canongate ward is my special care… I want to mother the young people – I have done it all my days – and to impress them with the same spirit that I have myself… Never to let go, to hold on to the good things of life, because they will be rewarded in the end, the same as I have been.

Esta Henry, 1936

She also put her money where her mouth was and provided trophies for local clubs. In 1936 she presented the first of many Esta Henry Cups to the men of the Trinity College and Moray Knox Club on Cranston Street, an organisation formed for unemployed men. It was for the man who scored highest in their games league of dominoes, billiards, draughts and other pastimes with which they occupied their enforced idleness. Another such cup was presented to the local Caledonian Football Club. In November 1937, the Lord Provost gave her a leave of absence from her duties to travel officially to South Africa, where she was to spend two and a half months investigating working class housing and town planning on behalf of the city. He provided her with letters of introduction but they probably weren’t necessary, she apparently owned a fruit farm in the country and her son Phillie had settled there as a dentist! On her return she reported back that she had “travelled many hundreds of miles by air” but that it turned out things in Scotland were far more advanced and better organised for the poor than they were in South Africa! At this time she was also becoming increasingly involved with the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, becoming a local committee member, and in 1939 she and the Lady Provost threw a Christmas dinner for its members in the Canongate Tolbooth.

Esta Henry (2nd left, in the beret) and the Lady Provost give a Christmas Dinner to the elderly of the Canongate in the Tolbooth. Evening News, December 22nd 1939

The year 1939 also brought the clouds of war to the High Street and municipal elections were suspended for the duration. As an incumbent councillor at the end of her 3 year term, Esta would have faced re-election in November that year. She now found herself with an extra six uncontested years added to her term of office and intended to make the most of this chance. She applied her single-minded determination, boundless energy and never-ending appetite for meetings and committees to the task at hand. And so it was that Councillor Esta Henry went to war. Interviewed shortly after the outbreak, she told the People’s Journal that there was no need to conscript women to the war effort as she had not met a woman in Edinburgh “who is not prepared to do whatsoever she is called upon to do“.

People’s Journal, 16th September 1939

One of her first acts, on behalf of the Scottish Old Age Pensioners Association, was to campaign for government allowances for women dependent on the wages of their sons where these men had now been called up. In the Canongate she joined the local ARP (Air Raid Precautions civil defence force), turned her shop basement into an air raid shelter (her name is against it in the Valuation Rolls) and established a corps of 40 local women to act as fire pickets. Later, the Esta Henry Ambulance Section first aiders were also formed. She was soon putting on social events to help finance these activities and found herself placed in charge of the Entertainments Committee of the Lady Provost’s Comforts Fund. This latter organisation started out with the simple of aim of knitting kilt socks for soldiers of the Highland Regiments, as had been done in the 1914-18 conflict. Esta organised bridge parties to raise funds for buying the wool and offered up her house of Marchdyke as a suitable venue. In the Canongate she formed the local women in to work parties in the Tolbooth meeting hall, and arranged free entertainments to keep them amused as they knitted the socks. Soon she was organising mass balls; in February 1940 some 600 dancers packed out the Plaza dancehall in Morningside in a charity gala. At the Eldorado dancehall in Leith though it wasn’t dancing that she put on but boxing, a sport new to her but one that she had fallen in love with. There was nothing that she would not turn her attention to in the name of raising funds; charity auctions, raising pigs and Warship Week where she matched every £1 bond bought at a public rally with £1 of her own.

Esta Henry feeding pigs she was raising for charity sale. Evening News, 26th April 1940

Increasingly in the city centre on her ceaseless war work, getting to and from Marchdyke must have been proving an inconvenience as in 1941 she took possession of the flat in Moubray House above the shop and fitted it out as her own residence. She was also keen to demonstrate that old houses in the High Street could be rehabilitated for use without demolishing them. At the end of that year she paid for 800 local children to go to the cinema as a Hogmanay treat, a special programme being put on for them at the New Palace on the High Street. At the end of this screening she had new years resolutions projected onto the screen and had her audience promise en masse to be good children while their fathers were away and to help contribute to the war effort. 1942 saw the institution of the city Corporation’s Holidays at Home programme; municipal entertainments to keep people and children occupied over the summer holidays and try and reduce the temptation to travel. Esta organised outdoor public dances at the Ross Bandstand in Princes Street Gardens which were put on for 2 hours every Monday to Friday afternoon, admission 6d on the gate. She herself led off the first dance with the Lord Provost and was a regular attendee, encouraging and cajoling shy young men to get themselves a partner and join in.

Wartime dancing at the Ross Bandstand in 1945. Evening News photo, from “Living Memories” by Jennifer Veitch

There was more dancing organised by Esta Henry in 1943, as well as cycle racing at Meadowbank, mass picnics for mothers and children and – as Baths & Washhouses Committee Convenor – she arranged for Portobello outdoor swimming pool to be re-opened (some of its machinery had been removed for war use and the rest had fallen into disrepair) so that charity swimming and water polo galas could be held (the awards being more Esta Henry Cups). This also meant children and youths could go swimming in the holidays again – she was well aware that with many fathers away on service and mothers occupied with war work at home, juvenile delinquency as a result of bored children being left to their own devices was a real problem. At the end of that year she spoke at a meeting to form the East Edinburgh Anti-Fascist Committe when it was announced that British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Moseley had been released from jail.

In 1944 she instituted a scheme whereby service personnel in the city and groups of school children were invited to the City Chambers to attend meetings of the Town Councils as her guest. They watched the proceedings and afterwards could question her and other members about the mechanics of local government; she wanted to show how the Home Front was functioning, to connect people with the municipal authorities and to raise awareness of the acute difficulties faced by it at this time. That summer she pressed the Corporation to make the city’s now unnecessary civil defence resources available to house evacuee children from London in the face of the new V1 and later V2 terror bombing. Although the idea garnered wide support it ultimately came to nothing and she would latter press the city to instead give away its accumulated surplus of bunk beds, mattresses and blankets for free to those in need.

With the end of the war finally coming into sight she now turned her attention to the post war prospects. With the Rev. Selby Weight of Canongate Kirk she held public meetings for the Canongate Welcome Home Service Fund to plan for the reintegration of demobbed service personnel and provide comforts and necessities for them and their families. She joined the local Women for Westminster branch to try and get a woman MP elected for the city and repeatedly went on the record that providing for youths and children had to be central to the city’s postwar planning and foresaw the coming housing crisis in the Old Town (it had of course always been there to an extent, but it was about to get very acute). “My slogan is houses and more houses – housing priority!” she said, but she was also clear that it had to be done by reconstruction of existing communities, not by swinging the wrecking ball and scattering them to all the corners of the city. She also took a great interest in Portobello and joined a local campaign to improve the district after the war. Always one to put her money where her mouth was, at her own expense she commissioned plans and artists’ impressions for a scheme to turn “Edinburgh’s ugly sister” into a fashionable new sea-side resort and Garden City. This wasn’t just pie-in-the-sky thinking, she successfully proposed it to the city authorities who had it approved by the Lord Provost’s Committee and included in Sir Patrick Abercrombie’s 1949 “Plan for the City and Royal Burgh of Edinburgh” (you will find it on page 69 in glorious technicolour but with little additional detail). The realities of postwar economics and political priorities meant however that it would never get beyond the pages of that work.

Artist’s impression of Esta Henry’s scheme for post-war Portobello. Evening News, September 18th 1945

As the war drew to its close Esta found time to join yet one more committee, that of the League of Angry Wives. These were Scottish women who had married American servicemen and as “G.I. brides” wanted the right to join their husbands in that country. A resolution was passed and representations were sent directly to President Truman – by letter – and the First Lady – by telegram. A week later, Esta henry defended her seat, which she had now held for 9 years, at the ballot box but the winds of political change blew hard and she was comprehensively defeated by Labour candidates. This was despite her being presented with a pair of boxing gloves by her supporters and urged to “go on fighting“. After further defeats at the 1946 and 1947 elections she stepped back finally from politics, but not from life!

Esta Henry addresses the League of Angry Wives, Daily Record, October 29th 1945

In 1946 and 1947 she was a key organiser with the Scottish Housewives Association in an Edinburgh and Fife-based campaign against bread rationing. This culminated in her and Janet Neish of Kirkcaldy chasing the Parliamentary Secretary of the Board of Trade out of the North British Hotel and across the street to his car as he sought to avoid the combined fury of their sharp tongues! Never one to turn down a committee, she was also elected as the President of the Edinburgh branch of that organisation. 1947 had however started on a sad note for her as Jack Henry finally succumbed to long-term heart disease, leaving her a widow. It was around this time that the house at Marchdyke was sold. But Esta showed no signs of retiring from life to mourn and threw herself instead to yet another new activity; women’s football. She became the director of the Edinburgh Lady Dynamos, a team formed from core members of successful pre-war teams when the women’s game had enjoyed a brief spell of public popularity. Donating another Esta Henry Trophy to the cause it was likely that she paid for their kits too and she could be relied upon to turn her formidable oratory power at the authorities when they refused to allow the women to play in public grounds.

Edinburgh Lady Dynamos football team, late 1940s. CC-by-SA-NC 0084-003, via Edinburgh Collected.
Back row L-R is Esta Henry, Kitty Russell, Betty Rae, Agnes Whitelaw, Theresa Mulvie, goalkeeper Jessie Baillie, Nan Laurie, Babs McWhinney and Walter Caesar. Front row L-R is Eleanor Wilson, Betty Davidson (?), Linda Clements, Mary Leslie, Bet Adamson.

She had long been a local celebrity but in the year 1953, Esta Henry’s reputation went national on two accounts. Around the 27th of December 1952, a well dressed man entered her shop on the High Street and introduced himself as a Belgian art dealer, Paul Eugene Dillin. The pair quickly struck up a rapport and he soon confided in her that his identity was a front; he was actually a stateless Romanian Jew by the name of Pinchas Haimovici and had spent two and a half years in hiding in the Netherlands during the war. As he refused to sign a national oath pledging himself to Communism he was exiled from his country of birth and had no papers. It was at the recommendation of the renowned sculptor Benno Schotz, a prominent member of the Scottish Jewish community and whose wife came from the same village as him, that he had come to Edinburgh seeking art. Esta fell in love with the man then and there, despite an age gap of 21 years between them, and proposed to him on the condition that he took the name Henry. When he accepted she threw his fake passport on the fire and urged him to turn himself in and seek asylum so that they could be legally wed.

Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953Pinchas and Esta, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

Esta perhaps imagined naïvely that her reputation and connections would make it a mere formality and booked the couple a honeymoon trip to Madeira. However when the police were invited to the shop they instead charged Pinchas with offences for landing illegally in the country on false papers under the Aliens Act 1920 and he was sent to Saughton Prison. On December 31st he pled guilty at the Sheriff Court in Edinburgh and was remanded for sentencing, which was deferred to give his solicitor a chance to arrange an application for Israeli papers and asylum so that he could travel there instead of being deported. After the hearing, Esta told the waiting reporters that she still intended to marry her “Prince Paul” (Paul Haemovitz was another alias he had used) but that she was going to go on the Honeymoon trip to Maderia anyway by herself as the stress of events would otherwise give her a stroke; the reporter noted that she was smoking at the time and confided she had smoked 100 already that day. The case rumbled on and on, the Israelis were being slow with the papers as apparently there was another Pinchas Haimovici on an Interpol watch-list, despite this being a common name in Romania, and he had to prove it was not him. The Sheriff in Edinburgh grew tired of the repeated delays and on March 13th 1953 he ordered Pinchas’ release. But no sooner had he left the courtroom than he found himself re-arrested; the Home Secretary Sir David Maxwell Fyfe had finally signed a deportation order for him and he was sent straight back to Saughton. Esta told a waiting reporter from the Daily Mirror that if he was to be deported to Romania then she would join him there; “I’m only seventy, and fit enough to crash any of Stalin’s curtains”.

Pinchas petitioned the High Court in Edinburgh to avoid deportation and his case was heard on April 10th. As a declared anti-communist he told the court that he faced “torture and death” if returned to Romania. He also asked leave from court to marry Esta (who waved the papers she had ready to the court), but this request and his protests over his captivity fell on deaf ears and the case was adjourned. Back to Saughton Prison he went were Esta, with her lawyer Lionel Daiches, continued to visit him and made a habit of finding her way uninvited into the Governor’s office to protest more directly. The case was now being reported across the national and regional British newspapers and had become quite embarrassing for the Government. And so it was that the Home Secretary cancelled his previous order and on Friday 24th April 1953 Pinchas Haimovici was released and met by Esta with a pony and trap to drive him home and a brass band she had hired to serenade his freedom. The couple announced that they were to be married on the Monday morning and after a brief registry office ceremony, so they were. Esta insisted that they returned immediately to the shop to re-open for business but outside they were met by an immense crowd of well-wishers who lifted her into the air as they cheered for her and her husband. She lost her shoes in the process and the police had to attend to find the couple a path through the throng.

Esta and Pinchas are met by jubilant crowds of well-wishers in Hunter Square after their marriage. Daily Mirror, April 28th 1953

The crowd followed them all the way back to the shop where they posed for the press and thanked their well-wishers while Esta fumbled through the 20 different keys she kept for the various locks on the premises. They were back behind the counter and at work within an hour of their ceremony starting. The next day they took a taxi out to Saughton Prison and thanked the warders with wedding cake and champagne, Pinchas let the press know that they had treated him very kindly. A few days later he formally changed his name to Paul Henry in line with Esta’s prenuptial wishes.

Pinchas and Esta re-open the shop after wedding, Associated Press, 27th April 1953

To celebrate their union and to thank Benno Schotz for helping bring them together they commissioned him to produce a brass bust of them. Schotz insisted that Pinchas should be holding something in his hand and, knowing that Esta was immensely fond of rings, designed an Adam & Eve ring for the purpose. The finished work was unveiled to mark their first wedding anniversary as the centrepiece of an exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy on Princes Street.

Unveiling the bust with Benno Schotz, 23rd April 1954. Paul is holding the ring in his hand.

Returning to the events of 1953, it was while her Prince Paul was still incarcerated that the other event took place that garnered national reporting for Esta; she was robbed! Perhaps she had been distracted by the events surrounding Paul’s case, but she allowed herself to be taken in by a group of well-organised confidence tricksters posing as American buyers. Having taken the time and effort to establish her routines and build up a rapport with her, they arranged a distraction and took their chance to steal jewellery that she valued at £20,000 from a lock box, £320 and $600 in cash and the pass books for her life savings. Esta told the press that amongst the items stolen was an amethyst fob which had once been part of the Hungarian crown jewels. Bits and pieces of the loot turned up in sale rooms afterwards and she was forced to buy them back at half of what the other dealer had paid for them; she was not impressed. The police eventually caught up with her trio of robbers due to their amateurish attempts to pass her stolen valuables off to on an antique dealer for far less than their actual worth. Roy Fontaine got 4 years for theft, Arthur Wooton 3 years for reset and George Ross-Wham had already been jailed on a separate offence by the time his sentencing came up. Fontaine was a career jewel thief, confidence trickster and blackmailer but Esta had found him charming and visited him in jail. She left money for him to try and start up a better life after he was released. This he tried, but it was not to be. It turned out that she may have gotten off lightly from Fontaine’s gang; he was actually the Glaswegian Archibald Hall who gained notoriety some 20 years later as a serial killer who the press dubbed the Monster Butler. His modus operandi was robbing and killing wealthy elderly and high-profile clients that he had worked his charm on to gain work as a butler. He was sentenced to life without parole in 1978.

Archibald Hall being taken to Jail, Daily Record, May 1978

Esta Henry would have one last high-profile adventure before settling down to a quieter married life keeping shop with Paul. In 1954 the Egyptian Junta let it be known that they were auctioning off part of the personal collection of art and objets accumulated by the now deposed King Farouk at the state’s expense. She told the press she was determined to bag herself a bargain and flew to Cairo to the auction at the Koubbeh Palace; they were there at Turnhouse Airport to wave her off. In Egypt, when the Sotheby’s auctioneer initially announced the lots only in French and Arabic she interrupted to protest – “English was good enough for Shakespeare, it should be good enough for these people”. He yielded to her request and began to also announce the lots in English. She next stopped proceedings to ask an Egyptian army major to bring her some tea; tea was brought. When asked not to smoke she refused and instead asked for one of King Farouk’s diamond-studded, gold ashtrays – an auction lot – be brought to her.

Esta Henry, glasses in hand, berates the auctioneer yet again. The other bidders seem much amused. Sphere, 20th March 1954

She eventually brought the proceedings into complete farce by repeatedly protesting when, at the behest of the Egyptian organisers, multiple auction lots were withdrawn, joint lots were split up and opening bids were significantly above the catalogue reserve price. The other bidders, and indeed the Sotheby’s auctioneers, were actually on her side – they too were less than impressed with how the sale was being conducted. When she eventually walked out, labelling the Egyptians “a bunch of twisters”, a number of fellow dealers followed her out. She was chased into the car park by the auctioneer and a senior Egyptian officer who begged her to return. Realising she had made her point, she acquiesced, and went back into the sale room where she publicly hugged and kissed the astonished auctioneer. She now stopped making a nuisance of herself and got down to the business of buying, eventually spending some £15,000 (c. £360,000 in 2025). She allowed herself one last moment of pantomime when, outbid on a 16th century Scottish clock, did jump up, grab the item from the auctioneer’s desk and announce to all that it was Scottish, she was Scottish and “I am going to have it!”. Her delighted fellow buyers let her have it. When she returned home, the gossip columnists and society magazines were waiting and she told them she was left with only the 2/6d in her pocket having spent the rest in Egypt. Her treasures arrived at the end of the following month, and she was met by both the press and by Customs to assess the haul.

Esta and Paul Henry demonstrate one of the Egyptian auction items to a customs officer and the press. Sunday Post, 2nd May 1954

Esta and Paul Henry spent a happy decade together behind the counter at 51 High Street surrounded by the antiques and art that had brought them together. Esta through numerous exhibitions at Moubray House and contributed rare pieces to others. She began to form plans to perhaps leave the house and the best parts of her collection to the nation. In 1960 a fellow Edinburgh antique dealer told the press that they probably had the best collection in the country inside their shop. For their 10th wedding anniversary the couple decided to take a long overdue honeymoon and booked a round the world trip, perhaps to acquire yet more pieces or perhaps with a view to scouting out somewhere warm to retire to.

Copy of Esta Henry’s entry card into Brazil, issued by the Consul General in London on 10th December 1962

It was for this reason that they were in Sao Paulo, en route to Rio de Janiero on January 15th when Serviços Aéreos Cruzeiro do Sul Flight 144 came down shortly after takeoff, killing them both. The long reign of the Queen of the High Street was over and the Brazilian authorities had her buried together with her Prince in Sao Paulo. Back home her vast collection of treasure that formed the bulk of her estate was split up and sold off. Her shop became home to a succession of trinket and tourist businesses but her flat above fared better, remaining in the care of the Cockburn association before being restored by a wealthy American benefactor and in 2012 gifted to the nation under the care of Historic Environment Scotland.

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