Corner of Stockwell St and Bridgegate. January 1977
Stockwell St, west side south of the Bridgegate. Next to the Old Scotia is the former Metropole Theatre. It started in 1862 as the Scotia Theatre (Stan Laurel's father was the manager in the early days), changed its name in 1897, and was gutted by fire in 1961. November 1973
Rear of the warehouse at 130 Clyde St. In that year [1806] Allan Dreghorn's nephew and heir, Robert Dreghorn of Ruchill, better known as "Bob Dragon," and celebrated for his peculiarities of feature, person, and habits, took his life with his own hand within the walls of his town house. For that reason the mansion, which forms the back part of a furniture warehouse at No. 20 Great Clyde Street [later 130 Clyde St], was for many years reputed to be haunted—a sad sequel to the story of the brilliant craftsman and architect to whose genius the city owes the beauty of St. Andrew's Church. Regrettably I never made any effort to see inside the warehouse - did anyone else? With the adjoining tenements it was swept away for the Carrick Quay development. May 1974
Stockwell St, west side south of the Trongate. Utterly changed now. August 1973
The little building with the three half-dormers deserved to be better known and to meet a kinder fate, for being dated 1678 it was the second oldest house in the city, after Provand’s Lordship. Probably part of a larger town house erected by a wealthy merchant, it spent most of the 19th century and part of the 20th as the Garrick Temperance Hotel, and as such it earned a small but honourable footnote in history as the meeting place of the Abolitionist party at a time when the abolition of slavery was a contentious issue in the city - much of Glasgow’s wealth was founded on slave labour. Latterly the building was neglected, and its last owner made repeated unsuccessful applications to have it demolished , until one night it conveniently - woops, I mean unfortunately - caught fire and was flattened a few days later.
Stockwell St and Argyle St. There was much building around here in the later decades of the 18th century, unplanned but harmonious, of simple dignified four-storey tenements, and this corner block, its neighbour, and the one further down Argyle St were among the few that remained. They didn’t survive much longer. October 1973
The plain building next to the Royal Bank is worth noting, for it was Spreull’s Land, and had a curious origin. The previous house on the site, which adjoined the original Hutchesons’ Hospital, belonged to Margaret Spreull, born in 1700, the daughter of John Spreull, a man of affairs better remembered as Bass John from the years he spent imprisoned on the Bass Rock, having backed the Covenanters at Bothwell Bridge. Margaret, a spinster and the last of her line, wishing to perpetuate the family name bequeathed the house to her nephew James Shortridge, with an entail stipulating that if he wished to inherit he must change his name to Spreull. This he did on her death in 1784, and he immediately pulled down the old house and erected the fine building which became known as Spreull’s Land. A letting concern, as James already had a villa at Linthouse, it commanded a good rent and was for half a century one of the smartest addresses in town.
A cloud of dust is all that’s left of Spreull’s Land. August 1978
North side of the Trongate, opposite the New Wynd. The further, Italianate building survives, but not the nearer tenement of c1800. August 1973
North side of the Trongate, opposite the New Wynd. Architecture of Glasgow, by Gomme and Walker, was published in 1968 and remains the most authoritative general work on the subject, so for many years I thought that this was Spreull’s Land, as the map at the back of the book places it here. Other sources make it clear that this was a mistake. August 1973
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