Glencairn House is at the centre of controversy at the moment because West Dunbartonshire Council have decided to use UK government “levelling up” money – a cool £8.5 million – to create a museum and library there instead of creating a new town centre.
Glencairn House has been known by a variety of names: Glencairn House, The Greit House, Argyll’s Lodging, Garshake House, and The Barracks.
Dumbarton in the 17th century was still a very small town and the High Street was still its main thoroughfare. The south side of the High Street, closest to the river, remained favoured by merchants and residents.
A number of lairds had townhouses in the High Street – MacFarlane of Arrochar, Colquhoun of Luss, Darleith of Darleith and the Smollett family all had residences not far from the Mercat Cross.
One of these townhouses, Glencairn House, is the oldest surviving building in Dumbarton. It was built in 1623 for the 7th Earl of Glencairn, James Cunningham (1552 – 1630) ,who was a Scottish peer. The Glencairns were a branch of the Cunningham family and originated from Ayrshire. They also owned lands elsewhere, including Gartocharn.
James Cunningham was a Privy Councillor to King James VI of Scotland when the King was developing Dumbarton as a shipbuilding and outfitting base for his new navy.
Cunningham’s descendants included William Cunningham, 8th Earl of Glencairn (1575 –1630) and William Cunningham, 9th Earl of Glencairn (1610 – 1664), a Scottish nobleman, Lord Chancellor of Scotland and Chancellor of the University of Glasgow from 1660. It is possible all three Earls spent time at Glencairn House.
Glencairn House faced the Cross Vennel opposite the Tollbooth and almost certainly stood on the site of earlier town dwellings built of timber, wattle and daub, perhaps with thatched roofs.
The residential apartments were reached by stone steps to the first floor level and access to the rear of the tenement was through a round, arched pend. The earliest mention of Glencairn House in the Burgh Records was in 1631 when John Semphill of Aitkenbar, as proprietor, arrested the goods of the Earl of Glencairn for the payment of £12 10s for 2 years rent.
To this day the upper storeys of Glencairn House retain many 17th century architectural features including crow stepped gables (only now at the west end) and extensive decorative stonework. After 1780 skylights were added which contained glass manufactured in the Dumbarton Glassworks .
Glencairn House was later occupied by the Dukes of Argyll although no date is given for their occupancy. The house provided them with a power base throughout the 18th century when they had business in the town.
The 3rd Duke of Argyll born in 1682 was Governor of Dumbarton Castle and the Argyll faction at this time controlled the Dumbarton Town Council.
Robert Burns, pictured right, visited Glencairn House when he stayed in Dumbarton to receive his Burgess ticket on the 29th June 1787, which granted him the Freedom of the Burgh of Dumbarton.Glencairn House had various owners after the Dukes of Argyll. By the end of the 18th century the house was the property of a James Donaldson who owned land at Garshake and Overtoun. Donaldson, then the Town Clerk, renamed the house Garshake House.
Early in the 1800s Dr Walter Colquhoun and his brother Robert owned either the whole or a portion of the building. After their deaths the property belonged to John Colquhoun, a writer, who was a nephew of the deceased brothers.
The latter half of the century saw Glencairn House decline. By the 1880s, as shown in the William Blain who is photographed above, the Dumbarton fish market had opened on the ground floor while the upper floors had been subdivided and let to tenants.
The recessed area in front of the building became a place for collecting and disseminating information. Proclamations were read from the steps, bill posters were displayed and religious meetings took place in front of the building.
In 1908 a joiner named William Brown owned the ground floor of the building while a Mr W.F. Bannatyne who lived in New Zealand owned the upper floors.
By 1918 the building had become derelict and was bought by Peter Thomson, a Dumbarton blacksmith. He later sold it to the town council for £600 in 1923.
Over the next two years Glencairn House was refurbished. The stone steps at the front and its tall chimneys were removed. The ground floor was remodelled with arches to match the shape of the Quay Pend and to house a new gas showroom. The letters DGC in the mosaic floored entrance were laid in around 1924/5 and stand for Dumbarton Gas Committee or Corporation.
In 1926 the building reopened with gas showrooms on the ground floor and the town’s health department, sanitary inspector and medical officer of health in offices on the upper floors.
In later years Glencairn House was occupied by the Health Office and by 2001 the West Dunbartonshire Council Social Work Department were housed in the building. It currently stands empty, but a proposed regeneration project could see the building transformed into a new library and museum facility at the centre of the town.
A whale washed up on the shore of the River Clyde below Brucehill was brought to the fish market to be sold there.