Marchmont House

A historical perspective, drawn from the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland: A Survey of Scottish Topography, Statistical, Biographical and Historical, edited by Francis H. Groome and originally published in parts by Thomas C. Jack, Grange Publishing Works, Edinburgh between 1882 and 1885.

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Marchmont House, a mansion in Polwarth parish, Berwickshire, ¾ mile SW of Marchmont station on the Berwickshire loop-line of the North British, this being 3¾ miles NE of Greenlaw and 3¾ SW of the post-town Duns. It is the seat of Sir Hugh Hume-Campbell, seventh Bart. since 1665 (b. 1812; suc. 1833), who holds 20,180 acres in the shire, valued at £17, 977 per annum. His father, Sir William Purves, inherited the property from his great-uncle, the third and last Earl of Marchmont (1708-94), whose ancestors, the Humes, possessed the lands of Polwarth for three centuries. The most famous of them, Sir Patrick Hume (1641-1724), distinguished as a patriot and statesman, was created Lord Polwarth in 1690 and Earl of Marchmont in 1697. (See Harden.) The mansion was built about 1754 by the last Earl to supersede Redbraes Castle, situated 200 yards to the E. A semi-Palladian edifice, from designs by the celebrated Robert Adam, it stands in a large and finely-wooded park, whose trees, however, suffered great damage from the gale of 14 Oct. 1881, when the majestic beech avenue, nearly 1 mile long and 100 yards broad, was wrecked.—Ord. Sur., sh. 25, 1865.

An accompanying 19th C. Ordnance Survey map is available, or use the map tab to the right of this page.

Note: This text has been made available using a process of scanning and optical character recognition. Despite manual checking, some typographical errors may remain. Please remember this description dates from the 1880s; names may have changed, administrative divisions will certainly be different and there are known to be occasional errors of fact in the original text, which we have not corrected because we wish to maintain its integrity. This information is provided subject to our standard disclaimer