Addiewell, a manufacturing village in West Calder parish, Edinburghshire, on the verge of the county, near the Cleland branch of the Caledonian railway, 1½ mile WSW of West Calder. It has a post office under Midcalder, railway connection with the Caledonian, and a Church of Scotland mission station. Founded about 1866 in connection with great chemical works, it comprises a great number of factory buildings, retort sheds, etc.: and it looks like an assemblage of numerous factories and their appurtenances for a diversity of purposes. The works cover 70 acres, produce vast quantities of paraffin oil, naphtha, paraffin candles, and ammonia, and serve also as auxiliaries to the great chemical works in the vicinity of Bathgate. A public school, with accommodation for 327 children, had (1879) an average attendance of 274, and a grant of £251, 6s. Pop. (1881) 1819.
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