Auchindrain Township

A quick reminder that we are currently recruiting for Visitor Services posts at Auchindrain. Full and part time, year-round and seasonal options are available. For details and an application form, please email recruitment@auchindrain.org.uk. Closing date is 17th June.

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Now that the Scouts have departed the next step is to wash and sort all of our finds. The amount of pottery and glass that was found within ruin P confirms that the building became a midden, or dumping ground, after it was used to house animals. As always at Auchindrain we have found a large amount of Spongewear and decorated pottery as well as shoe leathers.

Visitor Service Workers
The museum at Auchindrain is a growing organisation: we have won recognition and awards for our work in heritage and as a social enterprise.
We are looking for new, dynamic and hard-working people to join our front-of-house team and provide excellence to our visitors. We have both part-time and full-time posts available. For copies of the Job Description and Application Form, please contact us at recruitment@auchindrain.org.uk. Please DO NOT apply through Facebook.

Thanks to the brilliant efforts of the Bonnyrigg Scouts this weekend we have transformed the floor within building P, removing the topsoil to reveal a manuring channel running down the middle of the floor towards the door. We had previously thought that this building was used for storage so this evidence that it housed livestock is completely new and very exciting news for us.
At some point the building was left to ruin and became a midden, or dumping ground, for the Township. Stay tuned as over the next few days we'll be posting pictures of some of the objects found during our dig down to this level.

Yesterday's star find was this piece of a spongewear bowl, its colours still glowing almost as brightly as when it was whole and new.
China like this, usually made in the workshops of central Scotland, graced the tables of the people of the township in the 19th century. When new it was cheap and intended for everyday use: try buying an undamaged example of a piece like this now and the price would shock you!
The Bonnyrigg Scouts found this, and other items, in the bed of the burn that runs through Auchindrain.

Today the 14th Midlothian Bonnyrigg Scout Group have been busy excavating and digging to expose the original road along with cleaning all the finds they have made despite the the rain and the army of midgies!

14th Midlothian Bonnyrigg Scout Group arrived on friday evening to set up camp. They are here for the weekend to help us with excavating a ruin, digging the original cobbled road and looking for findsin the burn!.
We will be posting regularly over the weekend so stay tuned!

Yesterday we welcomed a group of 25 emerging museum and heritage professionals to Auchindrain from the Open Palaces Programme, who were given an opportunity to make a Bow Tent, learn about dry stone dyking and sample some home-made drop scones straight from the gridle.

The first Auchindrain lamb of 2019.

The first Auchindrain lamb of 2019.

This is our Spike Harrow built by Harry Ferguson Ltd in the 1950's and designed to work along side our tractor, also from Ferguson. It is on its way to the agricultural engineers in Oban, for conservation.

We recently began the process of taking down and rebuilding part of The Bull and Wool House, after a storm in September 2018 damaged one corner of the building.
The Bull and Wool House was used in the early 20th century to store large hessian sacks full of clipped fleeces before they were sold, and as the byre for the township's bull. It was also a gathering place for the young people of the township - the piles of fleeces must have been comfortable and warm. Inside the bu...ilding you can see many of their initials across the roof timbers and the walls. A few of the initials can be recognised such as John McCallum, although not all. Instead of using traditional tools for writing such as paint, ink or chalk, they used 'keel', the sticky coloured paste made for marking the fleeces of sheep. By the mid-1950's, the building was being used by Eddie McCallum as byre to house young cattle.
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