In 2025, we will mark the 280th anniversary of the Battle of Prestonpans. As we head towards this milestone, our Beyond the Battle project aims to research, map and present a comprehensive snapshot of the community which lived on the battlefield in 1745 – and how that community and its landscape have evolved in the 280 years since.
BEYOND THE BATTLE: AN INTRODUCTION
Our aim is to create an unprecedented understanding of the landscape in which the Battle of Prestonpans was fought – and the people who lived in it.
Our research will be guided by a series of core questions:
- Who lived on the battlefield in September 1745, and what did they do?
- What was life like for the people who lived here?
- How did the conflict in 1745 affect the lives of the residents?
- Do any descendents of these residents still live in the community?
- What did our community look like in 1745 – and do any of the buildings, roads and features remain?
- What are the milestones of change on the landscape and community in the last 280 years.
The project will be run from the Battle of Prestonpans Museum, where we will be holding a series of events as the work progresses – including opportunities for you to get involved.
The project will lead to, amongst other things:
- A special exhibition at the Battle of Prestonpans Museum, as part of the 280th anniversary of the battle
- FactFiles available at our museum and here on the website, providing detailed information on the people and places which made up the battlefield community in 1745
- An interactive digital map of the battlefield area, highlighting the main features and revealing how the landscape has evolved over time
As our project develops, we’ll be posting up progress reports here to let you know what we are investigating.
Map Regression workshops
In early September we held two round-table discussion workshops focusing on a series of maps and plans of the battle which were created in 1745. For comparison, we also used several later 18th and 19th century maps of the same area, and made use of the National Library of Scotland’s amazing online map tools. The purspose of the workshops was to stimulate thought about the geographical features of the battlefield: what was recognisable to us and what was not; whether the contemporary plans were consistent in how they showed the features and settlements; whether there were any mysteries to solve, such as inconsistences, anomalies, or things which were missing.
The results of the conversations raised a number of issues which we want to look into deeper:
- Lost villages: what happened to the small hamlet near Bankton House, identifiable on some plans of the battlefield but no longer extant, and the village of Seton which was clearly more substantial in 1745 than it is today?
- The drainage ditch: was this a linear man-made feature, or was it a natural watercourse – or both! When was it dug, and when was it filled in? How does it fit into the longer history of water management on the battlefield?
- The Prestonpans windmill: a long-standing question, as a windmill features on battlefield plans but does not seem to appear in later maps. Where exactly was it, and what was it for?
- The Riggonhead Defile: how significant was the defile as a geographical feature, considering that it does not appear in any meaningful way on the plans?
- Preston House walls: we think we might have pin-pointed their lines, and that parts might still be traceable, but the interior arrangement of the gardens is very inconsistently shown in the plans and the mercat cross is never depicted.
Some of these questions might be answered by further map regression. Some of them might require a little more archival research. We’ll let you know how we get on.
In the meantime, here’s our curator Dr Arran Johnston to provide a synpotic summary of the contemporary battle plans:
Producing our own “List of Persons Concerned…”
We don’t just want to create a map of the streets and landscapes of the Prestonpans area in 1745; we want to populate it with people!
So who lived here at the time of the battle, and do the battle records help us get deeper into the community than might otherwise have been possible?
The big question is where to even start with such an exercise! Well we are going to start with some of the people we know lived here at the time.
First off, the gentlemen and local worthies: Lord Grange, MP; lords Prestongrange and Drummore; the ministers, Reverend Cunningham at Tranent and Reverend Carlyle in Prestonpans; and the Gardiner family at Bankton.
After that, the we have decided to draw upon the List of Persons Concerned in the Rebellion. This database, compiled county-by-county in 1746, records all those accused of rebellious actions in the course of the last Jacobite rising. It lists names, place of residence, occupation, and alleged misdemeanors. This list contains a number of men who lived in the Prestonpans area who allegedly helped, sympathised, or event fought with the Jacobites – and that inadvertently provides us with a snapshot of the community. So we are studying this list, looking at the occupations listed to see if there are any trends, and cross-referencing the people listed with other records (such as the churchs’ burial lists) to see if we can grow their families and uncover their stories.
Some fascinating results have been emerging from this study, including hints at widely differing motivations for joining the Jacobite army and evidence of some perhaps unsurprising results of soldiers mixing with the local townsfolk.
Our volunteers are also delving into kirk session records and the funerary monuments in our churchyards, to continue building a “who’s who” of the battlefield community – our own List of Persons Concerned!
Interesting walls!
As part of our research on the physical landscape of the battlefield, we are trying to trace some of the old boundary lines, roads and walls – especially those around the former Preston House site – in order to pin down locations and landmarks.
But these aren’t the only walls we are interested in!
We have also dedicated a wall in our museum’s reception area at Prestonpans Town Hall, to showcase some of the information we are gathering during the research project. Here we are posting some details of local residents of the battlefield area, and a handy QR link for visitors to find this page and the ongoing work it reports. We are sure it will become a great conversation starter with both locals and visitors alike!
The Life and Death of Colonel Gardiner
One of the battlefield’s most famous regiments was Colonel James Gardiner, who lived with his family at Bankton House on the southern edge of Preston village.
Gardiner was a career soldier, with a long history of service stretching back through the 1715 Rising to the great campaigns of Marlborough. At the Battle of Prestonpans, he was mortally wounded after the rout of his regiment – the 13th Dragoons – and died a few hours later in Tranent manse. In January 2025, on Gardiner’s birthday, we held an event at the museum to tell the story of his life whilst highlighting some of the objects which he have on display relating to him.
During the research for the presentation, we found a possible lead to a forgotten portrait of Gardiner – we will keep investigating until we can find out more!
Here is a slightly abridged online version of our talk The Life and Death of Colonel Gardiner:
The Erskines of Preston House
One of the most important landmarks of the battlefield was Preston House, the park walls of which helped to trap much of the redcoat infantry when they tried to escape from the fighting.
Preston House no longer stands, but evidence of where it was and what it looked like can still be found. Not only that, but the arrangement of the estate has helped to influence the layout of later street patterns, and the fact that the house was later converted into a school ensured that even after much of the estate was sold of the house’s grounds came into public ownership and became the ideal locations for the primary school, community centre, medical surgery and swimming baths.
At the time of the battle, Preston House was owned by James Erskine, Lord Grange, whose character appears to have been a fascinating contradiction of Presbyterian piety and drunken debauchery, with a good measure of political intrigue thrown in. Erskine’s destructive marriage to Rachel Chiesley, and his terrible treatment of her in later life, create a remarkable story which played out against the backdrop of the battlefield’s most impressive mansion.
We presented our research into Lord Grange and his property in a presentation held at the museum. Here again is a slightly abridged version created for our online audiences:
Mapping the Changes
A key part of our project is the presentation of our understanding of the battlefield landscape in a new and accessible visual format. That means the creation of new maps (we really like maps!).
We are delighted to be working with Neil Thomson of NTDesign, to create a phased illustration of how the appearance of the battlefield area has changed over the course of the last 280 years. There’s a great deal of information to collate, filter, and illustrate, and we look forward to sharing further news as Neil progresses.
Meanwhile, our volunteer team continues to investigate both local records and the evidence of the built environment that still surrounds us. Here they are in the museum a few weeks ago, identifying structures on contemporary battle plans which might represent buildings we have identified around the town today.
Volunteers Visit the County Archive
Historical research is new territory to some of our volunteers, and not everyone on the team was readily aware of all the tools that are available to support their efforts. We therefore decided to arrange a visit to the county archive at Haddington’s John Gray Centre. There, archivist Frances Woodrow showed us their oldest document – the town’s charter from King Robert I – as well as the burgh minutes from the time of the 1745 Rising, and a photograph album full of memories from the 250th anniversary event in 1995. A visit to the map store was a particular treat, giving a chance to see Armstrong’s 1773 map of Edinburgh and the Lothians: not only is the battlefield labelled, but the Thorntree was clearly already famous enough to be named and illustrated!
As well as visiting the archive, our team visited the Local & Family History Centre. There Hanita Ritchie provided another warm welcome, and a very helpful presentation introducing the centre’s work, the nature and variety of its resources and services, and the information held which might be relevant to our project. In addition, Hanita walked us through the museum and library services’ website, explaining how to maximise access to the collections and prepare for future research visits.
The visit was not only enjoyable but enlightening, and even in the short time we spent in the centre after the tours were over we managed to discover some new information and leads to feed into the project! Our volunteers felt the visit had increased their confidence in identifying and using the tools available to them, both for our own project and for their own future interests.
We are grateful to Fran and Hanita for taking the time to allow us exclusive access to the facilities at the John Gray Centre, on a day when they would otherwise be closed.
A Taxing Question… and a Cheape Answer!
During our research we have become increasingly interested in George Cheape, the customs collector at Prestonpans at the time of the battle. His name cropped up a number of times in various local records, and he is also named (“Collector Cheap”) in Alexander Carlyle’s autobiogaphy. We managed to discover a little about his family: George was the son of the Laird of Rossie in Fife, brother to a ship’s captain, and uncle to a wine merchant in Leith. In 1716 he married Mary Wedderburn, whose wealthy family owned the Gosford estate in East Lothian and whose cousin was Lt Colonel Peter Halkett (who led his regiment at Prestonpans). George and Mary had two “beautiful girls” as well as a son, Thomas, who went on the grand tour to Italy in the 1750s. The Cheapes were clearly a well-connected and prosperous family!
Where, then, did the Cheapes live? Their home was clearly substantial, as Alexander Carlyle remembers that it was used to accommodate 23 wounded officers after the battle. It might also have been conspicuously so, as Carlyle suggests that they were ordered to be sent there by the Duke of Perth who is unlikely to have any special knowledge of the town. Peter Halkett may have been able to supply the latter, however, as he was taken prisoner during the battle and assisted the Jacobites in negotiating the surrender of the baggage guard at Cockenzie to avoid further fruitless bloodshed. Perhaps it was he who recommended his cousin’s house for the treatment of his comrades.
For a long time we were unable to find any clues as to where the Cheapes’ house was located. Recently however, we came across a plan labelled as “Part of the High Street of Preston Pans” and dating to 1780. The map had no accompanying context, but its purpose was clearly to record the location of a number of “company buildings”. After some digging it became clear that the most likely candidate was the Prestonpans Vitriol Company, a pioneering sulphuric acid works founded in 1749. Across the road from some of the company property, the map labels a large property as “Mr Downey’s House”. This must surely refer to Patrick Downey – manager of the vitriol works in the 1760s and one of its owners by the 1770s. Most intriguingly of all, however, was that the map labelled the land adjacent to Downey’s house as “Customs House Property”. This is the best lead we have yet found as to where the Customs House might have been. Although the map is from 40 years after the battle, could it be the same property that was inhabited by George and Mary Cheape?
The next step was of course to identify where the Vitriol Company’s plan was depicting. The distinctive arrangement of the roads strongly suggests that it shows the junction of the High Street with Harlaw Hill. This allows us to identify Mr Downey’s House with Harlawhill House – which still stands despite severe neglect in recent years which has required emergency interventions from Historic Environment Scotland and East Lothian Council. The location established, map regression helps us to identify the land which is labelled as belonging to the Customs House. Using later OS maps from the 19th century, there is a clear candidate for a substantial dwelling with large gardens adjacent to Harlawhill. Unfortunately this building no longer stands, although a successor property occupies the same site. The access to this building passes through a stone gateway which clearly pre-dates the current building. So, is this the gate into the grounds of the former Customs House, where the Cheapes had lived in 1745?
A few weeks ago, our curator Arran paid a visit to the National Records Office in Edinburgh. There he was shown a small bundle of folded papers bound with string: the salt tax returns for 1745-6. Unfolding the returns for Prestonpans and Cockenzie, Arran was able to read the tables and calculations which George Cheape had carefully compiled, recording the quantities of salt produced by each producer in the community and the duties collected on them. The dramatic fall in revenue in the aftermath of the battle was obvious, as was Cheape’s attempt to quantify how much of the revenue had been collected by the Jacobites. A note in Cheape’s hand recorded his instructions from the authorities to investigate whether the salt officers had colluded in securing that money for the Jacobites – which tallies with the presence of numerous salt watchmen and officers in the government’s “List of Persons Concerned in the Rebellion”. There was something humbling about holding Cheape’s papers. Perhaps now we have identified where he lived too, and can can imagine the Collector and his family passing the gate pillars onto Harlawhill road on their short walk past the manse and into the church, where they would greet their friends the Carlyles. This is the very essence of what Beyond the Battle is all about!
We will continue to investigate our theory on the location of the customs house, and hope that more corroboration can soon be found. If anyone knows any more about this history of the building beyond these gates (9-15 Harlawhill), we would love to know.
The Rebel Next Door
Throughout this project, we’ve been as interested in people as we have in places.
One of the issues we wanted to explore was to what extent the local population was impacted by the Jacobite rising: was there much support or sympathy for the Jacobites, or were the people here in favour of George II’s government?
At a special evening presentation in our museum, curator Arran presented some answers to these questions as he summarised what we have been learning so far.
Following the well-attended talk, Arran has again created a recorded version of the presentation which can now be enjoyed on our Beyond the Battle YouTube playlist. Here’s the link:
Project Exhibition opens in Prestonpans Town Hall
As the project moves into its final phase, we are delighted to showcase some of our new insights into our 18th century community in a new exhibition at our museum.
The display covers a range of subjects, with the overall theme being the people and places which made up the battlefield area. Through artworks, artefacts and text, the exhibition hopes to bring us a little closer to the people who lived here on the battlefield at the time the battle was fought.
“Beyond the Battle” is supported by Historic Environment Scotland.
