Prestongrange House A resource pack for teachers and students This Resource Pack is one of a series offering an introduction to local history while fulfilling National Curriculum targets across a number of subject areas. It has been designed for the 5-14 age range and mixed abilities. Contents 1. History 2. Summary 3. Glossary 4. Timeline 5. Curriculum Targets 6. Activities 7. Further Investigations 1. A Brief History of Prestongrange House To 1170: De Quincy was Ker’s primary residence, especially The earliest records of ownership the painted ceiling which was uncovered regarding Prestongrange are associated during renovations in 1962 and with the De Quincy family and the subsequently removed to Merchiston. Cistercian monks of Newbattle Abbey The ceiling is dated 1581, when Mark near Dalkeith. Ker was owner of the property. It is difficult to judge whether an existing 1170-1587: Newbattle Abbey building was modified or whether a new A charter dated 1170 records an property was built, but variations in agreement to lease the lands to the window shape and different floor levels abbey, but these early records refer to suggest that an existing building was land rather than buildings: the charter incorporated into an extended residence makes no mention of a dwelling house for the Ker family. and implies that only agricultural On his father’s death in 1584, Mark buildings occupied the land. Ker’s son, also Mark, was confirmed in Prestongrange was worked for his right to the Newbattle lands by King agriculture, coal and the salt extracted James I and VI. In 1587 the king issued from the waters of the Forth by the a charter granting Mark Ker the younger monks of Newbattle until the and his heirs the title to the lands of Reformation in the mid-sixteenth Newbattle monastery and the baronies of century. Newbattle and Prestongrange. He was given the title Lord Newbattle and in 1547- c1609: Ker 1606 was created Earl of Lothian. On After his appointment as Commendator his death in 1609, his estate was worth of Newbattle Abbey in 1547, Mark Ker almost £37,000. Although his wife, controlled the land of Prestongrange. Margaret Maxwell, is recorded as having His appointment as Abbot in 1557 died at Prestongrange in 1617, their son extended his control to the disposal of Robert, 2nd Earl of Lothian, did not these lands. continue the family’s involvement with Mark Ker’s career as a churchman was the estate, probably due to the crippling essentially a secular one. As burden of debt resulting from the effort Commendator, he had little involvement to maintain a noble lifestyle. In 1624, he in the religious life of the Abbey and, killed himself at Newbattle, having sold though a priest and not yet married to off the Prestongrange Estate some years Helen Leslie, he was already a father. It before. is at this stage that the earliest evidence of a house at Prestongrange emerges. There is some evidence that this house C1609-1745: Morison information is available about Little recorded information survives Prestongrange, possibly because his about the early years of the Morison public duties made it difficult for him to family’s ownership of Prestongrange. spend time at his new estate. John Morison and his wife, Katherine References in his letters include mention Preston, were succeeded by their second of the fitting up of a nursery by his wife, son, Alexander who enjoyed a Grizel Millar, as well as the employment distinguished career as an advocate and of workmen in the house, possibly to later as a Lord of Session with the title install a new plaster ceiling. He also Lord Prestongrange. Alexander died at displayed some interest in industrial Prestongrange in 1631 when the estate development, particularly the repair of passed to his son, another Alexander, Morison’s Haven harbour and he was also Lord Prestongrange. His mother, also instrumental in promoting the Helenora Mauld, survived her husband development of the pottery industry in by 34 years, until 1665. Most surviving Prestonpans. At this time, a woman’s records of this period concern the property passed to her husband on her borrowing and lending of money. There marriage, and William Grant had four is little information concerning the house daughters and no sons. To ensure and grounds of the Prestongrange Estate. ownership of the estate remained with William Morison, Alexander’s son, the Grant family, the estate was subject inherited Prestongrange, probably in to an entail. This meant that none of 1684. He was a successful and wealthy Grant’s daughters would inherit. landowner. However, his circumstances Instead, ownership would pass to the deteriorated after the death of Janet eldest male child of any one of the Rochheid, his wife, in 1716 and by 1734, daughters. His eldest daughter Janet, his property was sequestrated, taken over Countess of Hyndford, took over by the lords of session to pay his debts. management of the the estate on his As a result, details of the Prestongrange death in 1764, but no details of the house house are recorded in documents relating are recorded during her ownership. to William Morison’s goods, titles and items of value included within the 1818-1956: Grant-Suttie policies, or lands, of the Prestongrange Janet Grant died in 1818. Since she left estate. It is evident from these no children of her own, the estate documents that Prestongrange House passed, by means of the entail, to James was a comfortably furnished home, Suttie, the eldest son of her sister Agnes. typical of a gentleman’s residence of the On inheriting the estate, James took the period. name Sir James Grant-Suttie of Prestongrange and Balgone. 1745-1818: Grant At this time, estate revenue increased In 1745, the baronies of Prestongrange dramatically, thanks to the expansion of and Dolphinston were purchased by industrial activity on the estate. Much of William Grant, a well respected this increased income was used to establishment figure, whose life is convert Prestongrange House from a documented in some detail. In his later typical country house into a building of years, as a Lord of Session, he took the significant architectural interest. Sir title Lord Prestongrange. However, little George Grant-Suttie, son of Sir James, appears to have inherited the estate Lady Susan Harriet Innes-Ker, mother of before his father’s death in 1836, a short the second Sir George, 7th Baronet, time after his marriage in 1829 to Lady remained closely involved in the local Harriet Charteris. Sir George engaged area. However Sir George himself did William Playfair, one of the foremost not live locally and left the estate Scottish architects of his day, to management to his lawyers. undertake a radical programme of After Lady Susan’s death in 1909, the improvements. The fact that one of house was uninhabited for a number of Scotland’s most prominent architects years, although its gardens and orchards was willing to undertake this work, were let separately. The Inland Revenue together with surviving records of the Survey of 1912-1914 describes a cost of these alterations, clearly indicate substantial property, with numerous the status and affluence of the Grant- public rooms and bedrooms, plus attics. Suttie family at this period. Outbuildings included stables, Sir George retained ownership from coachhouses, a boiler house, cow byres approximately 1830 until his death in and additional accommodation. But the 1878 and although his interest in the nearby colliery and lack of estate diminished in his later years, for modernisation inside were not attractive much of that time Prestongrange House to potential tenants until, in1924, its was his main residence. gardens and other grounds were re- His heir and eldest son, James, died very designed to form a golf course and the shortly after his father, leaving an eight house became home to its present year old son, another George. This had occupant, the Royal Musselburgh Golf serious implications for the estate. Club. Thanks to a second entail, the value of the estate was divided between a number 1956-2002: CISWO/Musselburgh of people, at a time when revenue from Miners’ Charitable Society coal was shrinking. This signalled the On the sale of the property and grounds start of a decline in the fortunes of by the Grant-Suttie family in 1956, Prestongrange House. ownership passed to the Coal Industry & Playfair’s improvements are recorded in Social Welfare Organisation (CISWO), his finished designs and legal documents on behalf of the Musselburgh Miners’ arising from the existence of the entail Charitable Society. This was part of adds some further background. A total CISWO’s commitment to the provision of 212 drawings record the addition of a of leisure amenities for local people, north tower during the early 1830s, especially miners. However, the house followed by an eastern lodge and continued to deteriorate until the early gateway in 1837, a range of offices and 1960s, when extensive restoration was stables in 1845 and a final series of undertaken, along with the addition of an works, begun in 1850, on a massive extension in contemporary style. This tower at the westward end of the house. addition was the last radical Although the interior was modernised restructuring of the property before the and equipped with all necessary end of the 20th century. comforts. Playfair’s designs are In 1997, on the death of the 8th Baronet, modelled on the external appearance of the baronial title and remaining lands an original Scottish tower house. were acquired by Dr. Gordon Prestoungrange, who maintains a close interest in the former baronial home and its associated lands. 2. Summary Early records The Grant (later Grant-Suttie) In 1170, the De Quincy family family, owned Prestongrange until gave Prestongrange Estate to the 1956.