Old Photograph Fletcher Hall East Saltoun Scotland

Old photograph of Fletcher Hall in East Saltoun located five miles South West of Haddington, East Lothian, Scotland. In the 12th century David I gifted lands in Saltoun to Hugh de Moreville. In 1643 the lands and barony were sold to Andrew Fletcher, grandfather of Andrew Fletcher, the Patriot, and it was the Fletcher family who attempted to make Saltoun a centre of manufacturing in the early 18th century. Most industry was sited in West Saltoun, formerly Milton, on the Birns Water. The first barley mill in Scotland was established there in 1712, and the British Linen Company had bleachfields in West Saltoun in 1746. In the early 19th century the Fletcher family invested further in the parish by helping to pay for a new church, manse and school in East Saltoun, and commissioning additions to Saltoun Hall (near West Saltoun). By the mid 19th century most of the parish's industries were failing, and the land was given over to agriculture. Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, the Patriot, born 1655, died September 1716, was a Scottish writer and politician, he is remembered as an advocate for the independence of Scotland, and an opponent of the 1707 Act of Union between Scotland and England. Fletcher became an exile after being accused of promoting insurrection, he was appointed the cavalry commander of the Monmouth Rebellion, but shortly after landing in England he killed another leading figure. He again went into exile, this time as a fugitive and with his estates forfeit. He returned with William of Orange, becoming Commissioner of the old Parliament of Scotland.



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