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Thomas Carlyle's Birthplace

Birthplaces of individual peopleBuildings and structures completed in 1791Buildings and structures in Dumfries and GallowayCategory A listed buildings in Dumfries and GallowayDumfries and Galloway geography stubs
Thomas CarlyleUnited Kingdom listed building stubs
Ecclefechan at the Birth House
Ecclefechan at the Birth House

Thomas Carlyle's Birthplace is a house in Ecclefechan, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland, UK, in which Thomas Carlyle, who was to become a pre-eminent man of letters, was born in 1795. The house was built in 1791 by Carlyle's father James and James' brothers John and Tom, stonemasons all. It is owned by the National Trust for Scotland, registered as a Category A listed building. Architecturally, the home exemplifies 18-century Scottish Vernacular. It first opened to the public in 1881 and remains much as it was then. Many of Carlyle's belongings are housed along with a collection of portraits and photographs relating to his life. Carlyle lived here with his brother John Aitken Carlyle who would go on to translate Dante's Inferno into English. It was from here that Thomas Carlyle walked nearly one hundred miles in order to attend the University of Edinburgh at the age of 13, intending for the ministry.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Thomas Carlyle's Birthplace (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Thomas Carlyle's Birthplace

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N 55.059144 ° E -3.264246 °
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Thomas Carlyle's Birthplace


DG11 3DG
Scotland, United Kingdom
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nts.org.uk

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Ecclefechan at the Birth House
Ecclefechan at the Birth House
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Middlebie
Middlebie

Middlebie is a hamlet and parish in the historic county of Dumfriesshire in Dumfries and Galloway, south-west Scotland. It is approximately 2 miles (3.2 km) east of Ecclefechan, and 6 miles (9.7 km) north-east of Annan, on the banks of the Middlebie Burn. Middlebie Parish consists of the ancient parishes of Middlebie, Pennersax (Pennersaughs) and Carruthers, united in 1609. Middlebie was the seat of a Presbytery from some time after the Reformation until 1743. It was then divided to form the Presbyteries of Langholm and Annan. Middlebie parish is now in the Presbytery of Annandale & Eskdale. It is bounded by the parishes of Tundergarth, Langholm, Canonbie, Half Morton, Kirkpatrick Fleming, Annan and Hoddam. The villages of Eaglesfield, Middlebie and Waterbeck lie within the parish, with Kirtlebridge on its southern boundary. Eaglesfield and Hottsbridge by Waterbeck still have primary schools. The school at Middlebie closed in 1972, nearly a hundred years after it opened. The Eaglesfield building is now just over a hundred years old. The former school in Waterbeck village, built about 1900, is now the public hall. Eaglesfield's public hall was built in 1892–3. Middlebie's old hall (a wooden ex-army building purchased in 1928) was demolished and a new one built in 2001. The West Coast Main Line railway runs through the parish from London to Glasgow. Previously the Caledonian Railway, the line formerly had a station at Kirtlebridge, where the writer Thomas Carlyle would alight before walking up to his parents farm at Scotsbrig above Middlebie. From Kirtlebridge the Solway Junction Railway ran down to Annan and across by the Solway viaduct to Cumbria. It was built to transport iron ore to the Lanarkshire steelworks. In 1841 the population of the parish was 2,154 and about sixty of these people were handloom weavers. There were inns and shops and the Lime Works Blacketridge. Tradesmen listed in 1841 include joiners, shoemakers, tailors, cloggers, masons, millers, carters, grooms, gardeners, dressmakers, straw-hat makers, etc. Today, only Eaglesfield still has a general store and post office. In 1841, as well as 73 farmers, 314 people were employed as agricultural labourers and 60 more as servants. Notable people from Middlebie include Matron Jane Bell who was sent as an orphan to Australia and William Brown (1888–1975), professor of plant pathology and head of the botany department at Imperial College of Science and Technology.