Avonhill Doocot

SMR 6 / NS 8948 7236

A doocot formerly stood immediately to the north of the west carriage drive to Avonhill House.  The House was built in 1878 for James Paton, publisher, 5 St James Square, Edinburgh.  In 1883 he bought a thin strip of ground in Badcur from Elizabeth Gaston Ralston Waddell and used it to provide a main western drive, at the end of which a lodge was built in the same style as the main house.  It was probably at this time that the doocot was erected.  The rectangular structure is shown on the 1897 Ordnance Survey map, but it was only in 1916 that it was labelled as a dovecot.  The present West Lodge has a squat, square crenellated tower and the doocot may have been of the same form.

Illus: 1897 Ordnance Survey Map. The Lodge stands at the right-angled turn in the road at Parkneuk and the Doocot is the small square building north-east of it. (National Library of Scotland).
Illus: 1913/16 Ordnance Survey Map showing the Dovecot (National Library of Scotland).
Illus: The Lodge at Parkneuk looking north-east.

In 1892 two local miners were found guilty of stealing thirty pigeons from the Avonhill House doocot (Falkirk Herald 13 August 1892).

The house was destroyed by fire in the 1960s and the estate fell into neglect. The building was still depicted on the 1962 Ordnance Survey map but only the lowest courses now survive showing that it was a square brick structure.

Bibliography

Bailey, G.B.1991‘Doocots in the Falkirk District,’ Calatria 1, 33-56.

G.B. Bailey, 2025