1057 



BERVIE. 



BERWICK-UPON-TWEED. 



10ES 



BERVIE, or INVER-BERVIE, Kincardineshire, Scotland, a royal 

 burgh in the parish of Bervie, is situated on the coast-road from 

 Du.idee to Aberdeen, in 56 51' N. lat., 2 17' W. long., distant 824 

 miles N. by E. from Edinburgh. The population of the burgh hi 

 1851 was 878 ; of the entire parish, 1459. Bervie unites with Mon- 

 trose, Brechin, Arbroath, and Forfar in returning a member to the 

 Imperial Parliament. 



The north side of the parish is bounded by the Bervie, a small 

 stream which joins the sea a little below the town, and forms a harbour 

 large enough for fishing-boats. The parish slopes from west to east, 

 and is only about 2 miles long and a mile and a half broad. 



Bervie is the only royal burgh in Kincardineshire ; its charter was 

 granted in 1342 by King David II., and was renewed in 1595 by 

 James VI. The burgh is governed by a self-elected magistracy. 

 The town is irregularly built. There is a good bridge over the Bervie. 

 The inhabitants are supplied with water by means of pipes. Linen- 

 weaving affords some employment in the town. The salmon fishery 

 on thu beach employs a few fishermen. The village of Gourdon, in 

 the south-east corner of the parish, has a harbour and several small 

 craft. There are here also granaries and warehouses belonging to 

 Moutrooe merchants. In addition to the parish church there is a Free 

 church in Bervie. 



1! HI [WICK. [GAMBIA COLONY.] 



BERWICK, NORTH, Haddingtonshire, Scotland, a royal and 

 parliamentary burgh, a town and sea-port on the coast at the mouth 

 of the Frith of Forth, so called to distinguish it from Berwick-upou- 

 Tweed, is situated in 56 4' N. lat., 2 42' W. long., distant 22 miles 

 N.E. from Edinburgh, 11 miles N.W. from Dunbar, and 10 miles 

 N.N.E. from Haddingtou. The borough is governed by two bailies 

 and seven councillors, of whom one is provost, and unites with 

 Lauder, Dunbar, Jedburgh, and Haddington, hi returning one member 

 to the Imperial Parliament. The population of the royal burgh in 

 1851 was 498 ; of the parliamentary burgh, 863. The parish of North 

 Berwick stretches about 3 miles along the sea-coast, and is in breadth 

 inland about 2J miles, containing an area of more than 4000 acres. 

 The whole parish is arable, except the conical hill called North Berwick 

 Law, and about 89 acres of links or downs near the sea. 



About 2 miles to the east of the town are the ruins of Tautallou 

 Castle, on a high rocky cliff overlooking the sea, which surrounds it 

 on three sides. In shape the castle was half an irregular hexagon, 

 encompassed towards the land side by a double ditch ; the entrance 

 was by a drawbridge. Formerly it was one of the strongholds of the 

 Douglas family, and Lindsay of Pitscottie relates a siege of it by 

 James V. On the shore near the town are the ruins of a nunnery. 



North Berwick was made a royal burgh by James VI. The town 

 consists of a long street running east and west, at the east end of which 

 ia the town-house, and another street which leads to the harbour. The 

 pier is tolerably good, but the harbour is difficult of access, and only 



few vessels belong to the port. The inhabitants have rights of 

 common near the town. There is little trade or manufacture in the 

 town or parish. In the town are the parish church, a Free church, 

 and a ^chapel for the United Presbyterians. There is also a good 

 reading-room. 



BERWICK-UPON-TWEED, a municipal and parliamentary 

 borough, sea-port, and garrison town, and the seat of a Poor-Law 

 Union. It ia not within any county ; and it is somewhat difficult 

 to determine whether it is situated in England or Scotland, though 

 for convenience it has been frequently entered in official documents 

 as belonging to the county of Northumberland. It was however by 

 5 and 6 WilL IV. c. 76, constituted " A county of a town corporate;" 

 and by 6 and 7 Will. IV. c. 103, "A county of itself to all intents and 

 purposes," except as to returning county members to Parliament. 

 Berwick stands on the left bank of the Tweed, in 55 46' N. lat., 

 2 W. long., 54 miles E.S.E. from Edinburgh, 337 miles N. by W. 

 from London by road, and 345 miles by the Great Northern and 

 York Newcastle and Berwick railways. The population of the 

 town and parish in 1851 was 10,294 ; that of the municipal and 

 parliamentary borough (which includes this parish and the town- 

 ships of Tweedmouth and Spittal) was 15,094. Berwick returns two 

 members to the Imperial Parliament. It is governed by a corpora- 

 tion, consisting of six aldermen and eighteen councillors, one of whom 

 i mayor. The living ia a vicarage in the archdeaconry of Lindisfarne 

 and diocese of Durham. Berwick Poor-Law Union contains seventeen 

 parishes and townships with an area of 49,090 acres, and a population 

 in ISM of 23,165. 



The usual description of the place is 'the borough of Berwick- 

 upon-Tweed,' but in some ancient deeds it is called ' South Berwick,' 

 doubtless to distinguish it from ' North Berwick,' on the Frith of 

 Forth. The town and its liberties, which extend about 3J miles 

 along the sea-coast, and about the same distance towards the west, 

 form an irregular figure, comprising an area of nearly eight square 

 miles. They form one parish, bounded by the German Ocean on the 

 east, the shire of Berwick in Scotland on the west and north, and a 

 detached portion of the county palatine of Durham, called Islandshire, 

 extending to the mid-stream of the river Tweed on the south ; the 

 other half <.f the river belongs to the town. 



Of the origin of Berwick nothing is known. The few materials 

 which exist for its early history are principally found in the Scottish 



OEOO. DIV. VOL. i. 



Chartularies. The first authentic record of it is in the early part of 

 the 12th century, during tlie reign of King Alexander I., when it was 

 part of his realm of Scotland, and the capital of the' district called 

 Lothian. About this time it became populous and wealthy, contained 

 a magnificent castle, was the chief sea-port of Scotland, and abounded 

 with churches, hospitals, and monastic buildings. Its importance as 

 a place of trade is fully attested by its having been created one of the 

 four royal burghs of Scotland. The castle passed into the hands of 

 the English in 1174, but was given up again in 1189. In 1216 the 

 town and castle of Berwick were retaken by King John. During the 

 reign of Alexander III. Berwick seems to have attained its highest 

 point of prosperity as a commercial and trading port. A company of 

 Flemings had settled there, who as well as the native merchants carried 

 on an extensive trade in wool, hides, salmon, and other commodities. 

 During the competition between Baliol and Bruce for the Scottish 

 throne, the English Parliament sat at Berwick, and Edward I. finally 

 gave judgment in favour of Baliol in the hall of the castle. In 1296 

 Edward I. besieged and took Berwick, and treated the inhabitants 

 with great cruelty. Up to this date the burgh of Berwick was within 

 the archdeaconry of Lothian and diocese of St. Andrews ; it was under 

 the rule of a mayor and four bailiffs, and subject to the jurisdiction 

 of the justiciary of Lothian. There were besides a governor of the 

 town and another of the castle, and a sheriff, whose authority extended 

 also over the county of Berwick. 



Edward I. gave the town a charter for its internal government, 

 containing the privileges and immunities usually inserted in similar 

 grants to English boroughs, but without altering materially, if at all, 

 its ancient constitution ; and he confirmed to it the enjoyment of the 

 Scottish laws as they existed in the time of Alexander III. 



In 1318 Berwick fell into the hands of the Scots under Robert 

 Bruce, to whom the acquisition was of great importance : it was the 

 key to the sister kingdom. It remained in the possession of the Scots 

 until the fatal battle of Halidon Hill in 1333, when Berwick again 

 fell under the dominion of the English. It was alternately taken and 

 retaken by the Scots and English on several occasions till nearly the 

 close of the next century. In 1482 the town and castle were finally 

 surrendered to Edward IV., and were never afterwards recovered by 

 Scotland. 



About the end of the 13th century Berwick was governed by a 

 chancellor and a chamberlain. These two offices were retained from 

 the reign of Edward I. to the accession of James VI. of Scotland to 

 the English throne. To the chancellor, who had his chancery, master 

 of the rolls, clerks, &c., and a Domesday Book at Berwick, was com- 

 mitted the duty of preparing and sealing all grants and other official 

 documents emanating from the crown : the chamberlain had the 

 management of the royal revenue, besides a judicial power in his 

 itinera, or circuits, as the justiciary of Lothian also had. There were 

 also at Berwick an escheator, an exchequer, an exchange, and a mint, 

 and the usual officers found in other ports of England and Scotland, 



such as customers, collectors of customs, controllers, troners of wool, 

 clerks of the cocket, and the like. The military officers (the governor" 

 of the town and castle, the marshal, &c.) were likewise continued ; 

 indeed the whole civil, judicial, and military establishment of tho 

 borough resembled that of a kingdom. The peculiar situation of 

 Berwick on the confines of the two kingdoms may afford a sufficient 

 reason for the exceptional enactments relating to the borough. Ber- 

 wick has sent members to the English Parliament since the time of 

 Philip and Mary. 



Berwick still remains a walled town, but the fortifications do not 

 inclose so large a space as they did in ancient times. The modern 

 ramparts, which are generally speaking in good repair, do not include 

 the suburbs of Castle Gate and the Greens, but the ruins of the old 

 wall which surrounded them, and extended farther towards the east 

 also, yet remain ; and one of its towers, called the Bell Tower, is still 

 almost entire. The present walls were built in the reign of Queen 

 Elizabeth. Excluding the suburbs the circumference is n mile and 

 three quarters, but including them it extends upwards of two miles 

 and a half. The existing defences consist of a rampart of earth 

 substantially reveted, faced with stone. Towards the river the lino 

 of works is nearly straight, but to the north and east five bastions 

 break the line of the curtains. There are no outworks, with the 

 exception of the old castle, now in ruins, overlooking the Tweed, and 

 an earthen battery guarding the landing-place below the Magdalen 

 Fields. Around four sides of the irregular pentagon of the walls is 

 a ditch mostly dry. Tho first bastion to the north is called Megs 

 Mount, and like three of the others it has a cavalier of earth, which 

 enables the guns to command the irregularities of the ground up the 

 Tweed, on the Scotch side of the river. It is a demi-bastion, having 

 a double flank on the right, which defends the Scotch Gate, situated 

 between it and Cumberland Bastion. Brass Mount Bastion is the 

 next, under the cavalier of which is a powder-magazine. This with 

 Windmill Mount has double flanks. Between Windmill Mount and 

 King's Bastion (a demi-bastion without a cavalier, on which is the 

 flag-staff), is a powder-magazine, with a bomb-proof roof. A four and 

 a six gun battery near the governor's house defend the entrance to 

 the harbour. Finally, the saluting battery of twenty-two guns com- 

 mands the English side of the Tweed. There are five gates : tho 

 English Gate at the end of the bridge (now removed), the Scotch 



3 T 



