Easterhill House in Auchenshuggle, photographed in 1870 by Thomas Annan.
The Easterhill estate was acquired in the mid-18th century by tobacco merchant Archibald Smellie of McCall & Smellie and then (with his son Richard) of Archibald Smellie & Son. Smellie built Easterhill House and began mining for coal on the estate.
The Smellies' business ventures were seriously disrupted by the American War of Independence and the estate was sold in 1783 to James Hopkirk, then of Dalbeth, who sold it on to his business partner Robert Findlay (b 1748). Easterhill remained in Findlay family hands until the 1930s, when many of the family heirlooms were transferred from the house to another Findlay family home, Boturich in Dunbartonshire.
The name of the estate is remembered today in the names of Easterhill Street and Easterhill Place.
Reference: Sp Coll Dougan Add. 73
Glasgow University Library, Special Collections
Keywords:
Arhibald Smellie & Son, coal mining, country houses, Easterhill House, mansions, Smellie, McCall & Co, tobacco lords, tobacco merchants
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