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Kelhead Lime Works

WNW of Annan, Kelhead, Dumfriesshire.

Quarry waterlogged.

Extensive lime-works are described at Kelhead. [Chalmers, 1824]

At Kelhead the lime rock which is of the first quality is from 12 to 24 feet thick and is said to yield 95 parts out of 100 of carbonate of lime. [Alison, 1842]

Kelhead Lime Works & Quarry, Annan, was established by the 1820s. By the end of the 19th century there was a bank of four draw kilns from whence the lime was taken down to the main line railway on what was described as a wagon way. Ownership was with the Kelhead Lime Co until 1922 and then the Kelhead Lime & Coal Co Ltd. The works closed in 1925 and the quarries are now flooded. Of the bank of kilns, only the base and draw arch of the southernmost kiln survives. [Kitching, 2016]

Kelhead limeworks (long disused and the main seams flooded). [BBS, 1961]

A detailed reading of the Old and New Statistical Accounts for Dumfriesshire, the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright and Wigtownshire (87 accounts in the OSA, 88 in the NSA), identified almost twice as many planned villages in the region ... is likely that 'planned' villages were associated with the limeworks at Porterstown in Nithsdale and Kelhead on the Kinmount Estate near Annan and at Canonbie Colliery, although the literature does not explicitly name the settlements associated with these industrial activities as planned villages. [Philip, ]

The limestone bed is about 30 foot in thickness, and inclines one foot in seven and sometimes dips or sinks a foot at once, then suddenly rises again for upwards of a mile to the NE of the present (c. 1845) quarry, where it sinks below sandstone. and does not appear again until about six miles from the present Kelhead quarry. in the parishes of Annan and Middlebie, where there are several lime-works. The lime at Kelhead in Cummertrees is considered far superior to any in the country, being ninety-six parts pure in a hundred. No veins or fissures are cut across, nor are there any separate beds of magnesian limestone found intermixed with the common limestone ... since the opening of the lime-works at Kelhead, the digging of marl has been dropt. [NSA, Cummertrees]

The parishioners of a higher class (in Dornock) are supplieed with coal brought hither by wherries or small vessels from Whitehaven and Workington, and excellent lime from Kelhead, the property of the Merquis of Queensberry, a distance of six miles. [NSA. Dornock]

William Stewart, son of a publican in Closeburn, was an acquaintance of Robert Burns. He was factor of the Closeburn estate of the Rev. James Stuart Menteith of Barrowby, Lincolnshire. He was also the father of 'lovely Polly Stewart'. According to Stewart's will he 'possessed the lands of Bilbow and the houses built a thereon lying in the parish of Tarbolton, he was tenant of three farms belonging to the Duke of Queensberry, and joint-tenant of Kelhead Limeworks; and he held one-fourth share of the woollen manufactury carried on at Cample under the firm of Stewart, Mathison & Co.' [Burns Encyclopedia]

Proposed canal from the mouth of the river Annan to Lochmaben by the limeworks at Kelhead (not built). [Edinburgh Encyclopedia]

Alternative Names: None recorded.