Seafield
New Rows incorporating Seafield Old Rows
coordinates:
55°52'37.37"N,
3°35'31.30"W
location: in Seafield,
West Lothian, on the southern side of the A705
former parish: Livingston
current
status:
Those South of A705 extant and occupied, remainder demolished
and built over.
date
constructed: c1892 - c1900?
owner/builder: Pumpherston
Oil Co.
Image
courtesy of West Lothian Council Libraries
"There
are three rows of 24 houses each on one side of the main
road and two rows of 24 houses each on the other. The houses
are all built of brick, but some 72 of them have lately
been rough-cast. The 72 consist of a room (12.5 x 11.5),
kitchen (14.5 x 11.5 also bed recesses), scullery with sink,
and w.c. A coal cellar for each house is provided and a
wash-house for every four tenants, as also drying greens.
For 24 houses gardens are provided. Rental - 2/9 and 3/-
weekly, inclusive of rates. Cement pavements are laid between
the houses. There are also 24 houses of room, kitchen, attic,
with boiler in scullery, and a garden in front of house
- rental 4/6 per week. Dust-bins are emptied daily by the
Company. There is a good water supply and drainage system.
An
additional 24 new houses have just been built with similar
accommodation as the foregoing, at rentals of 4/-, 4/6.
and 5/-. The latter is for houses with two attics."
Theodore
K. Irvine, Report on the Housing Conditions in the Scottish
Shale Field, 1914.
"When
I was a Seafield we stayed in miners cottages. We had a
room and a kitchen. We had running water and an inside toilet.
The wash-house was around the corner and four of them used
it. There were eight houses in a block, so four of them
used one and the other four used the other one. There was
nine of us in the family. We just had two beds in the kitchen
and one bed in the room. We just all slept together"
R.B,
born 1906, recorded in 1983
Seafield New Rows. October 2009
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