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Scotland (Counties as in 1851-1901) => Scotland => Roxburghshire => Topic started by: ThrelfallYorky on Friday 29 June 12 17:09 BST (UK)
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Revisiting Hawick recently after many years, we looked for a hotel we'd stayed at then, when we were young and foolish.
We looked for it largely because we couldn't believe it could still be in business. It was a strange experience! We were looking for "The Commercial Hotel", and couldn't find it.
I thought it may be where Sainsburys' Supermarket bloomed, my other half thought it was a building a little way away, in the throes of redevelopment.
Does anyone recall just where it is/was, please? I've also hunted round on "GoogleEarth" trying to spot the location.
Idle curiosity, I suppose, but I'm sure you know how it is when something just lodges in your mind - I want to know, now, and it will annoy me until I find out for sure.
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Can you put a timeframe for when you stayed there? Might help jog people's memories better with an idea of years!
Monica
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Know it was somewhere between late 1970s and mid 1980s we were there - as I said, we were young and foolish then, and zoomed all over the place.
It was a bit of a timewarp, even then. We just felt it couldn't have survived as it was then, so went to see if we could find it, as we were passing through a bit ago.
When we couldn't agree where it was (see original post) I got a bit obsessive, trying to find if it was where Sainsburys is. I really do want to know- even if I'm wrong!
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Nothing wrong with being wrong (for us obsessive types, it is just getting to the info that matters ;)).
Hope someone can help. You might need to access a business directory for the period. Nothing really showing on general searches as you have found.
Monica
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Worth phoning the Tourist Information Centre or the Library - you might well get an answer instantly!
Alternatively try looking in the old Phone Books on Ancestry....
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Are you sue about the name of the hotel, commercial road only had a B&B at the end the Station Hotel around the corner at the north bridge, in the high street there used to be the tower and crown and elm house is still on bridge street. I ask my mum and she doesn't remember a commercial hotel.
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It was a hotel, rather than a B & B, and we really think / thought it was the Commercial Hotel - I seem to recall it being fairly near a bridge, though, too. Very solid, greyish and square and symmetrical. Can't find a receipt to check after all these years - so far back that one of us probably paid by cheque, but I can't see us keeping cheque books quite that far back!
I'll try other sources, thanks for the ideas. (Knew someone here would come up with something) Thanks to you all.
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could it be the Ewe & Lamb at the Sandhill nr the Albert Bridge at the bottom of Commercial rd - its an Inn (pub with rooms).
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I think that's the building where Sergio's is, it used to be a hotel, I'm meeting with some old guys today, I'll ask them if they can remember. But there was a Commercial Hotel in Hawick.
Stewart
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I wonder if it was the Station Hotel. I have attached a link which describes it as a "first class family and commercial hotel". It would not have been too far from Sainsbury's either.
http://www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk/sc-51198-1-dovemount-place-the-station-hotel-
Brina :)
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I was talking to some old Hawick worthies yesterday, and none of them can remember a hotel called the Commercial in their lifetime, let alone the 70's or 80's.
I mentioned perhaps the old Channel Cafe, (Sergio's) but they said no, as that was only used as a boarding house for Turnbull's the dyers workers, and was never a Hotel, so that lets that out.
The only reference I can find about a Commercial Hotel is in the 1870's a wee bitty early, which stood where the Catholic Church now is.
I think Brina is spot on, the Station Hotel, it fits the description perfectly and the location is just about correct.
Stewart
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Thank you so much, Stirling76, especially. I think it must have been the Station Hotel from all your efforts - wonder how we could have got the name "Commercial Hotel" fixed in our minds? Perhaps there was something etched on a window to that effect??
Your descriptions fit so well with what I recall, apart from the name, of course, that you all must be right. Ah well, it was a long time ago ... and in another country.... and we were young.
Thank you all for your help and kindness.
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Hi
The building at the end of Albert Bridge was The Bridge House Guest House run by my mothers parents later extended for Turnbull the Dyers Workers.
I lived in Hawick until the early 70s and cant remember a Commercial Hotel But it could be the old Victoria Hotel (THE Vic) frequented by business travelers demolished mid 70s.It was situated next to Woolworths on the High Street It had a large function room used for weddings etc. (I had my reception there).
There was also the crown hotel with a public bar fronting on the High Street this was between the Town Hall and the Tower. The building is still there.
The was also the Temperance Hotel on the High Street opposite the Vic.
Hope some of this jogs the memory. Regards minto77
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Hi again
My wife has just reminded me about the Buccleuch Hotel on weensland Road/ Trinity Street. Still there now a public bar /function room. In the 70s you would have seen the railway bridge and embankment on one side and the cattle mart on the other. The cattlemart now a supermarket Safeway I think. The railway embankment also gone to make way for a new road. The road layout has also changed a large roundabout now stands where the railway bridge across Weensland Road once stood.
minto77
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Thank you also, Minto - I'm glued to GoogleEarth now, with all these alternatives.
I even scavenged out some old negatives, hoping against hope I'd taken a photo of the place - but I haven't found one.
I suspect it means that we'll have to take another trip to Hawick sometimes, and try to ascertain exactly which building it was. It's really annoying when something gets so stuck in your mind, isn't it? It wasn't until we found ourselves in the area last month that I'd even thought of the place.
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Hi again
There is also a small hotel in North Bridge Street/Northcote Street which is close to the old bridge on what WAS the main road into the town. It was two houses but was licenced for residents, now on Hawick map as Lux B&B but had a few names. Remember the road layouts have changed a lot the main A7 ran along the High Street and North Bridge Street not Commercial Road as it does now. You mentioned Sainsburys that is on Commercial Road which has always been an industrial/college are no hotels there.
I don't know what type of building you are looking for but if you Google Old Photographs of Hawick there a number of sites and hundred of photos you might get lucky.
minto77
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Thanks again, Minto77, you really are a mine of information, as I recall it most definitely was an hotel, with dining room, bar and all that, as well a quite a number of (rather gloomy) rooms and a central-ish staircase.
Brown paintwork comes to mind, but that's not a lot of help, most things seemed brown then. We only stayed one or at the most two nights, on the way back down into England, and we booked through a tourist Information service when we decided that we'd travelled enough for one day.
It was I think very greyish, rendered possibly, symmetrical and I think 3 or possibly even 4 floors high - I think our room was on the first floor, above the dining room / public rooms, and I'm sure there were other floors above.
It's silly, but I was determined to try and find it when we ended up back in Hawick again. I think that on that evening many years ago we didn't realise there was so much more of the town than a short stroll round in the immediate area after dinner, showed us - some shops, all rather traditional and similar, on one or two streets nearby, in one direction, and, as first I mentioned, quite a sizeable bridge on the right hand side, a short way away, I think, as you stood at the front door, but well within sight.
I really think you may have been on the right track with the name "Station Hotel", and can't prove that the place we stayed was "the Commercial Hotel" - but for some reason we both thought that was what the place we'd stayed years ago was called.
Thank you all for your helpfulness with our nostalgic ramble looking for Memory Lane!
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Hi
The attached photograph shows the Station Hotel. Does this revive any memories??
minto77
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Thanks for the effort, but really the image didn't come through to me very clear. I do appreciate the effort you have made. I just got an impression from your image of gables - and I'd felt the Hotel we'd stayed at was more four-square and a bit less gothic in image.
I'm still enjoying myself trawling all over the internet calling up all sorts of images of old Hawick, and learning a great deal.
It's amazing what a quite small, unimportant query can lead you on to, on this site!! Floreat Rootschat, and all that!
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I'll be in the town today, so I'll take my camera with me, lets see if I come up with the right hotel.
Stewart
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This has become a fun challenging thread now.... ;)
The mission to find this hotel is full on it seems!
Adding to the research pile is info on here www.historic-scotland.gov.uk/hawick-burgh-publication.pdf Page 28 onwards has a section with photos on Hotels and Clubs for additonal background.
Monica :)
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I've taken photos of the hotels in Hawick, and the buildings that were hotels from the 70's to the 80's, lets see if the mystery hotel in one of these.
The first one is the Tower Hotel, which is at the far end of the High Street heading South. The hotel has been closed down for some years.
The Second is of the Station Hotel, not been used as a hotel for years, the bar is still open. This was across the road from The Railway station, just yards from commercial road
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The first pic is the Kirklands Hotel, now a private house.
The second is the building where the King's Hotel used to be, now a B&B.
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The first pic is the Elm House Hotel, still functions.
The second is where the Crown Hotel was in the High Street.
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The first is the Buccleuch Hotel, now only a restaurant, stopped the rooms only a few years ago.
The second really was never a hotel, however like the station its very close to a bridge. It is now an italian Restaurant, before the it was the Channel Cafe and before that it was a boarding house.
As Monica says, this is a Challenge, if its not one of these! then we are snookered!
Stewart
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My goodness! A day or two without checking the computer, and it's fantastic what's popped up while my back has been turned ( and judging by the aching shoulders, otherwise employed in a soggy garden). I'm overwhelmed.
Thank you so much for the great help, which is totally over the top for such a feeble little initial query, especially Minto77 and stirling76, you are wonderful.
I am now quite convinced it was the Station Hotel - and if/when I ever get to Hawick again, I shall have to go into that bar, just to check it out finally.
It was such an idle comment that set it all off, we were in the area, taking about an unplanned visit there many years ago, and a Hawick hotel that had been what may best be called a "memorable" evening meal, bed and breakfast experience at that time, and we really just wondered if it had survived, and then drove round - and round - and tried to find it. We then could not agree quite where or what it had been, thought it had been the "Commercial Hotel" - and sought help here.
You are all amazing, and I can only thank you all for your interest, generous help, and skill downloading photos ( I can never get it right).
Thank you all again. "Station Hotel" Hawick, is now firmly in my mind.
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Well done Stirling76. I would have done the same but for the fact that I am 500 miles away.minto77
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good photos
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Just to point out that the first photo is know the Tourist Info/Registrator Office/Museum on the corner of Towerknowe
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Good News - I've found the Location of the Commercial Hotel ;D
I was looking through was old notes made by my late father and came across a list of the Hotel and Bars in Hawick - the Commercial Hotel was in Buccleuch Street opposite Grape Inn (around no 19) both now gone.
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The building you refer to as the commercial hotel was demolished in the early 1900s. The building known as the grapes inn is still there although now houses/flats. It was known as the grapes inn because wallpaper was put up when it was still a coaching inn but it was hung upside down so that the grapes hung up and the name stuck.
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:-\ Hate to say this after so much....but if the Commercial Hotel last mentioned opposite the Grape Inn was demolished in the early 1900s...can't be the right location for the 1970/80's.
Monica
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re Comercial Hotel
I have been told that the Comercial Hotel was situated in the centre of Hawick High Street oposite the once Woolworths Store. There was a Temperence Hotel there but not sure if it is the same hotel.