Drummond Street, Edinburgh

For other uses, see Drummond Street.

Coordinates: 55°56′52″N 3°11′03″W / 55.94778°N 3.18417°W / 55.94778; -3.18417 Drummond Street is a street in Edinburgh's Old Town, near the famous Royal Mile and Holyrood. The street joins South Bridge and the Pleasance. Its west most opening is opposite the University of Edinburgh School of Law located at Old College. Drummond Street is a cobbled road and is home to many students as well as pubs and restaurants, as well as a sex shop.

The street was named after George Drummond.^[1]

Included on the street is the Rutherford Bar^[2], patronized in the time of Robert Louis Stevenson and by members of The Speculative Society at the University. Their weekly meetings were held on Tuesdays, officially from 8 p.m. to midnight.^[3] Lord Guthrie, joint president of the Society with Stevenson in the years 1872–1873 and 1873–1874, recalls in his personal memoirs of Stevenson:

About nine we adjourned for half an hour, when most members left "to buy pencils", as they gravely informed any new-comer, a euphemism for a visit to Rutherford's public-house in Drummond Street, otherwise (also euphemistically) known as "The Pump".

—Lord Guthrie, Robert Louis Stevenson Some Personal Recollections^[4]

A former second floor café, now a Chinese restaurant, is reputedly where J. K. Rowling began writing the Harry Potter series.^[5]

At the junction of Drummond Street and the Pleasance can be found some vestiges of a bastion of the Flodden Wall.^[6] The wall travels from that bastion along the north side of the street.^[7] The lower four feet of the present wall still comprises the stones of the original.^[1]

The street was the site of the Drummond Street Surgical Hospital. This was an addition to the Royal Infirmary, which was built in 1853 by David Bryce.^[8][9] The February 1850 Monthly Journal of Medical Science records the plans for building the hospital as follows:

The new building will stand upon an elevated piece of ground, presenting every facility for drainage, and will front Drummond Street. It will supersede the necessity for several out-buildings, in which surgical cases are at present rather uncomfortably accommodated, and which will be removed. The surgical hospital, in its new form, will contain beds for 200 patients. If funds are still at their disposal after the completion of the surgical, the managers propose to erect a new wing to the medical department; and, in conformity with plans in their possession, ultimately to rebuild the whole house, turning its front to Drummond Street, which would undoubtedly be a great improvement.

—Monthly Journal of Medical Science^[10]

On 1857-11-04, John Gamgee set up the New Edinburgh Veterinary College on the street, which received its royal sign manual in 1859.^[11][12] Gamgee didn't regard Drummond Street as an ideal location, and sought relocation elsewhere.^[13]

In 1860, Robert Nasmith opened the Dental Dispensary, which was a forerunner of the Edinburgh Dental Hospital and School, on the street.^[14]

References

1. ^ ^{a b} Edwin Francis Catford (1975). Edinburgh: the story of a city. Hutchinson. pp. 19,62. ISBN 0091238501. 
2. ^ Shelby, Barry (2006). Frommer's Edinburgh & Glasgow. Frommer's. pp. 106. ISBN 0470055316. 
3. ^ Andrew Lownie (2005). The Edinburgh literary companion (2nd ed.). Polygon. pp. 56. ISBN 1904598617. 
4. ^ Lord Guthrie (2005). Robert Louis Stevenson Some Personal Recollections. Kessinger Publishing. pp. 33. ISBN 1417913908. 
5. ^ "Walking Tour 2 ". The New York Times, 20 November 2006.
6. ^ Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments and Constructions of Scotland (1951). An Inventory of the Ancient and Historical Monuments of the City of Edinburgh: With the Thirteenth Report of the Commission. H. M. Stationery Office. pp. lxv. 
7. ^ "Edinburgh". The Topographical, Statistical, and Historical Gazetteer of Scotland. I. A–H. Glasgow: A. Fullarton & Co.. 1842. pp. 455. 
8. ^ John Gifford, Colin McWilliam, David Walker, and Christopher Wilson (1984). Edinburgh (3rd ed.). Penguin Books. pp. 186. ISBN 014071068X. 
9. ^ Charles J. Smith and J. G. Collee (1994). Edinburgh's Contribution to Medical Microbiology. Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Glasgow. pp. 16. ISBN 0951176560. 
10. ^ Monthly Journal of Medical Science. X. Edinburgh: Sutherland and Knox. 1850. pp. 198. ISBN 0217782280. 
11. ^ Pamela Hunter (2004), Veterinary Medicine, Ashgate Publishing, Ltd, pp. 215, ISBN 0754640531 
12. ^ Henry Colin Gray Matthew and Brian Howard Harrison (2004). "John Gamgee". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. pp. 362. ISBN 0198613717. 
13. ^ The book of the Old Edinburgh Club. 6. The Old Edinburgh Club. 2005. pp. 61. ISBN 0951728458. 
14. ^ Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (1965). Journal of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. XI. Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. pp. 82. ISBN 1841101699.