A virtual tour of the early history of Juniper Green
Slide 4
The river bank below the by-pass bridge over the Water of Leith in the 1990s, a possible site of an early bleaching green
Now, let's start on the bypass bridge on Lanark Road at the east end of the village. Turn down the steps near the Tanners' pub and go down to the Water of Leith. Here you find a south- and west- facing slope which catches both the sun and the wind. It is very close to the river and to the earlier ford from Woodhall House to Denholm's mill as Inglis mill was called. Sun, wind, water and customers are all vital ingredients for the early bleaching industry. This is the area where a bleaching green may have been established in the very early 1700s, paying rent to the "Big House" for "a little bank". Certainly a bleachfield is named here on a map of Gillespie's Farm estate in 1771 (RHP 47). This is all conjecture but maybe, just maybe, it gave us the green in our village's name.