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The Dumbarton Combination Poorhouse once occupied this site; it was built here after an earlier location, a field beside Scapesland Cottage (NS40217587) that was then being used by Dumbarton Cricket Club, had been considered and rejected. The Poorhouse, which cost £7098, officially opened in 1865. The architect was J C Walker (James Campbell Walker) of Edinburgh; the building had a plain exterior, and it would be extended several times. There was a seven-foot-high boundary wall enclosing the grounds; there was also a lodge.

In the second volume of his "Book of Dumbartonshire", nineteenth-century local historian Joseph Irving writes that "in 1865, and principally through the exertions of Mr J. B. Risk, Chairman of the Dumbarton Board, a combination was formed of neighbouring parishes, and a poorhouse commenced on a pleasant healthy site at the outskirts of the burgh, near to Barloan toll-bar. It was designed to accommodate 134 paupers, male and female, and 40 lunatics. Including site, but exclusive of furniture, the first cost was about £7000, but since then various useful alterations have been carried out. The present governor is Mr. McLean, formerly of the county police force."

It became the Townend Hospital in 1932, and the Central Hospital in 1948. Under the new name of Strathclyde House, it became a care home for the elderly in 1965, by which time the grim high boundary wall had been removed, and the lodge had been demolished. As a residential home, it closed in 1977, but the building was used as a day-care hospital until 1983, after which it was demolished to make way for a new care home.

That new care home opened in 1985, and it was called Langcraigs Residential Home. It closed in 2018, and in 2019 it was demolished to make way for another care home, Alderwood Care Home, that would be built on the same site.

References:

• "J C Walker": see Link at the Dictionary of Scottish Architects.
• "J B Risk": see NS4076 : The Risk Family Memorial and a further reference given there.
• "Scapesland Cottage": see a c.1860 map sheet — Link — at NLS and Link at Scotland's Places.
• "Barloan toll-bar": see NS4076 : Barloan Toll Roundabout.
• Joseph Irving, "Book of Dumbartonshire" (Volume 2, 1879), page 142.
• Mike Taylor, in a "Dumbarton Remembered" feature in the Lennox Herald issue of October 3rd 2003.
• Other cuttings in Dumbarton Public Library.

Created: Thu, 21 Nov 2019, Updated: Sat, 2 Mar 2024