Lost Aberdeen: The Freedom Lands

This, the final volume in Diane Morgan’s acclaimed Lost Aberdeen trilogy, is a fascinating, ground-breaking account of the west side of the city.The Stocket Lands and the adjoining Lands of Rubislaw, both Crown grants dating from the fourteenth century, form the greatest part of the urban section of the Freedom Lands, stretching in a vast semi-circle from the Low Stocket (Westburn Road) in the north to the South parks of Rubislaw (Great Western Road) in the south. We discover not only land improvement and great mansions, but the unexpected, from Turkish baths to aircraft manufacture, and a bevy of Scottish Enlightenment polymaths – Dr Hamilton, Professor Copland, and the Rev Skene Keith, the cultured Sheriff Dauney, his near neighbour, Francis Peacock, doyen of the performing arts, and that dilettante par excellence James Skene, who south to metamorphose his unpromising Lands of Rubislaw into an Edinburgh of the North and in so doing set in train the development of Aberdeen’s golden West end. Featuring period photographs, illustrations and maps, Lost Aberdeen: The Freedom Lands uncovers the forgotten hamlets and communities that make up this large area of the modern city.