In 1882-4, Frances Groome's Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland described Gogar like this:
Gogar, a station, a quondam parish, and a burn in the W of Edinburghshire. The station, in Ratho parish, is on the Edinburgh and Glasgow section of the North British railway, 5½ miles WSW of Edinburgh. The parish since 1599 has been incorporated partly with Ratho, partly with Kirkliston, and chiefly with Corstorphine; and contains Gogar House, Gogar Burn House, Gogar Mount; Gogar Park, Gogar Green, Gogar Mains, Gogar Bank, Gogar Nursery, and Over Gogarall within 1 or 2 miles of the station. ...
Its church was older than that of Corstorphine, and a small part of it still exists, having been set apart soon after the Reformation as a family burying-place. On 27 Aug. 1650, twenty-five days before the Battle of Dunbar, Gogar was the scene of an artillery due; between the Scotch under General Leslie and the English under Oliver Cromwell, a skirmish thus described by the Protector himself:-'We marched westward of Edinburgh towards Stirling, which the Enemy perceiving, marched with as great expedition as was possible to prevent us; and the vanguards of both the Armies came to skirmish,-upon a place where bogs and passes made the access of each Army to the other difficult. We, being ignorant of the place, drew up, hoping to have engaged; but found no way feasible, by reason of the bogs and other difficulties. We drew up our cannon, and did that day discharge two or three hundred great shot upon them; a considerable number they likewise returned to us: and this was all that passed from each to other. Wherein we had near twenty killed and wounded, but not one Commission Officer. The Enemy, as we are in formed, had about eighty killed, and some considerable Officers. Seeing they would keep their ground, from which we could not remove them, and our bread being spent,we were necessitated to go for a new supply: and so marched off about ten or eleven o'clock on Wednesday morning,'first to the camp at the Braid Hills, and thence to Musselburgh (Carlyle's Cromwell, part vi., letter 138). Gogar Burn, rising near the middle of Kirknewton parish, winds 13 miles north-north-eastward through or along the borders of Kirknewton, Ratho, Currie, Corstorphine, and Cramond, till it falls into the river Almond at a point 3 ¼ miles WNW of Corstorphine village. It abounds with excellent trout, but is strictly preserved.—Ord. Sur., sh. 32, 1857.
Gogar through time
Gogar is now part of Edinburgh district. Click here for graphs and data of how Edinburgh has changed over two centuries. For statistics about Gogar itself, go to Units and Statistics.
GB Historical GIS / University of Portsmouth, History of Gogar, in Edinburgh and Midlothian | Map and description, A Vision of Britain through Time.
URL: https://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/place/21645
Date accessed: 15th June 2024
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