THIS week, Ronald Ireland brings us the history of Peebles' Gas Works...

The use of coal gas was pioneered by a Scottish Engineer called William Murdoch, who was born in Old Cumnock in Ayrshire in 1754.

He moved to Cornwall in 1779 and experimented with the use of coal gas as a source of energy for lighting his own house.

By the early part of the nineteenth century, his technology had been developed to the stage where it could be used for street lighting, first in London in 1807 and then in Edinburgh in 1819.

On January 9, 1829 a meeting of the burgesses was held which agreed to form a company called the Peebles Gas Company. Before that, in December 1828, Peebles Town Council had agreed that if a gas company was set up, it would be allowed to open up and lay pipes in the streets and if that proved successful, it would then have the street lamps lit by gas.

Initially a site for a gasworks on the Old Town Green (now Greenside) was chosen, but it proved to be unsuitable. A site was found on the area of ground lying to the west of the Parish Church. Today the site is still visible and forms part of the parkland and walkways close to the modern swimming pool.

One of the factors which made the development of a gasworks feasible was the great improvement in major roads serving the town following the Turnpike Acts. That allowed coking coal to be brought to the town from the coalfields of Lanarkshire and Midlothian.

To begin with gas was produced for only ten months of the year and the street lights were lit for only about a third of the year, during the darkest winter months.

By the end of the 19th century, the demand for gas had greatly increased and as well as street lighting, was beginning to be used for household appliances such as gas cookers. In 1898 the assets of the Peebles Gas Company were acquired by the Town Council. Within a few years demand was outstripping supply and in 1905 it was decided to build a new gas works at Eshiels as the existing site, which also served as the council yard, was too restricted to allow for expansion. By then the existence of railways made it possible to import coal directly to the Eshiels site.

In 1948 the Town Council starting converting all street lighting to electricity. The gas works at Eshiels became part of the national system and continued in operation until the advent of North Sea gas in the late 1960s.