Bridgend

About Bridgend

The current bridge dates from 1764. Just to the South of the bridge stood a toll house where travellers paid the charge for crossing the bridge. These tolls were used for the ‘public good’ in Dalkeith. A house just north of the bridge was the scene of the Brigend poisoning in 1911. A young man desperate to pay off his debts added arsenic to the after dinner coffee during his parent’s Silver Wedding party. His father and one of the guests died, many others were very ill. He fled to the Channel Islands and took his own life as the police closed in on him.