Dumbarton

"DUMBARTON, town, castle, and parish in Dumbartonshire. The town stands on low flat ground, bisected by the river Leven, 3/4 mile from the Clyde, and 15½ miles north-west-by-west of Glasgow; covers the site of the Roman naval station Theodosia, and the site of a Culdee cell; shared in the history of Dumbarton Castle as the royal seat of the kingdom of Cumbria or Strathclyde; is now a seaport, a royal and parliamentary burgh, and they political capital of Dumbartonshire; unites with Port Glasgow, Renfrew, Rutherglen, and Kilmarnock in sending a member to Parliament; comprises a main body on the left bank of the Leven, and two suburbs, old and new, on the right bank; was designed in 1876 to undergo extensive improvements in its streets and harbour, and in 1881 to acquire an eastern suburb with house accommodation for about 2000 families; was long distinguished for glass manufacture, and is much more distinguished now for shipbuilding; publishes 2 weekly newspapers; and has a head post office with money order and telegraph departments, a railway station, 3 banking offices, 2 hotels, a fine town hall of 1865, a long costly pier of 1874-75, a steepled Established church of 1810, a handsome Free church of 1878, another Free church, 2 United Presbyterian churches, an elegant Episcopalian church of 1873. Evangelical Union, Baptist, Wesleyan, and Roman Catholic churches, a Mechanics' Institute, and 7 public schools with accommodation for 1961 scholars. Real property in 188-81, £43,842. Pop. 13,786."

[From The Gazetteer of Scotland, by Rev. John Wilson, 1882.]