Dunbar
Size: A5 with 1 inch border.
Golf is recorded in the Dunbar area as far back as 1616; on the west side of the town when playing golf on the Sabbath was banned by the religious authorities of the time. This puts Dunbar among the earliest sites for golf in Scotland but it is not till 1794 that its first golfing organisation is recorded.
Size: A5 with 1 inch border.
Golf is recorded in the Dunbar area as far back as 1616; on the west side of the town when playing golf on the Sabbath was banned by the religious authorities of the time. This puts Dunbar among the earliest sites for golf in Scotland but it is not till 1794 that its first golfing organisation is recorded.
Size: A5 with 1 inch border.
Golf is recorded in the Dunbar area as far back as 1616; on the west side of the town when playing golf on the Sabbath was banned by the religious authorities of the time. This puts Dunbar among the earliest sites for golf in Scotland but it is not till 1794 that its first golfing organisation is recorded.
In May of this year a body known as The Dunbar Golfing Society set down its rules and listed its 27 members’ names. They met to play on the West Barns links but no other record of them survives; the links there were soon commandeered by the military for use as a training and encampment area.
Not till 1856 did the town of Dunbar establish the Club we know today. In the ornate script of the time, probably that of John Jaffray, the first Club minute carefully records that on Saturday, December 20 1856, having hired Dunbar Town Hall at a cost of one shilling, six gentlemen gathered for the purpose of forming a golf club to be called Dunbar Golf Club, under regulations to be afterwards submitted. Capt. George Warrender of Lochend, aged 31, chaired the founder members; George was in the Coldstream Guards and later succeeded to the title of 7th Baronet of Bruntsfield. The other five founders were Capt. James Cox of the Berwickshire militia, Lt. John Stewart, William Anderson, James Brand and John Jaffray, with Jaffray elected as convenor, or honorary secretary. The prevalence of military titles is no surprise; by this date Dunbar had become a major garrison town.
The Club’s first official competition was in April 1857 when Warrender’s wife gifted the Club’s first medal, which was won Lt. Buckle in 93 strokes. The competitors then retired to the George Inn in the High Street for a dinner. In the autumn the second major competition was arranged, for the newly purchased Club Medal. The winner was Capt. Home with a score of 91. Probably the most important members in these formative years were the Duke of Roxburghe and most of his family. The Duke was ultimate owner of the links land and his wealth ensured a stable future for the embryonic golf organisation and resulted in a beneficial association over the next 100 years.
By 1869 membership had reached 54, comprising mostly well-to-do East Lothian landowners, Edinburgh merchants and the upper ranks of the military. A black-ball system was operated which kept things this way. However in 1870 comes first mention of ladies’ golf when an organisation was created allowing their play over 12 holes on a western portion of the links. Although today’s ladies’ club was instituted in 1894, this earlier club is the third oldest ladies golf club yet recorded.