Rough and tumble Wellgate days were music to the ears

Craigie’s ongoing spotlight on Dundee’s old Wellgate is prompting a healthy response.

Stanley Gordon’s lovely initial offering has sparked a fair few messages about its shops, and today we hear from Frank Galloway who spent much of his early home life in the long-gone thoroughfare.

The ex-roads engineer was partly raised at ‘Back Land’, the name given to the close that stood next to the former Watt’s music shop.

Frank says: “Born in December 1939 in my grandmother’s house on the ground floor of the tenement at the rear of 31 Wellgate, my first real memory must have been when I was four or five years old hearing the siren

and going to the large concrete air raid shelter – one of two that took up half of what was the communal drying green.

“Another early memory was walking with my grandfather down the Wellgate and along to the Overgate to have his accumulator – or battery – charged up to listen to the radio. The kitchen also served as the living room, with an open fire in one corner where we would all gather round in the evening to listen to the essential radio.

“Above the table that took up more

than half the room was the pulley which seemed to be permanently full. This three-bedroomed house was home to my grandparents, six aunts, my younger cousin, my mother and me, all sharing one toilet.

“My father served in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers for five years in the Middle East so I was five years old before I remember him in his Army uniform.

“Fortunately we were given a house in Blackscroft just as Father was de-mobbed from the Army, but I remember going back to the Wellgate as often as possible as I had made great friends there, plus the really warm welcome from my gran and aunties.

“As the war was over we used the concrete shelters as our gang hut and the Wellgate as our territory, especially on a Saturday morning when we would go to the King’s Club Cinema and then to the bottom of the Hilltown for a bag of ‘wulks’, the shells of which littered Wellgate from top to bottom.

“Often I would still be at my gran’s into the evening and one vivid memory was standing at the bottom of the close watching the pubs coming out at 9.30pm – yes, 9.30pm! Regularly the pub on the corner of Wellgate and Baltic Street would spill out and a punch-up would inevitably start.

“Just as inevitable was the arrival of the ‘Black Maria’ from Bell Street, out of which would appear half-a-dozen policemen

– all well over ‘ten feet tall’ – who would unceremoniously propel the battlers into the back of the van. We always thought that this weekly event was for our entertainment!

“Another great memory was our closeness to St Andrew’s Parish Church and joining the Boys’ Brigade at the age of 10 along with some pals from in and around the Wellgate. There were over a hundred officers and boys and we were given gymnastics, first aid training, swimming lessons, drill and a choice of bugle or pipe band.

“One special later memory is of going in 1964 with Faye – my wife for over 57 years – to visit my aunt, who still lived in the same house at 31. We were passing Watt’s when we heard over the outside speaker Jim Reeves singing Dark Moon. We decided to go in and find out what was playing this record and finished up buying the radiogram. The salesman gave us The Intimate Jim Reeves as a gift as we had only been married a few months. We still have the LP and play it often to remind us of those happy days!”

Eric Niven of Dundee took this picture in Highland Perthshire and writes: “This view is from the Bealach route near Killiecrankie where the weather turned out lovely.”