Helensburgh in 1860 is a well established town of mainly substantial detached houses within their own grounds set above the main shoreline Clyde Street. It is laid out in a regular grid pattern the centre of which is the all important railway station. It was the recent development of the railway system which has made the settlement of the town
viable, linking the commercial middle class, for whom the
town was built, to their offices and enterprises in Glasgow.
There is strong evidence of a civic community with a town
hall, bank, three churches and a gas works. Day visitors to
the town on excursions from the city were landed at the
long pier and longer stay holidaymakers were no doubt
well accommodated at the strategically situated Tontine
Hotel. The town bears a strong similarity to a resort
further to the south, both in location and function, Southport.
Overall the Helensburgh a has settled, respectable and
contented air, an oasis in the turbulent social times of the
industrial revolution, it is the one town in Scotland without a
poor house.
