For sale; historic Burns house

A house is up for sale in Kirkcudbright that has many attractive features such as “elegant public rooms” and a fully landscaped garden. Oh, and a poem by Robert Burns too...

The Bards short poem, scribbled on a Kirkcudbright wall over 200 years ago.

The historic Georgian townhouse at 52 High Street was, back in the Bard’s day, The Kings Arms coaching inn, often used by Scotland’s County Commissioners - ie; excisemen - when holding meetings in the town’s tollbooth.

Burns is known to have worked as an exciseman between 1789 and 1796 and a short poem scrawled on a bedroom wall, attributed to him, was re-discovered in the 1920s.

The lines uncovered are very similar to the lyrics of a song Burns wrote around that time, “The Lass That Made The Bed To Me.”

Famous local painter William Robson later lived in the house and was convinced that the poem was a genuine Burns work and had it preserved on the wall where the Bard allegedly scribbled it more than 200 years ago.

The house has been extensively renovated over the years but the poem remains.

The sale is being handled by estate agents Galbraiths.