DDHS AGM Presentations 2026

Published Categorised as Adverts, Buildings, Castles, Churches, Exhibitions, Fishing, Hospitals, Past Talks

April 2026

This year’s AGM took place in the Town House on Tuesday 14th April 2026. At the conclusion of the AGM business, Committee members each gave a short presentation. Text by Pauline Smeed and Dr James Herring, with links added by the latter.

Dr James Herring led the presentations and showed attendees photos from the 1999 Millenium celebrations at Dunbar Harbour. The photo above shows the Dunbar Lifeboat with cox Noel Wight at the helm and 15 year old Andrew Chisholm playing the pipes at the front of the lifeboat. It was a spectacular entrance to the harbour, with the lifeboat lit up with flares and it reminded many people of Up Helly Aa (good photos) in Shetland, where a replica Viking ship is set alight. There was a huge crowd of people at the harbour on Auld Year’s Night 1999 to see an archer fire a flaming arow to light the beacon on the castle top and then to cheer wildly as the lifeboat appeared, at first just a blaze of light and then as an illuminated vessel.

DDHS TreasurerAlasdair Swan followed with an outline of his forthcoming talk on the 3 Dunbar harbours in medieval times. The talk will cover aspects of Dunbar Castle (good photos), the early fishing trade both in the present harbours and at Belhaven, aswell as Dunbar as a coastal town where traders came an went during the medieval period.

DDHS Secretary Pauline Smeed told a good -sized AGM audience that among the many projects supported by the society this year was the renovation and re-opening of Dunbar Parish Church Hall. To support a display in the hall, DDHS donated items of past events in the hall, together with copies of the original plans of the hall from 1908, The photo above shows an advert for a concert in the hall in aid of Dunbar Cottage Hospital. you can read more about and see photos of the renovations here.

Chair Gordon Easingwood then showed the photo above, which is a Boys Brigade drum found under the hall stage during the renovation. The drum was a reverse donation i.e. given to DDHS by the hall committee and it was passed on to the Museum and Archives in the John Gray Centre. You can see a photo of the Dunbar BB corps in the 1960s here.