Mary Stenhouse
The correct name was Millknowe and Hainshawside; Millknowe is in Stenton parish so Whiteadder reservoir is half in Stenton and half in Whittingehame parishes. Before flooding, oats, turnips and enough potatoes for the farm people were grown. Feeding rape or sheep rape was grown for hoggets in autumn and winter.
The farm consisted of one farmhouse and one cottage the end of which had been a bothy for the Irish labourer, later a separate wooden bothy was built. Half a mile away a shepherd’s cottage with byre and pigsty and another out on the hill for the outby shepherd. The farm originally was 2200 acres but acreage would be cut in 1968-69 when reservoir was built and steading and houses were burned and bulldozed into the bottom.
Two Orlit houses were built above the water line in 1953 but not wired for electricity as the electric company said power could never come as far out. However, power came in the early 1960s as it was going to be needed for reservoir and pumping station and for the water attendant’s new house at the foot of the reservoir.
A bungalow and large shed were built above the Olits to house the shepherd and farm machinery in the 1970s.
Kingside school was in Whittingehame parish but Millknowe and Gameshiel residents as well as outlying residents in Innerwick parish and Whittingehame met there to collect ration books and attend monthly evening services in summer.
The East Lothian – Berwickshire boundary has been moved from Harehead to just beyond the reservoir so perhaps the area of the parish has been reduced.
Mary Stenhouse grew up at Millknowe, where her father worked; she went to Kingside school, and now lives at Morham.