Would you care to partake of the waters?

From the end of the 1700s, Peterhead became established as a fashionable resort and spa town. As one visitor, Robert Forsyth, put it in 1806: This is the most thriving and well built town on the coast of Buchan... it has, near its harbour, a mineral well... and is frequented in summer by not a little gay company, coming to enjoy the amusements of a rural town, thus thriving and elegant, as well as to repair health by sea bathing and by use of the mineral water. Here many elegant houses for the accommodation of strangers have been erected: there is also a ballroom under which there are two salt water baths.

By 1800 the original mineral wells had started to decline in quality and volume and the town's status as a fashionable spa was in serious decline. in 1824, in an attempt to recover Peterhead's popularity this new well was built,  at a cost of £5, overlooking the beach at Gadle Braes. Sadly the investment did nothing to halt the drift of wealthy patrons to more fashionable resorts.

The well is now truly derelict, especially in B&W, as the "extra" shows.

An interesting aside: news of the Russian Revolution first reached Britain via the Norwegian-Scottish undersea cable which came on shore at this very same place!