Roberton, Scottish Borders


Roberton is a small village in the Scottish Borders area of Scotland, on the B711 and near to the A7, from Hawick, from Galashiels, and from Langholm. It is situated by the Ale Water, the Alemoor Loch and the Borthwick Water, and nearby are Branxholme, Broadhaugh, Burnfoot and the Craik Forest.

Borders Poet

The Borders poet Will H. Ogilvie was born in Kelso and died in nearby Ashkirk. A cairn has been erected in his memory.
Unveiled in August 1993, an identical cairn was also erected in Bourke, New South Wales. The bronze was prized from the surface and stolen in August 2016 for metal theft. One of Ogilvie's 800+ poems included the six stanza The road to Roberton:

Borthwick Mains Symbol Stone

to the east of the village, in front of the house at Borthwick Mains, is a fish symbol-stone, possibly representing a salmon. The stone is 1.5 metres high, and the figure of a fish is almost a metre long, with the tail downwards, cut into the stone with pecked lines. It is similar to class 1 Pictish symbol stones of the 6th or 7th century, but its status is doubtful, and it may belong to a more recent period.