Provincial Grand Lodge of Midlothian

The formation of this Lodge in the Nineteenth Century was due to a desire among Brethren at Kirkliston that the benefits of Freemasonry should be extended to this part of the County. A meeting was held in the Newliston Arms on the 26th February 1868 a hostelry that still exists to this day and the twelve Brethren present and with an advance of £10 from George Simpson an application was sent to Grand Lodge for a Lodge Charter. The Maitland part of the Lodge name although not clear may have come from the Maitland Hog family of Newliston House or it may have come from Sir Alex Gibson Maitland of Clifton Hall a relative of the Newliston family.

The Lodge owned its first hall when it bought from the Friendly Society the Fellowship Hall on the Main Street Kirkliston for £245 and was consecrated on the 22nd October 1902 by Brother Major Gordon Gilmour Right Worshipful Provincial Grand Master of Midlothian.

As if coming of age Twenty One years later the members purchased the Kirkliston Drill Hall which is the Lodges current home for £1000 and it was declared open on the 4th April 1923 by Sir Henry Dundas the then Right Worshipful Provincial Grand Master of Midlothian. Although situated in West Lothian the Lodge has strangely never been part of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Linlithgowshire. The lodge was originally under the responsibility of the Metropolitan Grand Committee and it is recorded that they first intended to visit Kirkliston in 1877 however, if records are correct they didn't visit until six years later.

The Lodge eventually became part of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Midlothian and has been honoured with two Provincial Grand Masters, Brother James Masterton Scott the Grandson of our founder Master James Masterton in 1957 and more recently Brother Samuel Hunter Fox in 1988. It should be noted that the first official visit of the Provincial Grand Lodge of Midlothian was to Kirkliston Maitland on the 6th October 1897.