Wellgate House, 78 West Road

Date stone in garden

This house dates probably from the 1820s as it appears to show on a map from 1828. That would certainly tie in with the dates of several other houses on West Road. However a very corroded date stone in the garden shows the date 1794 but we are not sure of the significance of this date. The land the house is built on was part of the St Fort estate and until the 1930s the house was owned by the Stewart family of St Fort and their descendants.

Wellgate House was the home of John Leng when he first came to Newport. He lived here for five or six years in the late 1860s before his new mansion Kinbrae House was built.  He had arrived in Dundee from Hull in 1851 to be editor of the Dundee Advertiser, and he was also the founder of the Evening Telegraph and the People’s Friend. Between 1889 and 1906 John Leng was a Liberal MP for Dundee, and he was knighted in 1893.

From the 1950s to 1970s this was the home of Dudley Plummer. One of his family visitors was Christopher Plummer, best known as Count von Trapp in the Sound of Music.

The fairly modern bungalow next door at 80 West Road is built on the ground that was the orchard of Wellgate House.