Aystree House Victoria Road Broughty Ferry
Built by Colonel Thomas H. Smith of the Black Watch in 1907 and was registered in his wife’s name, of Evelyn Jane Smith.
At this time he was a partner in the family jute firm of Henry Smith & Co Polepark Works
He was a Director of Dundee High School for 35 years and the first President of its Old Boys Club.
Aystree House, one of the four houses in the school was named after him shortly after his death in 1939.
Aystree house was sympathetically restored by Morton Properties in 2011.
In the early days the Dundee Tramway ran alongside the house. Colonel Smithy owned the field and stables at the other side of Victoria Road across from the main house. In order that the horses would not be spooked by the trams he had a tunnel constructed below the road allowing the horses to be brought safely to the house.Sadly Colonel Smithy’s toddler son ran in front of a tram car and was killed.
Colonel Smith was a director of Aystree Housing whose Registered Offices are at the Offices of Lickley Proctor and Burnett, 23 South Tay Street. Their original offices were in Reform Street in the same building as Grafton Lawson Solicitors. There may be a connection there as Aystree Housing may have had their registered office with Grafton Lawson and factored by Lickley Proctor & Mitchell.
It is believed that TAY STREET was converted into Aystree by the simple expedient of removing the “T” from the beginning and end of the street name where the company is registered.
There is a plaque on the wall bordering the house as follows:
Sadly the inscription is badly worn but can just be seen at the bottom of the plaque.
There is a local story that a ship she was travelling in was caught in a storm and her shiptook refuge in the Tay. She was brought ashoreand gave birth to a still born son and she herself died there from complications.
There is no truth in this story as she died, albeit after giving birth to a still born son, but it was in her own London home of Claremont House in 1817, some 90 years before Aystree House was built.
Why the plaque to this very popular Princess was put on the wall of Aystree House is not known.