Hole i' the Wa', Dumfries

Hole i' the Wa'

156 High Street, Dumfries DG1 2BA

Grade C · TraditionTrading · checked Sept 2026

Hole i' the Wa' claims 1620. No earlier record has been found.

Claimed

1620

First record

none found

Building

no single date

The building. Much-altered mid 18th-century inn behind a mid 18th-century High Street block (HES LB26236) — we give it no single date because Mid 18th century per Historic Environment Scotland; 1620 is CAMRA's date.

Burns

Food

The claim

Reached through a pend off Dumfries High Street, the Hole i' the Wa' takes its name from the gap in the wall that was once the only way in. CAMRA's branch note dates it to 1620. Historic Environment Scotland describes a much-altered mid eighteenth-century inn behind the listed street block, and lists it for historic interest because Robert Burns drank here. Whether it is still pouring in 2026 we could not firmly confirm.

What the records show

The 1620 date is CAMRA's Dumfries and Stewartry branch note, not a document. Historic Environment Scotland (LB26236, category B) describes the inn as much-altered mid 18th-century work at the rear of a mid 18th-century street block, and lists it for historic interest because Burns used it. The house does keep a site of its own, found on 18 September 2026, and it publishes its hours: half past nine in the morning until half past midnight Monday to Wednesday, until one in the morning Thursday to Saturday, from eleven on Sunday, with food served until two in the afternoon from Wednesday. Two registers agree with it. Hole i' the Wa' Ltd is an active Scottish company, number SC546981, whose latest confirmation statement is dated 4 October 2025 and whose accounts run to March 2025; and the Food Standards Agency carries the premises at 156 High Street as a pub, though its last hygiene inspection there was in 2018 and CAMRA last surveyed the bar in 2015. So the trading is settled, and what remains thin is the 1620.

What to look for inside

Listed by Historic Environment Scotland for historic interest because Burns used it
Reached through a pend from the High Street, which gave the pub its name

Visiting

Hole i' the Wa' is in Dumfries, Scotland, at 156 High Street, Dumfries DG1 2BA. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.

holeithewadumfries.co.uk Directions in your maps app