Bellshill (pronounced "Bells hill") is a town in North Lanarkshire in Scotland, southeast of Glasgow city centre and west of Edinburgh. Other nearby localities are Motherwell to the south, Hamilton to the southwest, Viewpark to the west, Holytown to the east and Coatbridge to the north. The town of Bellshill itself (including the villages of Orbiston and Mossend) has a population of about 20,650. From 1996 to 2016, it was considered to be part of the Greater Glasgow metropolitan area; since then it is counted as part of a continuous suburban settlement anchored by Motherwell with a total population of around 125,000. History The earliest record of Bellshill's name is handwritten on a map by Timothy Pont dated 1596 although the letters are difficult to distinguish. It's possible it reads Belſsill with the first s being an old-fashioned long s. The site is recorded as being east of "Vdinſtoun" and north of "Bothwel-hauch" (which confusingly is above "Orbeſton" on Pont's map). The name can also been seen on another map, which was derived from Pont's work, made by the Dutch cartographer Joan Blaeu where the place is called "Belmil". The village consisted of a row of quarry workers' houses owned by Mr. Bell, who owned a stone quarry to the south of Belmill. Charles Ross' map of 1773 has "Belsihill" marked north of Crosgates and Orbiston. About 1810, this new settlement took on the name Bellshill and continued to grow. It absorbed nearby villages such as Nesnas, Black Moss and Sykehead. Bellshill was on the road which linked Glasgow and Edinburgh. According to the first Statistical Account, in the late 1700s the parish of Bothwell, which encompasses modern Bellshill, was a centre of hand-loom weaving with 113 weavers recorded. Only 50 colliers were listed. A hundred or so years later, these occupations had changed places in degree of importance to the area economy. With the introduction of new machinery in the mid 19th century, many cottage weavers lost their livelihood. Demand for coal to feed British industry meant that by the 1870s, 20 deep pits were in operation in the area. The first mine to open (and the last to close in 1953) was the Thankerton mine. Others followed swiftly and rapidly increased the size of the town, even attracting a steady stream of immigrants from abroad, particularly Ireland and Lithuania, so much so that the town is sometimes referred