Burnbank is an area in the town of Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, Scotland. It was formerly a separate mining village before being absorbed into the town. Location and governance Burnbank, previously an independent settlement, then part of Hamilton Burgh (in the historic County of Lanarkshire) and then Hamilton District (in the historic Strathclyde Region) is now a district of Hamilton within the South Lanarkshire Unitary Council. Today Burnbank is surrounded by other suburban neighbourhoods, bordered by Hillhouse and Udston to the south, the western part of Hamilton to the east, Whitehill to the north and the town of Blantyre to the west, with the Park Burn denoting the boundary. Burnbank is named after a tributary of the River Clyde - the Wellschaw Burn (also known as the Shawburn) which flows through the eastern areas of the district. This has been culverted for most of its passage through modern Burnbank. In historic times this stream's confluence with the Clyde lay within the district but now lies in neighbouring Whitehill. The area around the burn was still open country in some regards as late as the 1901 Census which records a Romany family "living in a field near Shawburn, Burnbank. Burnbank was a division (later ward) of the Hamilton Constituency in the House of Commons between 1918 and 1997. It then became part of the short-lived Hamilton North and Bellshill Constituency between 1997 and 2005. Since 2005 it has been part of Rutherglen and Hamilton West. Burnbank was part of the Hamilton North and Bellshill Constituency for the Scottish Parliament but is now part of Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse. History It was predominantly rural, with a number of plantations (Whistleberry Plantation and Backmuir Plantation being most prominent) to feed the lace industry in Burnbank and Hamilton which had been sponsored since before 1778 by the then Duchess of Hamilton Elizabeth Campbell, 1st Baroness Hamilton of Hameldon. With the Industrial Revolution Burnbank lost its rural identity becoming a mining village. The population of Burnbank had grown so great by the 1870s that a committee of citizens decided to apply for the erection of a Burgh of Burnbank. At the same time residents of Burnbank's western neighbour Blantyre reacted by petitioning for the erection of a Burgh of Blantyre. Both cases came before the Sheriff Court sitting at Glasgow. The Sheriff gave extra time for the petitioners for both causes to familiarise themselves with the