Situated between Coatbridge and Motherwell, 9 miles (14.5 km) southeast of Glasgow, the town of Bellshill lies to the north of the South Calder Water. It includes the neighbourhoods of Orbiston, Hattonrig, Milnwood, Mossend and Shirrel. Formerly a weaving village, Bellshill developed as a mining town with the arrival of the railway in the mid 19th Century, with collieries eventually surrounding the settlement at East Parkhead, Hattonrig, Milnwood, Orbiston, Rosehall and Unthank. Many of its sandstone buildings date from the late-Victorian era with the notable exception of the parish church (1762). Bellshill Hospital, opened in the 1870s in the countryside a mile (1.5 km) to the north of the village to treat infectious diseases, but became Lanarkshire's first Maternity Hospital in 1917. There are sizeable industrial estates to the northwest. To the south are Bellshill Golf Club, Strathclyde Country Park and Strathclyde Business Park, while to the east at Mossend are the Eurocentral industrial estate and the Eurocentral Rail Terminal for freight services coming from the Channel Tunnel.
Born in Bellshill were footballer Hugh Gallacher (1903-57), anarchist Ethel MacDonald (1909-60), football manager Sir Matt Busby (1909-94), political journalist Gordon Campbell (1927 - 2005), cricketer Mike Denness (b.1940), another footballer Billy McNeill (1940 - 2019), singer-songwriter Graham Lyle (b.1944), politicians Robin Cook (1946 - 2005) and Lord Reid of Cardowan (b.1948), singer Sheena Easton (b.1959), poet Robert Crawford (b.1959), footballer and football manager Ally McCoist (b.1962), broadcaster Jackie Bird (b.1962), athlete Tom McKean (b.1963), boxer Scott Harrison (b.1977), and judo champions Louise Renicks (b.1982) and Kimberley Renicks (b.1988).
