In “The A Middle Class Scandal – the Margaret Ker Story”, the second of our Tales from the Kirk Session, Jean Barclay tells the story of a two year long series of hearings in which the Kirk tried to discover the truth about Margaret Ker’s illegitimate child.
Gardening in Victorian Dunfermline
by Sue Mowat In July 1854 the Fife Herald published a report on a Dunfermline horticultural show. Among its descriptions of the exhibits and the lists of prize-winners, the report commented that : The Dunfermline amateur florists are reputed all around this district as being superior in the cultivation of the many-tinted family of flora, and no less so in that of the vegetables and roots, early cabbages and carrots, as well as the pansies and dahlias. There is plenty of evidence from other contemporary sources that this was no idle boast. The Horticultural Societies By the mid-nineteenth century four horticultural societies flourished in the town, each of them holding at least two competitive shows every year. All the competitors were men and because much of the information in this article comes from newspaper reports of the Societies and their shows, it is inevitably heavily male-biased. Although this no doubt reflects to some extent the actual situation ‘on the ground’ there is no reason to suppose that women had no interest in gardening, although they probably confined themselves to flower cultivation. The cover of Mrs Loudon’s “Gardening for Ladies” published in 1834 shows a lady and her child wielding a rake and a hoe. However daintily they may be grasping the tools there can be no doubt that they intend to use them. The Ancient Society of Gardeners Although it was not particularly ancient, having been founded in 1716, this was the oldest of the four…
Profaning the Sabbath
In the first of our new series drawn from the Dunfermline Parish Records, “Tales from the Kirk Session”, Jean Barclay provides us with a detailed insight into how people lived in Dunfermline in the Seventeenth Century, and how the Church sought to stop them “Profaning the Sabbath“.
More on Mrs More
In March 2016 we published a “Did You Know” about Mrs More’s Seminary for Young Ladies in Cairneyhill. Earlier this year, the author, Elaine Campbell received an email from a descendant of one of the pupils, containing further information about the school. Elaine has now written a new article “Mrs More’s Seminary – Revisited” which provides a vivid picture of life there, nearly 180 years ago.
Cleaning Up Victorian Dunfermline
by Sue Mowat Reminiscences and histories of nineteenth century Dunfermline present a rosy picture of steadily increasing improvement in all aspects of the town’s life, and in many respects this was true. However, contemporary records reveal a situation of widespread filth which only gradually improved throughout the century. There can be no doubt that the first thing a time traveller transported back to those days would notice would be the overpowering smell of the place. Until the 1860s such drainage as existed was by inefficient stone-lined channels covered with flagstones and even the piped system that was built in that decade discharged raw sewage into the Tower and Lyne Burns. The town’s sewage, still untreated, was not piped to the Forth until 1877. Flushing lavatories had been introduced early in the century but until the advent of drains they emptied into cess pits. The first piped network drained just the main streets of the town and was only gradually introduced into the outlying districts, leaving much of the population still dependent on the age-old privy and dung pit (cesspit). Such public ‘necessaries’ as there were consisted of privies or of a wooden plank pierced with holes with buckets beneath them. The other major contributor to the stench was the accumulated dung of the horses, cows and pigs that were kept in the town. Animals were sometimes housed in disgusting conditions and the middens that accompanied their stables, byres and sties were often left to…