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 which provides a vivid picture of life there, nearly 180 years ago. Mrs More’s Seminary – Revisited by Elaine Campbell The previous article on Mrs More’s Seminary for young ladies, which was located in the manse at Cairneyhill, led to an e-mail from a gentleman in New Zealand whose great grandmother was a pupil at the Seminary in the early 1840s. His great grandmother was called Anne Houeson Neil and she is recorded, at the age of 14, on the 1841 census along with 10 other boarders at the school. Anne seems to have had very happy memories of her time at Cairneyhill and many of these memories were recorded in later years by her daughter Mary. Before relating some of these happy and poignant memories which give a great insight into Mrs More’s character and the lifestyle of the girls, it would perhaps increase appreciation of them by first giving a bit more information about the school. The earliest record found for the school is an advertisement in the Fife Herald in 1837 which shows the costs and subjects taught at the school. As the advertisement below states that the school will re-open in September, it can be assumed it was in…
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…
Victorian Homeware and Furniture Shopping
In this, the third of her articles on shopping, Sue Mowat gives us a vivid insight into the home lives of a wide range of our predecessors in the town, as well as a description of the many shops and businesses which catered for their increasing prosperity. Shopping for the Home in Victorian Dunfermline by Sue Mowat Before we get into the business of buying for the home we’d better look at what that ‘home’ was like in Victorian Dunfermline. As was the case until quite recently, very few people owned their own homes, the majority living in rented accommodation. A dwelling was usually described as a ‘house’, which in Scotland could mean anything from a ‘room and kitchen’ in a tenement to a mansion with several public rooms, bedrooms, servants’ rooms, garrets, kitchen, bathroom and other offices. The majority of ‘houses’, however, consisted of two, three or four rooms, which might comprise an apartment in a large building or be contained in a small cottage. The very poor lived in just one room the usual rent being £1 10s to £2 a year, although some were available for as little as £1. Much of the single-room occupation was concentrated in the area of Pittencrieff, Woodhead, Golfdrum and William Streets. In Pittencrieff Street single rooms comprised 38% of the available housing, many of them occupied by single women or widows. Ground floors were occupied by weavers living in a ‘room and loom stance’. Paupers who were on the official ‘outdoor relief’ roll of the Parochial Board…
John Goodall and Co Motor Engineers
by George Beattie In 1868, at the age of seventeen years, Mr John White Goodall set up his horse and cab business in a single stall stable in what is now known as Commercial School Lane, off East Port, Dunfermline. His assets at that time comprised one horse, one cab and a set of harness. The horse cost £3.00, the cab £19.00 and the harness 30 shillings. Soon afterwards he added, at a cost of £3.00, a dog cart – a two wheeled carriage with seats back-to-back. Recognising the possibilities of expanding this trade, which was then virtually in its infancy, he soon acquired more extensive stabling accommodation in New Row, to the rear of the East Port Hotel, which at that time was owned by his sister Mrs Tullis. Mr Goodall’s business rapidly expanded and, in 1875, he obtained a lease of the Royal Hotel Stables at 58 Queen Anne Street, these being the premises from where the Goodall family would conduct business for the next 100 years. Later, Mr Goodall took advantage of an opportunity to become owner of the Queen Anne Street property which he subsequently converted into one of the largest, and best appointed, stabling yards in Scotland. It was commonplace that Mr Goodall, during the years of his ever growing business, was never known to send out a yoke (horse and carriage) to which the slightest exception could be taken. Horse, harness, cab and driver were, so to speak, of a piece. During the later part of the nineteenth century the resources of Mr…
Victorian Clothes Shops in Dunfermline
In the second of her articles on shopping in Victorian times, Sue Mowat describes the wide range of tailors, milliners, boot-makers and others trading in Dunfermline in the 1860s. Shopping for Clothes in Victorian Dunfermline By Sue Mowat Setting out to buy clothes in Victorian Dunfermline there were so many possible outlets it’s hard to know where to start, but probably the best place is Bridge Street, home of seven of the town’s ten drapery shops. There were ‘clothiers’ in the town who sold ready-mades for gentlemen but if you wanted clothes with a really good fit you would choose your fabric at a draper’s shop and have it made up to your own measurements, by a tailor or dressmaker employed by the shop or by an independent worker. The choice of fabrics was wide; for instance in the Spring of 1863 John Davie (8 Bridge Street) offered the ladies a typical stock of black and coloured silk for dresses, mantles and bonnets in Glaces, Gros de Naples, Chenes and Foulards. Other fabrics were Mohairs, French de Laines, French Merinoes, Lawns, Poplins, Poplinettes, Coburgs and Bareges ‘in new styles’. For the gentlemen there were Scotch Tweeds, Union Tweeds, Moleskins, Cords and Velveteens. Davie also advertised ‘Gentlemen’s Clothing, Children’s Kilt and Knickerbocker Dresses and Servants’ Liveries made to order’ and in the following year announced that millinery and dressmaking were now ‘done on the Premises in the Newest Style, under the management of a thoroughly experienced…