The Execution of Janet Mitchell – The Murderer of Her Owne Childe by Dr. Jean Barclay In 1709 Janet Mitchell, who was about 28 years old and worked as a servant maid for John Watt in Sunnyside, Saline, was tried in Dunfermline and hanged for the murder of her new-born child (1). The case rested on an `Act anent murdering of Children` 1690 which attempted to suppress the prevalent crime of child murder. Under this severe act, a woman did not have to physically kill her child but if she concealed her pregnancy or did not call for assistance at the birth and the child was found dead or missing, she was held `ye Murderer of her owne Child` even if there was no wound or bruise on the body. Any woman found guilty in the terms of this act was to be punished with `the pains of death` and `escheat of her moveables` (confiscation of her property) (2). While the act may have helped to reduce child murder there seems little doubt that many innocent women were unjustly accused and executed or banished. This was arguably the case with Janet Mitchell. On May 15th 1709 the Saline kirk session led by the Rev. Patrick Plenderleith, met to consider a report that Janet Mitchell was guilty of fornication and had been found to have milk in her breast, a sign that she was with child or had given birth. When questioned, Janet confessed to fornication with James Gibson, a fellow servant at Sunnyside, but would not say whether she had had a child or not and it was decided that members of…
David West, Road Haulier
David West & Son, Road Haulier of Rumblingwell and Touch. By George Beattie In 1920, David West, a former bus driver with the Autocar Bus Company (ABC), Dunfermline, founded his own road haulage business at James Street, Dunfermline before moving to Foundry Street, Low Beveridgewell and, latterly, to Rumblingwell. The early history of the firm is somewhat vague but it is known that in 1924, Mr West operated ex-army Karrier vehicles with bodies which could quickly be converted from lorries to buses. With the bus side of the business, Mr West operated a route from Dunfermline to Burntisland, via Aberdour from May, 1924, and then another from Dunfermline to Limekilns from August, 1925. In 1926 the bus side of the business was allowed to lapse in favour of the haulage operation which in the main involved the carriage of produce, mainly grain and potatoes, for local farmers. The haulage business flourished and in the early to mid-1930s West moved to larger premises at 179 Rumblingwell, Dunfermline. By that time West’s fleet had increased to some ten vehicles, mainly Albions, AEC and Maudsleys, and David West’s son, Jim, had joined the firm. Jimmy Hynd, interviewed in 1999, spent most of his working life with David West and recalled starting work at Rumblingwell as a 15 year old driver’s mate in 1937. The driver’s mate, or second man as he was more commonly known, was compulsory at that time and part of his duty, as well as assisting in the loading and unloading the…
`My Favourite Boy` – The Dunfermline Link with the Bartholomew Map Family
I’m sure many of us will have used Bartholomew’s maps over the years and may well still do. John Bartholomew and Sons was a very well known cartography company, founded in 1826 in Edinburgh, but it’s origins lie further back. In “`My Favourite Boy` – The Dunfermline Link with the Bartholomew Map Family”, Jean Barclay tells the story of George Bartholomew, a boy who had a difficult and unusual start in life, his parents fought a long court case, but became a skilled engraver of maps and plans. His son John, also trained as an engraver, went on to found the business.
Their story tells us much about both class distinctions and social mobility in late 18th and early 19th century Scotland.
Fraser and Carmichael Ltd
Fraser & Carmichael Ltd, Grain-Millers, Wholesale & Retail Grocers Monastery Street, Maygate & Chalmers Street, Dunfermline by George Beattie Although the firm of Fraser & Carmichael was founded in Dunfermline in 1866, the family links to the Dunfermline business probably go back to back to 1817, when John Carmichael, a native of Comrie, Perthshire, opened a grocer and grain merchant’s shop in the town’s High Street. This shop is believed to have been at No 7 High Street, later occupied for many years by the London & Newcastle Tea Company. John occupied the High Street shop for a number of years before moving to 1–7 Maygate where the firm of Fraser and Carmichael will be best remembered. In tandem with the Maygate shop, and probably with the High Street shop, John Carmichael operated the Heugh Grain Mill in Monastery Street. This mill was originally operated by water power from the mill lade which originated at the Town Loch at Townhill. In the 1851 census, John Carmichael, (44), a grocer, is residing at Gardener’s Land, Dunfermline, with his wife, Jane, (46), daughters, Anne (13), Janet (10), Catherine (8), and son, Archibald (7). In 1865 John Carmichael’s daughter, Catherine, married Alexander Fraser, a native of Limekilns. Alexander had served an apprenticeship as a grocer/wine merchant with the long-established Dunfermline firm of David Blelloch, whose premises were also in Maygate. Shortly after completing his apprenticeship Alexander Fraser moved…
Halbeath Wedding
Back issues of local papers can give us all sorts of fascinating information about the past. When the article itself is about “Past Times”, we are shown even further back in time. George Robertson has found an article in a 1909 copy of “The Leven Advertiser and Wemyss Gazette” which recounts how weddings were held in Fife mining villages in the 1860s. Wedding Celebrations in 19th Century Halbeath By George Robertson Weddings today can be lavish and expensive affairs but young couples in earlier times did not have the money to spend lavishly and this is well illustrated in an article which appeared in The Leven Advertiser and Wemyss Gazette newspaper, dated 3rd February 1909. What follows, extracted in unedited form from the newspaper, gives a description of village life and, in particular, how weddings were conducted in the Fife mining village of Halbeath, during the mid 1860’s. “There is perhaps no hamlet in the county which clings more firmly to old customs than Halbeath. The village consists of the “Long Row”, as it is called, and a series of red-roofed short rows. People who want to study the manners and customs and activities of village life must go to the “Long Row”, which sits on the crest of a ridge on which the “Queen” pit was sunk shortly after the crowning of Queen Victoria. I can remember the time when the whole of the output of this great pit, which was one of the pits under the charge of Mr Charles Carlow’s late father, was drawn…