Tweedsmuir History - Listed Buildings
Current Buildings in Tweedsmuir Parish Listed by Historic Scotland.
Good website for Listed Buildings in the UK is www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk
1.1 Crook Inn. Listed as Cat C.
1.2 Victoria Lodge. Listed as Cat B
1.3 Tweedsmuir Parish Church, Kirkyard
and Quarter (Chapel) Knowe New - below
1.4 Carlow's Brig and the Bield - below.
1.3 Tweedsmuir Parish Church (Listed as Category B)
The current Parish Kirk (Established Church of Scotland) was built in 1874 replacing a previous church built in 1644 which is considered as the first church on the site. The mound on which the church is built was known as Quarter Knowe and has a very complex history and is probable that there was a religous building/site before this time - more about Quarter Knowe follows below. The current Kirk was designed by John Lessels. The building is Norman T plan gabled with tower and broach spire, whinstone with red sandstone dressings and spire. The doorway is said to have been inspired by Dryburgh Abbey. The war memorial in the vestibule was made from an oak tree planted by Sir Walter Scott at Abbotsford.
The memorial covers most of the east wall of the vestibule - unfortunately due to the small size of the vestibule one cannot stand far enough back to appreciate far less try and photograph the wall. The parchment scroll-work on the memorial was carried out by George Hope Tait - for genealogical information on George Hope Tait go to the Hopes of Traquair page. The bell is dated 1773 and came from the previous church. Inside are some nice stained glass windows particularly the main window in the east gable by Ballantyne and Allan of Edinburgh 1902. This window is dedicated to John Ker an eminent Minister in the United Presbyterian Church ( also plaque on gable end of the Bield, where he was born.) The double window in the north gable is in memory of John Martin and Margaret Hope, long resident in the Parish erected by their son John Martin, Chicago USA. (John Martin died in 1850 and Margaret Hope in 1860 in the USA - Margaret's two husbands are buried in the kirkyard. For more about Margaret Hope go the Hope Family Tree page and she is on Tree No 13. Also in the church is the 1662 date stone from the original manse and also a brass memorial plaque to Dr. David Welsh who was the Moderator of the General Assembly in 1843 and who famously walked out with hundreds of other Ministers to form the Free Church. The plaque however, is silent on the forming of the Free Church and Dr. Welsh's involvment! Tweedsmuir claims Dr David Welsh as one of their own but he in fact was born in 1793 just over the County boundary near Moffat in Dumfriesshire. His parents- David and Margaret Welsh - did farm Earlshaugh which is at the south end of Tweedsmuir Parish and they and several members of their family are buried in Tweedsmuir Kirkyard. Dr Welsh himself is buried in St Cuthburts in Edinburgh - he died in 1845. The following two WW1 memorial plaques can be found inside Tweedsmuir Kirk.
More Photographs in Picture Gallery (Tweedsmuir Kirk and Kirkyard).
Tweedsmuir Kirkyard (Listed as Category B)
The most interesting headstones are those of John Hunter a Covenanting Martyr. It is said that John Paterson (Sir Walter Scot's Old Mortality) recut the inscriptions. (More pictures in Picture Gallery)
The Inscription reads:-
Here lyes
The body of John Hunter
Martyr who was cruelly
Murdered at Corehead
by Col James Douglas and
his party for his adherance
To the Word of God and
Scotland's covenanted
Work of Reformation
1685
Erected in the year 1726.
(Reverse of Stone)
when Zions King was robbed
of his Right
His witnesses in Scotland
put to flight
When popish prelates &
Indulgancies
All who would not unto
their idols bow
They socht them out &
and who they found they slew
For owning of Christ's cause
I then did die
My blood for vengeance on
His en'mies did cry.
(The following was added in 1910 on a separate stone.)
John Hunter a Tweedsmuir lad
was accidently visiting a
sick friend at Corehead when
timely in the morning he was
surprised with Douglas and
his dragoons. He fled to the
hill a great way, but one
named Scott, being well horsed, compassed
him and came before him
He was most barbarouslie shot through the body,
felled on the head with the neck of a gun,
and casted headlong over a high steep craig.
Contempory Record.
J.H.
1660-1685
Another memorial is that to the 30+ men who died during the construction of the Talla Reservoir project (1895-1905). Not all died from industrial accidents, a small number died during the smallpox epidemic of 1902/1903. The grave stretches the width of the kirkyard. Oral tradition has it that there were 14 wooden crosses on the piece of land adjacent to the mortuary at the dam site. Whether the figure of 30+ on the headstone includes this figure of 14 is not known.
The John Hunter memorial erected in 1726 (he died in 1685) is not the oldest in the kirkyard, that would appear to be that of John Welsh who died in Over Menzion and dated 1711. There are in the records references to older stones that were whinstone slate which have now vanished.
The most common names in the older part of the Kirkyard are as one would expect are Tweedie/Tweedie Stodart, and the Welshes. The next are Andersons and perhaps surprisingly, Hopes! These Hopes were tenant farmers while at this time my own ancestors came via Selkirk from a village called Bole in Traquair Parish.
There is an interesting stone slab on which the Royal Commission commented as follows in 1959. " What seems, however, to be a relic either of the church (previous) or of a contemporary burial-vault is to be seen in a carved stone slab which now leans against the NW corner of the existing building. This slab is carved in relief with a shield, surrounded by a helm and mantling and having at either side an hour glass and, below, a cartouche which no doubt once bore an inscription; weathering, however, has made the charges on the shield illegible and entirely removed the inscription." We will never know to which family the slab referred but as its location is against the church wall adjacent to the Tweedie/Tweedie Stodart burial area it is reasonable to assume that it was a memorial plaque from an ancient Tweedie family burial vault.
One other headstone of local interest, is that of Jeannie of the Crook who was the landlady of the Crook Inn, which in her day was well known to a number of famous Scotsmen. The Rev. Hamilton Paul, Minister of Broughton, wrote a song in which he proposed to Jeannie, however she refused. She died in 1839.
The Rev. John Ker DD of the main window of the church and plaque on the Bield building who died in 1866 is buried here.
The parents of Dr David Welsh - David and Margaret Welsh -and members of the Welsh family are buried here. There are also two WW1 Memorial Plaques inside Tweedsmuir Kirk.
Photographs in Picture Gallery
Quarter Knowe.
Quarter Knowe is the mound on which the Tweedsmuir Kirk and the old upper section of the Kiryard are located and hence is covered by the Listing protocols. Etching of 1709 on the right showing what is considered the first church on the site of 1644. This shows the Manse near the present day car-park and also shows the ancient cultivation terraces on the mound - enlarged image available in the Picture Gallery - Tweedsmuir Kirk and Kirkyard section..
The origin of the word Quarter can either mean a quarter of a piece of land or a quarter of a Parish for Elder representation and also for the disbursement of "poor money" purposes. There is a Quarter Hill in Tweedsmuir not far from the Kirk. However the more well known Quarter is that at Glenholm/Rachan which was the seat of the Tweedies of Quarter.
Like most of Scottish History the history of the Knowe is obscured by shadows and mist with very little light around the edges and the obvious confusion between the two Quarters, mentioned above, in historical documents has not helped!
Tweedsmuir was originally part of Drumelzier Parish and was formally disjoined in 1644 when the Tweedsmuir church was built. However a separate Tweedsmuir Parish had been planned for some time. There had been a roll for the new Parish in 1639 and this indicates that the new Parish would extend as far North as and to include Hopecarton. This boundary would make Quarter Knowe more or less in the middle of the new Parish. By 1643 the northern Parish boundary had been set at the Polmood Burn - as it is today. This boundary makes Quarter Knowe towards the north end of the Parish. From this it is plain that the chosen location of the new church was to be Quarter Knowe regardless of the boundaries of the Parish. What made it the chosen spot? Was there something there already of religious significance?
There are a couple of nuggets in the records that shed some light on Tweedsmuir Quarter Knowe. Firstly in the Peeblesshire Presbytery Records of 1626-1639 it states that when digging for foundations on the site then known as the Quarter or Chapel Knowe, on the lands of Menzion, skeletons were found proving an ancient burial-place and site of a chapel. The fact that that Menzion is mentioned indicates that we have the right site and that the mound was known as Chapel Knowe I think is very significant.
James W. Buchan (brother of John Buchan) in his acclaimed 3-Vol History of Peeblesshire refers to various Writs of 1512, 1555 and of 1564 involving the Hays which clearly refer to Chapel Knowe being in the Barony of Oliver Castle and was the "chief messuage" of that Barony. Buchan then went on "It is not unreasonable to assume that there would be a chapel on that site in pre-Reformation times, and accordingly it would seem that the Parish Church marks the site of the Quarter Chapel - a most suitable place for the chief messuage.)" A messuage is a dwelling house with associated out buildings - which possibly could include a small chapel, also gardens, orchards, etc.
It is probable that the mound was much larger than it is now. The Royal Commission on the Ancient Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS) in their survey of the site in 1959 stated that the east side of the mound had been cut back by the river. This observation is confirmed by the 1709 etching where it can be clearly seen that the cultivation terraces, as indeed can be seen today, do not continue around the east end of the mound as one would have expected. Although these terraces must predate the messuage of the Hays they would have been incorporated in their messuage.
My own input to this as mentioned on the Frasers of Oliver page where I suggest that the name of Oliver is a corruption of Holyford and that the first Oliver Castle was in fact called Holyford named so because the site guarded the ford across the River Tweed to the mound on which was located something of religious significance. The ford would have been at the shallows below the Carlow's Linn where in 1682 it is recorded that there were stepping stones across the Tweed between the Bield and the Manse - the Manse then being near the present day carpark. The holy part of Holyford can be construed as the Know and what was on it. There might not have been an actual edifice on the mound but possibly a Cross either of timber or of stone. The Cross would be a marker for travellears and also a meeting place for local inhabitants and particularly the farmers to gather and discus and pool their resources in arranging for the transport of their products ie wool, ewes milk butter and ewes milk cheese. The latter being a most important source of revenue. A Cross on the site would also make it the religious center of the area and would have been used for communion, baptisms. We do know that there was also a Cross known as Tweed's Cross at the southern end of the County Boundary at Tweedswell and shown on the OS map of 1860 and the site is recognised by the RCAHMS. Apart from being a boundary marker this Cross would have been a way-marker for travellers particularly Pilgrims, prior to the Reformation, heading North to St. Andrews via the Queen 's Ferry.
However even prior to this, an eminence such as the Knowe must have been used for some purpose for centuries. The ancient Cymric tribes worshipped natural things things such as water and stone. The Knowe at the confluence of two rivers, facing, east would be a magical spot for them and it is unthinkable that they did not use it.
To summarise. In stoneage/iron age times, say 2000BC the Knowe a large eminence at the confluence of two rivers would have been used by the local tribes as a significant religious site with standing stones, cairns etc and possibly also a defensible fort probably in use until Roman times. In Saxton times a wooden or stone cross would be erected to show the change to Christianity and as a way-marker. In early medieaval times the Frasers would have built the first castle overlooking the River Tweed and the Knowe which I believe was named Holyford. In the sixteenth century the Hays the successors to the Frasers would have a messuage on the site. Some time after this a significant section of the Knowe was washed away making the Knowe much smaller and unsuitable for a dwelling. This would be followed by at least one pre-reformation chapel then two post-reformation Kirks.
1.4 Carlow's Brig. (Listed as Category B)
This bridge spans the river Tweed at the point where it narrows to flow through the rocky defile known as Carlow's Linn, 400 yards SW of Tweedsmuir Church. It is built entirely of rubble masonry and comprises a single arch having a span of 30 feet and a width of 15 feet. Upon the south facing of the bridge a block of sandstone bearing the date of 1783 is built into the fabric above the crown of the arch. The bridge was constructed by James and Alexander Noble who were stone masons based in the Upper Tweed area. The structure evidently replaces the earlier bridge shown on William Edgar's map of peeblesshire, surveyed in 1741. (The above details are from the Royal Commission survey for Peeblesshire in 1959) Various spellings can be found in the records such as Carlows and Carlowse but the 's version has found favour with both Historic Scotland and the Royal Commission (RCAHMS). I wonder who Mr or Mrs Carlow (Carlaw) was who gave their name to the Linn (waterfall). John Buchan referred to it as Curlew Linn in his short story titled A Sentimental Journey in his early book Scholar Gypsies. Or, is Carlow a corruption of Carlin the Scots word for witch - Witches Linn? This bridge is the sole access for the large lorries taking away the harvested spruce and pine trees from the Tweedsmuir forests. The fact that this ancient bridge designed for a mule and cart can cope with the weight of these lorries is a wonder.
The bridge - March 2011 - is now showing signs of wear and tear and with no sign of the number of timber lorries crossing the bridge diminishing there is real concern by the local residents that the bridge could fail - leaving them isolated. The Scottish Borders Council are aware of the problem but appear to have no solution as to what can be done.
Photographs in Picture Gallery - Carlow's Bridge.
The Bield. (Listed as Category B).
This site was occupied by an Inn in the early 18th century and the oldest part of the present building may belong to that period. The structure was extended and partially rebuilt in 1726 and further additions were made about a century later. Above the front door there is a lintel bearing the incised initials IT and ME for James Tweedie of Oliver and his wife Margaret Ewart. who were married in 1718. (The above details are from the Royal Commission survey for Peeblesshire in 1959).
However in the second half of the 17th century during the Covenanting period there is mention of an Inn/Change House known as the Bild in the records and one presumes that this must have been a predecessor of the building mentioned above.
The building has a commerative plaque on the south gable to John Ker an emminent Minister of the United Presbyterian Church who was born there. (See Church and Kirkyard above.)
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The above sites can be found on Multimap - Map. Pan north for the Crook Inn. The Bield is on the main road at the foot of the shorter drive to Oliver. Victoria Lodge is adjacent to the Talla Reservoir dam.
Photographs of the sites mentioned above appear in the Tweedsmuir Kirk/Kirkyard setion of the Picture Gallery
or
Return to Tweedsmuir History page