Introduction The Land Mines The Germans are Coming?! Our Super Seniors The School in Wartime What the Papers Said Verse & Worse! VE Day and Welcome Home The Blairskaith Bomber The white building in the foreground is Sunnyside, which was so badly damaged by the...
Stories of the Fallen James Callander GNR Royal Artillery Daniel Davidson LAC Royal Air Force Andrew M Maclean Lt Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve Archibald MacNicol SPR Royal Engineers Gilbert McKay P/O Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve Richard RN Pedder Lieut Col Highland...
Introduction How is Strathblane linked to Black slavery? More than we might think. First some context. Two key dates: 1807, the abolition of the transatlantic trade in enslaved people and 1833, the abolition of slavery itself throughout the British Empire. In the past...
In July 2023 we posted on the local Strathblanefield FACEBOOK group asking people to share their memories of the old school. Here are some of the responses: It’s so nice to create a bit of history about the old school. I was only there my first two years of school...
Stained Glass panel from Maryhill Burgh Halls showing bleachfield workers The abundance of water meant that bleaching and water-driven industries were commonplace in the parish in the 18th century and lasted well into the 19th century. By 1870 most of them had closed...
George Wilson’s Gravestone George Douglas Wilson, Lt Royal Field Artillery, aged 45 The country edition of the Stirling Observer of September 23 1916 contains a simple stark sentence in its war news: “Lieut. Col. Douglas Wilson, Royal Field Artillery, late of...
John Douglas Walker, Gunner Royal Garrison Artillery, aged 36 It is easy to imagine the wife and children of Gunner John Douglas Walker celebrating the news of the Armistice of 1918 and joyfully anticipating his return to Blanefield from the Front. It was a Monday...
Mugdock Village Mugdock was at one time the most important place in the Parish of Strathblane. It was "The Towne and Burgh of Mugdock" and the "head Burgh of the Regalitie of Montrose” with a “weekly mercat ilk fryday and two free faires yearlie", granted by a 1661...
STRATHBLANE WW1 PROJECT: 15 JAMES MACINTYRE, PRIVATE SEAFORTH HIGHLANDERS, AGED 19. The atlas from his Aunt Rhoda that James took to war The pressed wild rosebud marked "Ardlui June 1916" The calendar tab for September 1916 on which James was marking off his days in...
STRATHBLANE WW1 PROJECT: 10 ALEXANDER MITCHELL, PRIVATE CAMERONIANS (SCOTTISH RIFLES), AGED 36. Silk postcards sent by Sandy Mitchell to his wife at Duntreath Alexander Mitchel- family grave Strichen Parish Churchyard, Aberdeenshire Sandra Mitchell, Sandy's...
View from Old Mugdock Road, where a lone cyclist contemplates the grandeur of the Campsies. Edenkill (now Edenkiln) occupied the heart of the community we now call Strathblane and was one of the three villages that comprised the parish, along with Netherton...
Local Workmen with the Water BoardLeft to right : Tom McCulloch, Jimmy Baxter, Tommy Miller, David Getty , John Harkins The Glasgow Water Supply The Blane Valley is the final stage of what justifiably can be called one of the greatest civil engineering achievements of...
Blane Valley from the Cuilt Brae Until the mid-20th century farming was very much an integral part of the life of the parish of Strathblane. The school log contains frequent references to children skipping school to help with the harvest. The Blanefield printworks...
“Often a child made a dramatic recovery on the back of good food, fresh air & loving care” - Margaret McIntyre, who worked at Strathblane Children’s Home Hospital for two periods between 1958 and its closure in 1994. Penelope Ker The rapid...
Helen Lillie produced historical novels, Home to Strathblane in 1993 and Strathblane & Away in 1996.
Early Days I was not born in the village but in Salisbury House, Campsie Glen. My dad was a native of Strathblane, being born in Milndavie House. My mum was born at Little Gala near Biggar but came to Ballagan Farm when her father took over the tenancy there in about...
Extracts from The Campsies and the Land of Lennox by Iain C Lees, describing walks around Strathblane. (Blackie & Sons, Glasgow, 1933) Secrets of the Campsie Fells The rich valley of the Blane, which can be traced to its junction with Strathendrick, is the finest...
Extract from A New Kind of Life by Helen Lillie (Argyll Publishing, 1999) The older people living in the Blane Valley between the wars usually had unmarried daughters at home. And these middle class, middle-aged women spent their days taking care of their mothers'...
For various reasons, a number of men from the parish fell in the First World War yet are not commemorated on the War Memorial. These men are also therefore only briefly mentioned in "A Village Remembers", a book about the men commemorated on Strathblane War Memorial...
Families of some of the men on the memorial A Village Remembers (pdf) Download Contents Foreword by the Wright family Introduction by Anne Balfour (nee Johnstone) Jack Barr, inventor’s son Robert Blair, gardener James Cartwright, joiner William Cartwright, storeman...
The Strathblane Notebooks Life in a Stirlingshire Village before the First World WarBy Alex Urquhart edited by Anne Balfour Quotation from the headstone of Alex Urquhart's parents in Strathblane Cemetery Alex Urquhart (1894-1978) Strathblane Heritage Society...
The poet Thomas Thorpe was born on 9 March, 1829 in Milton, Dunbartonshire, son of a block printer at the local works. When he was five, he moved with his family to Strathblane. One of his earliest childhood memories was being with his sisters in a wood where wild...