Threepenny Guide & Directory for Stirling, Bridge of Allan
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Threepenny STIRLINC/BRIDCE Of ALLAN, Dunblane, DouNE, Si niniansjcBannockbiirn STIRLING. BRiiCE cf ALLAN sDUNBLANt STIRLING DAVID MILLER * SOW. ^ BAK&H STREE T >0A PATERSON & SONS' LONDON AND PARIS PIASOFOBTE, EARMOMM, ASD MFSIC S A L K S. The Largest Stock of Instruments in Scotland for Sale or Hire. PubUshers of the Celebrated GUINEA EDITION of the SCOTCH SONGS. SECOND-HAND PIANOFOKTES AND HARMONIUMS. PATERSON & SONS Have always on hand a Selection of COTTAGE, SQUARE, AND SEMI-GEAND PIANOFOKTES, SLIGHTLY USED. THE PATENT SIMPLEX PIANETTE, In Rosewood or Walnut, EIGHTEEN GUINEAS. This Wonderful Little Cottage Piano has a good touch, and stands well in Tune. FuU Compass (6i Octv.) HARMONIUMS BY ALEXANDRE, EVANS, and DEBAIN, From 6 to 85 GUINEAS. A Large Selection, both New and Segond-Hand. PATERSON 8c SONS, 27 GEORGE STREET, EDINBURGH; 152 BUCHANAN STREET, GLASGOW; 17 PRINCES STREET, PERTH. National Library Of S^^^^^^^^^^ -k ^^^^^ i^fc^^*^^ TO THE HONOURABLE THE OF THE ^v- Zey /Ma Digitized by the Internet Arciiive in 2010 witii funding from National Library of Scotland http://www.archive.org/details/threepennyguided1866dire .. ... insriDExi- - Address, . Stirling, Stirling Castle, Back Walk, . Cemetery, . Ladies' Eock, Hospitals, Drummond's Tract Depot, Post-Office, . Stirling General Directory, Street Directory, Academies and Schools, Places of Worship, Sacramental Fast-Days, . Stirling Young Men's Christain Association, Trades and Professions Directory, Stirling Town Council, &c., Commissioners of Police, Sheriflf Court, Small Debt Court, Commissary Court, Justices of the Peace, Stirling Castle Officials, High School, School of Arts, Faculty of Writers, Parochial Board, Excise Office, Gas-Light Company, ... Water-Works, Athenseum Subscription Eeading-Eooru, Macfarlane Free Library, Newspapers, . Stirling Eailway Station, Stirling Fairs, Stirling Carriers, Steamboats, St. Ninians, . ^: Bannockburn, Cambusbarron, St. Ninians, Bannockburn, and Cambusbarron Directory, Places of Worship in St, Ninians Parish, Schools in Do., Cambuskenneth Abbey, . Abbey Craig, Causewayhead, Bridge of Allan, Bridge of Allan Directory, Keir House, . Dunblane, Sheriffmuir, . Kippenross, . Dunblane General Directory, Doune, Deanston, Doune and Deanston Directory, Advertisements (begin at) ADDRESS. A Directory for the town of Stirling has often been called for by strangers and others, and is universally believed to be a desideratum which ought to be supplied. Other Scottish towns, possessing fewer natural attractions, and of immeasurably less historical note, as well as of less importance even in a commercial point of view, have for years been issuing their several Directories, which we believe have been found of much general utility for business purposes, and are now reckoned among the indispensables of their respective localities. It has, therefore, as well as for other reasons which more immediately concern ourselves as a community, been matter of surprise to not a few that a flourishing market town such as ours, with its fourteen thousand inhabitants, the oldest, or at least one of the oldest of our royal burghs, and the centre, •we may say, of Scotland, and of one of Scotland's richest and most fertile agricultural districts, should, up to this time, be without such a great public convenience as a complete, accurate Directory. By such considerations we have been led to attempt the present publication, on which, we need hardly say, we have bestowed some considerable care and pains, and trust it will be found as full and accurate in its details as the nature of such a compilation will admit. It will, no doubt, be expected that in a Directory for Stirling some concise account should be given of the town, including the Castle, and other obiects of public interest connected with the place. And although this may not be very generally needed for the information of the inhabitants, who may be supposed on the whole to be sufficiently conversant with all matters of local interest, past and present, yet it will not therefore be the less necessary for the sake of the many thousand visitors who, attracted by its beautifully picturesque situation, and the unrivalled grandeur of its surrounding scenery, flow into Stirling from day to day, many of them to take up their residence for a longer or shorter period amongst us, and naturally enough desire not only to know the names and j)rofessions of the more outstanding of our townsfolks and men of business, but also to form some little acquaint- ance with whatever is memorable or note-worthy in its history. Accordingly we have deemed it not out of place to give the following very brief and necessarily meagre notices of the town and Castle, as also of some of the more prominent places in the neighbourhood, which may not be unacceptable to strangers or other parties who may wish for such information as we have here endeavoured to supply. STi RLI NG Is generally understood to have derived its name from two Celtic words— consi- derably changed, however, from their original form and sound—and signifying The Hill of Strife. With this appellation its early history well accords, inasmuch as the precipitous and commanding eminence, on the eastern slope of which the town Is mainly built, together with the fields adjacent to it, have often, in days gone by, been the scene of fierce and desperate conflict, on the. issues of which not unfrequently depended the fate of fcicotland and of Scottish liberty. The town, which is a Eoyal and Parliamentary Burgh, is situated 35 miles north-west from Edinburgh, which city, by the way, it is said in some respects to resemble ; lies 28 miles north-east from G-lasgow; and 33| miles south-west from Perth. It is the county town of the shire to which it gives its name; and besides being the seat of a Sheriff, (having been erected into a separate Sheriffdom by James IV.,) it is visited once in six months by the Circuit Court of Justiciary. It is also one of five boroughs, known as the " Stir- ing District of Boroughs," which unite in sending a representative to Parliament. It was the chosen seat of royalty during several successive reigns of the Stuarts, when the principal nobility of Scotland had also their residence there. But, after th© removal of the Court, it gradually fell into decay, and for many years was little heard |i' of save as a military station. Of late years, however, its trade has greatly revived, through means of the opening up of railway communication betwixt it and all parts of the country, and other favouring circumstances, so that the town and suburbs have, within the last ten years or less, been much extended and improved. Ther© are three weekly newspapers published in the town, as also two or three monthly religious periodicals. The population at last census (1861) was 14,012, and classified as follows, viz., 3250 families; 6814 males, 7198 females. The number of inhabited the houses at the same period was 1433; uninhabited, 30; building, 11. During the last few years, a large number of new houses and villas have been added. STIELINa CASTLE. The most conspicuous, and at the same time most interesting, object connected with Stirling is its Castle. It stands on the western brow of the hill just referred to, at a height of about 220 feet above the level of the surrounding plain, and commands, in all directions, a far-reaching extent of country, which, for varied beauty and grandeur of scenery, is rarely equalled, and scarce ever surpassed. It is, no doubt, to its Castle that the town of Stirling has owed its origin ; but at what precise period the imposing and warlike structure was first erected, it is now, we should say, very difficult, if not impossible, to decide. Certain it is that Stirling, under the somewhat uncouth nama of Stryveling^ occurs in authentic history so far back as the earlier part of the 12th century, when, as would appear, from the circumstance of Alexander I., who conferred on the town its royal charter, having died there in 1124, it must in all probability have been at least the occasional, if not the ordinary abode of — — — STIRLING. royalty. In the latter half of the same century we find it reckoned as one of the four principal fortresses of the kingdom. Regarded as the Key to the Highlands, as from its position it really was, its occupancy became an object of eager desire, and of the last importance, to those who would effectually govern the country; and accoi'dingly many desperate struggles were made by the Scots and English, each in opposition to the other, to gain and retain possession of it. To give an idea of its strength as a fortress in those times, it may be stated that in 1304, being at that period in the hands of the Scots, it was besieged by Edward I. of England, who, himself at their head, brought against it all the available forces at his command, and that for three months it successfully withstood his fiercest assaults, although its garrison consisted of but one hundred and forty men ! It was the favourite residence of James I., and the birth-place of James II., where, in after years, the latter monarch foully murdered with his own hand the Earl of Douglas, as referred to by Sir Walter Scott in the following couplet addressed to Stirling Castle : " Ye towers ! within whose circuit dread, A Douglas by his sovereign bled." Several succeeding monarchs of the house of Stuart were also much attached to Stirling Castle, and took up their abode there in preference to any other in their dominions. James III. was particularly partial to it, and besides extensivelj' repair- ing it, improved and enlarged it by several important additions. It was the native place of the handsome and chivalrous King James V., who was also crowned there, and whence, now in the disguise of the " G-aberlunzie Man," and anon in that of the *' Guidman o' Ballangeich," he was wont to sally forth among his subjects, either for his personal amusement, or for the purpose of thus becoming better acquainted with the habits and manners of the people.