Issue No 26

An Eighteenth Century Master Weaver and his Apprentices

© The Trustees of the British Museum. Licensor www.scran.ac.uk

CONTENTS Page

Notes from the Chair — News from the Archive 2 The Handloom Weavers of Perth 4 Review – Perth: A Century of Change 8 The Authors’ view - How probably not to write a local history ! 10 concluding The Battle for the North 12 The Joy of Extracting Oral History 16

Notes from the Chair

Belated New Year Greetings!

Although, sadly, we had to cancel our planned meeting in January, we still have much, including four talks, to look forward to for the remainder of the 2008-2009 season. As I write, our first Oral History project is getting under way. A small team of in- terviewers, equipped with tape recorders, will soon be at work in Alyth encouraging

people to share their wartime memories. These re- cordings of personal recollections will supplement the written records already held in the Archive, on which the Mosaic of Wartime Alyth was based. It’s an ex- citing thought that oral history projects not only bring the Archive to the community, but also add to it.

Last year the Archive acquired records, in poor condi- tion, of early Perthshire car registration numbers dat- ing from the early years of the twentieth century. The Friends have paid for the repairs to the papers, which are now available to the general public, smartly bound and, more importantly, legible.

As 2009 is officially designated as the Year of the Homecoming, I suspect that the Archive will be kept very busy as the year progresses and that many of the Friends may find themselves in various related activities. Watch this space! Increased in- terest in the Archive and additional related activities during this Year of the Home- coming offer an ideal opportunity for recruitment to the Friends. Even with the slight increase in fees and the “credit crunch”, I believe that membership represents tremendous value for money. Membership subscriptions also make very useful pre- sents. Margaret Borland-Stroyan

News from the Archive

We’ve been immersing ourselves in culture since the new year – artists and film makers have been descending on us! The Council is planning a cultural policy for Perth and gather- ing in opinions and ideas from across all the communities who live, work or visit the city – and the Archive has been playing its part. Steve has been interviewed and filmed in the

2 searchroom, as have one or two of the Friends volunteers, and I believe that a couple of our regular users have been approached as well. I think the edited highlights will be shown somewhere, so when I find out the when and the where, I’ll let all the Friends know. Even more exciting is that we have our very own Artist in the Archive. Local artist, Kyra Clegg, has been funded to create an artwork that shows how the collections are stories that link the past to the present and to the future – that through the archives we can travel in time! Kyra has been spending lots of time in the strong room and been finding some fascinating material – much of which I’d never seen before. At the end of March, she’ll be presenting her preliminary ideas and we should have complete artwork by the end of the year, ready to display to the world. The Artist in the Archive presenta- tion will be in the AK Bell Library Theatre on the eve- ning of 23 March – we’ll be sending out invitations to Friends members and others, so keep an eye on your email and post box. Meanwhile, you can see samples of Kyra’s work at www.kyclegg.co.uk.

It seems we haven’t stopped since the new year, for not only have we been involved in these projects, but we’ve been focused on a major Preservation Survey. At the end of January, we spent nearly two weeks sampling 800 records from all the collections to help us assess the condition of our holdings. We had specialist help in the form of NAS Conservator, Hazel van Hoff, and much- appreciated muscle lugging items backwards and forwards by our work experience student, John Watson.

All the sample data will be sent to the National Preservation Office, who will produce a re- port for us highlighting areas that need some work. However, the sample was immediately useful, in that it showed that many of our enclosures need replacing – doing this and the other work that the NPO will recommend is going to be a long-term and huge undertaking, and it’s very likely that we’ll be looking for volunteer help from the Friends. Re-boxing, wrapping and cleaning items isn’t the most exciting work in the world – but if we want to make sure that our collections last as long as possible, it’s vital work.

Finally, despite these projects, we’ve been continuing with our daily work as usual, answer- ing enquiries, helping researchers and accepting accessions – although shamefully, there’s not been any cataloguing done recently. Have a look at the website at www.pkc.gov.uk/ archives for details about our new accessions.

Jan Merchant 3 The Handloom Weavers of Perth

The weaving industry of the old Scottish burgh of Perth can be traced back to the 13th cen- tury at least. In 1210, William the Lion forbade anybody to make or dye cloth who was not a burgess within the town’s Merchant Guild. Essentially the town council of the time, the Guild protected the financial interests of both merchants and craftsmen, and as a trading body, it jeal- ously guarded its monopoly, keeping the weavers very much at arms’ length.

In 1424 an Act allowed for the creation of trade corporations in Scotland. The Weavers Incorpo- ration was duly formed in Perth, to provide mutual support and protection for its members. Known as ‘the Calling’ to its members, it was not until May 1556 that it gained a seat on the council, when Mary Queen of Scots decided that there should be equal numbers of craftsmen and merchants represented on the body. However, this was soon lost prior to the accession of James VI in 1567, the reason for which remains hidden in the past.

Apprentices and Journeymen

The apprenticeship registers of the Weavers Incorporation date back to 1593. A weaver’s ap- prenticeship could last from three to nine years, with most appointments made at Martinmas (November 11th), though also on the other quarter days. A typical example is that of Peter Dow. The son of James Dow, a tailor at Drum, Peter signed up to serve as an apprentice to William

The Weavers’ Incorporation owned several cottages which were rented to freeman weavers and widows 4 (photo courtesy of the Author)

Henderson, a Deacon weaver of the Incorporation, at Whitsunday (March 15th) 1782. The stipend payable to the apprentice was ten pounds and ten shillings, and to make sure the full indenture was served, both gentlemen had ‘cautioners’ to stand guarantor. An apprentice typically resided with his master for an agreed duration, from whom he would learn the necessary skills of the trade. Whilst most were men, occasionally, records of women do turn up, such as one from 1746 in which James Deu from Kintillo was booked apprentice to Katherine Adam in Houghfield. Apprentices occasion- ally broke their indentures, whilst some indentures ended early by mutual consent. As boisterous youths they also got into trouble, as the following Incorporation act shows from 1705:

The haill Generall meiting of the said traid Statutes and Ordaines that no journeyman or printeises shall in any time heirafter be found Drunk or shall be out of thair Chalmers after nine aclock at night unless they have ane sufficient Excuse And to shune all Idle company under the paine of ffourty shilling Scots money by and Attour Impris- onment of thair persones

On successful completion of an apprenticeship, a weaver became a journeyman in the trade, seeking employment with many different master craftsmen to accumulate experience. By now, he could live in private accommodation with his own family, and earn a decent wage.

Freemen Weavers Freemen within the Calling had the right to vote in its elections, but also had to adhere to certain stipulations. They had to obey the Acts of the Calling, and to share all financial burdens with their brethren. If they took up residence in the countryside, they had to pay half-a-crown annually for the privilege, and they were strongly dissuaded from defecting to the Merchant Guild, which could in- cur a fine of 100 merks Scots*. There were four main routes to becoming a freeman: i) The most common method was to marry a freeman weaver’s daughter. A freeman’s apprentice was charged 40 merks for the privilege, other apprentices were charged 100 merks, whilst a stranger was charged 50 merks. ii) A person could serve an apprenticeship with a freeman and gain the right to join upon comple- tion of his indenture. In this case, the payment to the Calling was higher, such as that of John Owr, who in 1726 who had to pay 100 merks Scots. iii) A third method was through hereditary right, with a son following in his weaver father’s foot- steps. For sons in the town, the fee was 20 merks; for a country freeman’s son, it was £20 Scots. iv) One could also simply purchase the right to join, though this was extremely expensive, normally charged at £100 Scots.

A rare fifth way was to be granted membership in gratitude for some particular service carried out in the Calling’s favour. In March 1778, for example, the Duke of Athole was made a freeman “for

______*A merk was worth two-thirds of a Scots pound; the latter’s value in contemporary English pounds 5gradually depreciated from par under James VI to about a seventh by the mid – 18th century. his signal Service to his King & Country in raising a Regiment for our defence & ye American Re- bellion so destructive to Government and our happy Constitution”. On November 9th 1790, the Earl of Breadalbane was also given membership for “his patriotic attention and distinguished zeal for promoting the Linen Manufactures, with the prosperity of which the welfare of this part of the United Kingdom, is directly connected”.

.

Sample of minutes from the Weavers’ Indenture Book, 1790—1809

The last paragraph reads-

“The said Andrew Feckney binds himself to pay one hundred marks Scots to the calling beside what he has paid this day if he fail to marry a freeman daughter or if he marry one who is not in her Pure virginity at the time of her marriage, for which hundred marks he has granted Bill.”

(Photo courtesy of the Author)

The Weavers’ Court

The Calling’s own court dealt with its members’ transgressions. On August 4th 1703, a John Hutson was tried and subsequently fined forty shillings “for his abusing the present Deacon and any other of the laite Deacons” and for having “called the s[ai]d Deacons Raskells and vil- lainds”. As if this crime was not heinous enough, Hutson also “often times commanded them to kiss his airs” for which he was fined an additional forty shillings!

The weavers’ fiery tempered wives were also clearly a headache for the deacons. On October 10th 1705 Perth based Patrick Smith was fined £5 Scots and sent to prison because “his wife abeused the pr[esen]tt deacon”. The lesson was clearly not learned, for on February 19th 1709, Smith was once more hauled up in front of the court. On this occasion, his spouse, Janet Mackie, had “Intruded herself in the Deacons company and without any ground of offence Did harrass and abuse him in a publick company” for which another £5 fine was imposed. Smith’s defence was that the charge was “butt out of splean of the deacon ag[ains]t him and his wife”, but he was again sent to prison!

Various disputes also engaged the hierarchy within the Calling. In March 1707, Deacon John Mar- tin 6complained that he had been verbally abused by John Gorie, a former boxmaster (treasurer) of the Incorporation. Gorie in turn complained that the Deacon had libelled him by saying that he was not worth four shillings when appointed as the trade’s boxmaster, yet had £4 of debt, and that he was “nothing butt a knave and a cheat to the traid and had thrie hundered merks of the traids money”. After many hostile exchanges between the parties, an exasperated court finally decided to fine Gorie forty shillings and the Deacon twenty shillings – with the warning that if either ever abused the other again, they would each be instantly fined an ad- ditional five pounds Scots.

Mutual Support

When members were ill, the Calling looked after them by paying for hospital care or by looking after rent payments. Similarly, if a member died, the organisation would pay to- wards the burial costs and make use of its own black velvet mortcloth, paid for by annual subscription from its members. Weaver’s wives were also catered for, even when their hus- bands predeceased them, as members would have previously paid a due known as a ‘football’ (or ‘ba-money’), usually charged at half a crown, which allowed their spouses to share in the fund’s benefits.

However, the Incorporation did occasionally get into debt, which at one point led to its sus- pension. George Penny in his 1836 book The Traditions of Perth identified the cause of their misfortune very firmly as drink, describing how the body often met at a tenant’s house “where they guzzled away their funds”.

Cloth

Until the late 1600s, Perth’s weavers traditionally wove wool, with the manufacture of linen and damask arriving at the start of the 18th Century. The Incorporation ensured that the cloth was woven to the highest standard both outside the burgh and within. In December 1704, a decision was made to appoint four of its number to check all linen produced by country based freemen as it arrived at each of the town’s main gates, in order that its standards would comply with an Act of Parliament, being exactly one ell in width (the length of a forearm) and bleached.

Within the burgh, weavers’ clients were mainly local families who would supply them with flax to create an item of cloth. Working at home, his wife would spin the flax into yarn, and with the children would wind it onto ‘pirns’ (bobbins). With the yarn prepared, the weaver would throw the shuttle back and forth over the loom whilst working the pedals of the frame, often late into the night. Once the cloth was completed, it was returned to the customer. As well as linen, linsey-woolsey was also woven, a coarse fabric comprised of linen warp and woollen weft, for the families’ own items, such as clothing and blankets. In 1766, a major boost to the industry happened when merchant George Penny (father of the Perth historian) introduced Silesia linen to Perth, a popular material first woven in eastern Europe, which soon found huge markets in London and the West Indies. As the industry boomed, weavers from outside the burgh migrated to the town to seek work, often outside the Calling’s control, but the town’s prosperity boomed. In 1782 Penny then introduced cot-

7 ton to the town, which was bleached and sold for ladies’ gowns at five shillings a yard. Weavers also produced materials for ginghams, shawls, muslins and even umbrellas.

The peak demand for the handloom weavers’ skills occurred in the 1790s, but from the start of the 19th century, war with France and the rapid development of factories saw the trade turn a corner. For many who began their lives in what had been a well-paid, middle class profession, their fortunes would soon collapse dramatically, with many ending their days in abject poverty by the middle of the century Chris Paton

About the author: Formerly a BBC producer/director on television history documentaries, Chris Paton is a professional genealogist and writer and holds a postgraduate diploma in Genalogical Studies. He runs Scotland’s Greatest Story family history research service at www.ScotlandsGreatestStory.co.uk, and the Scottish Genealogical News and Events blog at www.ScottishAncestry.blogspot.com

Perth: A Century of Change

Finella Wilson reviews Jeremy Duncan’s new book

Perth has been named as one of the best places to live in the UK, and for its present day resi- dents, it isn’t difficult to see why. It has a splendid situation on the banks of the Tay, fine old buildings, excellent amenities and a pretty calm tenor of life. Having read Jeremy Dun- can's book, Perth, a Century of Change, this reputation certainly seems to have been true going back a hundred years. In the early part of the century, the author describes a lively town where things happened - amazingly, 10,000 people attended the opening of the new Victoria Bridge - and the majority of the population were gainfully employed. Of course, it had its black side too; slum dwellings, drunkenness and disease, and low wages resulting in strikes, but what emerges from the book is a strong feeling of vibrancy and civic pride. It is hard to say if the latter still exist today.

It clearly identifies the major changes over the span of 100 years. In the earlier years Perth was still industrially based, with many important firms now gone but still remembered. There were dye works - not only Pullars, but also other rival firms, - glass works, and com- panies producing textiles, bricks, linen and blended whiskies. There were also three thriving livestock markets. Large quantities of goods went south by rail, and the railway itself em- ployed over 1,700 workers. At the turn of the century Pullars was a major employer, with a staff of 2,600. 8 A social phenomenon of the Victorian era was the existence of benefactors, and Perth was very fortu- nate to have had a good share. The most well-known names quoted were the Pullars, who mainly funded the Barnhill Sanatorium, Lord Forteviot, whose gifts included money for restoring St. John's Kirk and building a maternity unit at the Royal Infirmary, and AK Bell who established the Gannochy Trust. A rather unusual and somewhat charming donation was made by a Miss Rachel Penicuik, who in the early 1900s gave two fire engines to the town.

A modern change for the better is the almost complete eradication of the many infectious diseases which used to be rife. Tuberculosis, typhoid, smallpox, diphtheria and scarlet fever were all present in Perth , as well as the threat of cholera, and accordingly there were several very necessary fever hos- pitals. These diseases would have been exacerbated by the poor living conditions, and the building of modern housing in the town was a very welcome change.

Some things, of course never change. The author tells of the local ratepayers being shocked by a rise of fivepence (2p) in the pound. No ratepayer could have complained about the Town Clerk being al- lowed to purchase a typewriter (the only one) and pay a lady typist 30 shillings (£1.50) a month. How- ever, some eyebrows might have been raised by the Councillors making their annual boat trip to Broughty Ferry and back, with food and speeches to help them along their way. The existence of a Gaelic Chapel and Society to serve the 800 Gaelic speakers in the town points to another language being heard spoken about the town - now the language would probably be Polish!

Jeremy Duncan includes several very tantalising references in his book; for instance, what were Henry Coates's ‘less than acceptable interests’ at the Perthshire Natural History Museum? (his firm, Coates Bros, was a prominent Perth textile company ). Why did the poet William Soutar lead a pupils' strike at the Southern District School, and what was it about? And what were the people doing in that pho- tograph of a crowd behind the Session House ?

He includes many intriguing snippets, like the bull which fetched the world record price at the bull sales - 60,000 guineas - but, when it failed to perform its procreative duties properly, was later con- verted into what the press described as "the dearest mince the world has ever seen". The early live- stock sales held in the centre of the town often resulted in animals escaping and running amok; one woman who lived in the top floor of a tenement opposite the mart, opened her door and encountered a pig! Other accounts include how Sir Francis Norie-Miller, the renowned head of General Accident, was booked to sail on the Titanic and by good fortune cancelled his trip three weeks before it set sail; another tells how the cricket pavilion on the North Inch was burned down by suffragettes…..

Jeremy Duncan has produced a study of an important period of a fine town which is well written, im- mensely detailed and obviously the fruit of a huge amount of research. It makes you want to have been part of its history - to have ridden on a horse drawn tram, watched the canoes setting off on their race up the Tay to Dunkeld, to have caught a flight from Perth Aerodrome to one of seven scheduled destinations...but perhaps not to have witnessed the town executions!

9 Finella Wilson

Women employed as wartime railway maintenance workers in 1943

Perthshire Cricket Club burned down by suffragettes, on 17th of April 1913

North Muirton estate inundated during the great flood of 1993

All photos courtesy of Local Studies, AK Bell Library, Perth

______

We asked the author, Jeremy Duncan, to tell us something about the writing of the book, as the Archive and the AK Bell library played a prominent part in his research. He called his response-

The Story of Perth: a Century of Change, or, how probably not to write a local history…

One of the high points of the whole writing process is when the publisher’s contract lands with a thud on the front door mat. A corresponding low point occurs a few days later when, with shaky signature on paper, you begin to ponder what you have let yourself in for. So many thousand words, so many hundred illustrations with copyright cleared no later than such and such a date, and no further writing on a similar topic without the publisher’s permission. That, and details of pay- ments 10for film rights....

In this way, in September 2006 and after a false start four years earlier, Perth: a Century of Change got underway. Most of the research was carried out over the next year in the local studies section of the AK Bell Library where a century’s worth of local newspapers were pored over and condensed into three volumes of notes. One of the pleasures of this part of the research was the less than subtle political bias of the local newspapers in the early years of the century. When read- ing, say, the Perthshire Constitutional, I was tempted to wonder why one particular candidate for Westminster, clearly an out-and-out rogue, hadn’t been locked up years ago…until I read the PA and found he was regarded as little less than the Messiah himself.

The memories of some of the city’s older residents were tapped for information, and I enjoyed at- tending a reminiscence group of blind and partially blind people, suddenly hoping, as soon as the session began, that they hadn’t been blind from birth. Sure enough, several people remembered little details about old Perth, some of which I used in the book.

After several months of research I then indexed my notes and sat down to write. Some chapters were a struggle (discerning readers may be able to work out which) while others flowed relatively easily onto the page. The first draft was finished by the end of March 2008 which left me three months to polish the text, double-check numerous statements, and select and take photos. Steve Connelly and Rhoda Fothergill, equally venerated, were two of the several highly knowledgeable people who willingly gave their time to answer my questions, comment on the text, and generally lick it into shape. Paul Adair, the curator of the tens of thousands of photographs in the basement of the Museum, gave many hours of his time to guiding me through his labyrinthine collections as well as helping with the choice of cover photo. Finally, on 27th of June, three days before the dead- line, I filled a large envelope with the manuscript and CDs of photos and captions and, thinking my worries were over, handed it over to the care of the Post Office.

Oh, how wrong I was! The proofs came back in August and, unlike my first book which was pub- lished almost exactly as I had written it, I found that hundreds of little changes had been made. I would have been reasonably happy had they been for the better but the ‘editor’, in her obvious in- experience, made an utter hash of the text. Spelling mistakes were frequent, the rhythm of the text was destroyed, and in her desire to trim the wordage she ended up with several meaningless sen- tences. The upshot was that the editor quickly parted company with the publisher, and I had to make well over six hundred corrections to restore the text to something approximating its original form. Two further sets of proofs were corrected, but such was the time pressure imposed by the printers that I was denied the opportunity to check the final version. I can assure readers that the misprints on page 98 were definitely not there when the proofs were sent off for the last time!

In spite of these problems I was delighted with the finished work and feel that the publisher, in spite of the autumn’s misgivings, did an excellent job. The book was launched in the AK Bell Li- brary in mid-November and has been selling well since then. The highest point of all, even more thrilling than receiving the contract, was seeing it at the top of the best-sellers list in Waterstones (well ok, the Perth branch only, but even so…!)

Jeremy Duncan 11

The Battle for the North Part II Condensed from Charles McKean’s recent book

In part I: The dominance of the Caledonian railway company with its west coast origins was chal- lenged in the early 1850s by the upstart North British Railway Company (NBR), which had con- verted a ramshackle assembly of pre-existing east coast lines into a serious competitor for the all- important England to Scotland traffic. This initiated decades of no-holds-barred warfare, enor- mously expensive to both systems, the great prize being the capture of the lucrative traffic to Aber- deen and the north-east. Vast sums were spent on parliamentary bills and legal fees, and both com- panies routinely employed scullduggery against each other and often defrauded their long-suffering shareholders. The NBR saw a line bridging the great Forth and Tay estuaries as the key to its fu- ture. Thus when the first Tay bridge collapsed in the 1879 disaster, they immediately instructed Thomas Bouch, its chief engineer, to plan a replacement. But first there had to be an official in- quiry…

The Inquiry opened only six days after the disaster. It was evident that the chairman was following some government agenda, for he ignored the expert engineers on his panel and tried to undermine them. The inquiry made up its mind before the issue of the fourth girder had been brought up, with its crucial evidence of having been hit by a carriage. Without that evidence, and with whatever ail- ment he was suffering from, Bouch cut an extremely sorry figure as a witness. Rothery decided, un- supported by his engineering colleagues, that the cause of the disaster was the storm and that Bouch was entirely to blame.

Immediately after the disaster Bouch had set about plans to rebuild. But in July 1880, the NBR dropped him in relation to the Tay bridge, and work on his Forth Bridge was suspended in August. He died at Moffat in October. In his absence, a twelfth design for a Tay bridge, by engineers Coch- rane and Brunlees, was put before the House of Commons in August, but failed because MPs had now got cold feet.

In the meantime the NBR had lost 70% of its traffic to the north-east, and clemency could not be expected from the Caledonian. Worse was to come. Bouch's Forth Bridge design was found to fail new government requirements for windloading, and the contract was terminated. Moreover, the bridge over the Esk at Montrose being erected under the supervision of Bouch's son was failed by the government inspector, so the NBR line could not open to the north after all. Finally, the Forth Bridge Undertaking then decided to cease operations. At this point the NBR was at its lowest ebb.

But then early in 1881 its fortunes changed. William Barlow's design for a new Tay bridge (the fourteenth) was commissioned and the contract awarded to William Arrol. At the same time the 12 For a brief period in 1887, the columns of the first and second Tay bridges ran side by side (Photo courtesy of Dundee Central Library)

Forth Bridge project was rescued by the English east coast railway companies, who guaranteed suffi- cient traffic to make the project viable. The engineers of the four companies (three English and one Scots) were asked to produce competitive designs, and that of John Fowler and Benjamin Baker was chosen. Again, William Arrol was awarded the construction contract, provided he was prepared to be married into a consortium with the three other lowest bidders. An 1887 completion date was set.

In the meantime, the railway war marked time. With two major bridges under construction, the Cale- donian was well aware of the threat, but there was little it could do about it - except sulk. It rejected a further proposal to construct a joint Hauptbanhof on the site of Dundee's mediaeval quarter. But per- haps it was playing a cunning hand, for by 1885 the NBR was in great difficulty. The Tay bridge was barely half-built, and the Forth Bridge had run into deep trouble. Investigating why the contract was running so far behind, Fowler and Baker found that the consortium was not working as a team, and decided to put Arrol in sole charge. Coincidentally, Arrol won the contract for the Tower Bridge, and had to develop a pattern of commuting between Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and London on a weekly basis.

In 1887, the new Tay Bridge was opened to general celebrations, and Arrol was awarded the Freedom of Dundee. As predicted, however, the NBR proved sticky at removing the remnants of the old bridge which still blocked the navigation channels of the Tay. It caused fierce controversy and revealed, yet again, how little people trusted the railways. In the meantime the Forth Bridge was running behind again. Baker again intervened, imposing further reorganisation, and the NBR had to return to Parlia- ment 13for substantial refinancing. The bridge was now to open in 1890.

In the meantime, the railway wars had erupted again unexpectedly - with a railway race. Probably initiated by the West Coast companies pre-empting competition they foresaw once the bridges were open, the first railway race occurred in the summer of 1887 between London and Edinburgh. For the first time the Caledonian was obviously on the defensive. Although the result was inconclusive, it re- sulted in much faster running between the two cities.

In March 1890 the Prince of Wales opened the Forth Bridge in the usual gale, rendering the east coast trunk route from London to Aberdeen open. But although both companies jockeyed for the lucrative post office contract, a new threat had emerged in the form of the strike by railway servants in Decem- ber 1890. A common enemy brought the railway companies together to make the third - and this time final and lasting - peace agreement. Unfortunately, the new collaborative spirit did not percolate down to local level. The last few miles into Aberdeen was on shared track controlled by the Caledo- nian and Caledonian staff continued to disrupt and delay NBR services. So it was perhaps deliberately to expose these practices that the East Coast companies decided to pick up the challenge of a second Railway Race.

In June 1895, the West Coast companies tried to boost their declining share of the England/ Scotland goods traffic by running an 8 pm express from Euston to Aberdeen that took an hour off the running time. The East Coast companies met at York, plotted, and retali- ated with an even faster one. After a brief spurt of competition there was a hiatus; it be- gan again in mid-August, culminating in the race of August 22nd - by which time crowds would be on station platforms in the wee early hours waving their champions on. Technically the West Coast won by a margin, but only - so said the NBR - because they ran unscheduled services that did not stop and ran with fewer carriages. The result was proba- bly a draw; but the NBR had arranged for coachloads of journalists to witness Caledo- nian dirty tricks at Kinnaber. They had publi- cised the NBR's anger, and indeed its threat to build a new line into Aberdeen unless the Caledonian ceased these practices. It did, all companies denied that there had ever been a Forth Bridge nearing completion race, and the public was the beneficiary with (Photo14 courtesy of the author) five hours taken off the journey time.

An echo of the rivalry was then fossilised in the construction of their flagship hotels at each end of Princes Street. The NBR opted for overwhelming size, whereas the Caledonian produced a red sandstone behemoth of stunning vulgarity. Ultimately, in the flagship hotels rivalry, dis- honours were more or less even. In 1912, a comparative analysis of the two railway companies identified some minor margin between their operations but concluded, after all that expenditure and rhetoric, that they were more or less equal. The railway battle for Scotland had ended in a draw.

Was it worth it? Whether or not this was the best way to produce trunk railway lines within the British Isles is open to question. It brought little benefit to the original ordinary shareholders or to most of the preference shareholders who received very little or no dividend from these two companies from 1844 to 1880. It did not produce an ideal railway network, since much of the principal trunk line used short-haul coal wagon lines that did not suit trunk rail conditions, and there were the wrong lines in the wrong places. Moreover, somewhere between 150 and 200 people had died in the process. Although the railways ultimately benefited from the Scottish economy, there had been an enormous waste of capital in attending Parliamentary hearings in London.

On the other hand, competition was the ethos of the time, and it had probably held down prices. Whether it increased the quality of service seemed uncertain to contemporaries and remains un- certain now. Although the NBR effectively ended up equal with the Caledonian, it might have achieved the same result by different means. It certainly could have done so had the guardian of competition - Parliament itself - been prepared to police its decisions and impose a measure of common sense upon an industry that behaved like 'boys with toys'. It is hardly worth pon- dering whether it was worth it to the railway lawyers.

Scotland, however, had ended up with a first-rate example of how public enquiries could be manipulated to suit political agendas - and the longest and the largest railways in the world.

Condensed from Charles McKean’s Battle for the North (London, Granta, 2006)

Friends of Perth & Kinross Council Archive AK Bell Library York Place PERTH PH2 8EP Tel:(01738) 477012 Email: [email protected] Hon. Presidents: The Provost: Sir William Macpherson of Cluny and Blairgowrie: Mr Donald Abbott Scottish Charity No. SCO31537

Editor: David Wilson

15 The Joy of Extracting Oral History

One of the things I enjoy is talking to people about local history and teasing out nuggets of informa- tion. What I have discovered is that people can know quite a lot of things, and with a reasonable amount of detail, but it’s all been stored away deep in their memory, as the particular item probably hasn't been talked about for some considerable time. We are talking decades here, up to 60-70 years. The things that have been stored away were once probably common knowledge in the per- son’s family and probably in the locality, things that they take for granted. Questions are keys, and it’s only when a particular question is asked that it will turn the key that opens what is potentially a locked door in someone’s memory. The fun is to find those questions, and ask not just what they know, but to also ask about what information they heard from their parents or other relatives, and whether they know of any other stories that circulated in their village. To me, a key part of the exer- cise is to not just to take information but to give something back, not just to the community but to the families of the individuals who have made the whole thing possible.

By way of an example, the parents of a good friend of mine were getting very old and doddery a few years ago, but had shared a few stories over the years. Enough to make me realise that they had interesting stories that they ought to be recorded. I told my friend that he should do this on several occasions, but the pressures of his job got in the way, and he just didn't have the time to sit down and write them up. In short, nothing was being done. So, one day out of the blue, I rang his parents and told them that I wanted to come and record their stories, and being amenable, we met in their house that weekend, and I recorded them in stereo on a cassette player. We all soon forgot that eve- rything was being recorded and the stories flowed.

Much more was revealed about their lives, their ancestry and where they had come from, and how they came to live where they did. My friend’s father had flown seaplanes for the RAF in WW2 all round the coast of Scotland and up various lochs, and had ancestors who had made a fortune putting the copper bottoms on ships in their dock, which took us into the realm of family businesses. His Welsh wife revealed how her family made Cornish pasties, and then something that I found fasci- nating, that all of her Victorian aunts and uncles were named after famous composers. A lot of this came out of the blue, as their thoughts bounced off the questions and answers, and as additional questions were asked to tease out these nuggets. I have now added old family habits and ancient local recipes to my list of questions. Sadly my friend lost both of his parents within six months, but in hindsight a lot of things that would have been lost were found and recorded in the nick of time, and his family now has a very personal and irreplaceable record of the past. Exactly the same is true when it comes to recording local history.

As I write these words, I have got my mother writing down her vivid memory of seeing Hess's plane fly in over Ayrshire when she was sixteen. And she has already talked to her friends about their memory of the event, and of Hess's capture on a farm in Eaglesham. Local knowledge of where Hess was held in Britain has also been invoked. Its surprising what people know!

Alan Kinnaird 16