1903 Old Parish Church (PV)
This photo was given to me in the 1990’s by a elderly friend of my mothers. (Im so sorry, I can’t remember her name). In pencil on the reverse is 1903, but the photo does look like a copy of the original, being on modern photo paper. Pictured is of course High Blantyre Old Parish Church.
Seven or eight children play in the foreground, on the traffic free roads. Craigmuir Road leads up the hill on the right and just out the picture on the right would have been the High Blantyre Train Station.
Pictured immediately behind the church are the Saw Mills. This was a large double storey building made of stone, with very few windows. The roof was made of slate and the building is pictured almost in it’s entirety in this photo. The building had an almost square footprint with exception of an oblique gable along Craigmuir Road. The steps to the upper level were on the left hand side of the sawmill (behind the tree in this photo). To the left of the steps would have been a crane, used for manoeuvring the wood. The sawmill was demolished sometime in the 1920’s and as such, is a building not many people know of these days. It lasted no more than 40 years, which for such a size of building is a possible indication that it may have been affected by coal workings below. It is now the site of a modern home.
On social media:
In 1959 I purchased a house in a building along from the church hall the bottom had two stores used for storage, on the next level was two homes ,the one I purchased I was told was owned by the saw mill owner unlike the other three homes we had a inside toilet with a bath plus hot water, it had three rooms but the owner had sold one room to our next door neighborough John Nelson and I am sure at that time at the Bach was a lumber yard with a building,
