The full detailed story of the church is here

Stonefield Parish Church on Glasgow Road, opened on 18th June 1880 and could seat 900 people. Pictured here 100 years later is the burned out shell of the church, which was ready to be demolished.

On 3rd September 1979, Stonefield Parish Church suffered the fate of many other Blantyre church buildings and was accidentally set on fire. The roof was being restored at the time when a workman left his blowtorch on while he went for his lunch. The building was just 9 months away from its centenary!

At first it was thought that repair would be possible with a new roof, but soon it was discovered that the whole remaining church would need to be demolished as a result of weaknesses in the wall and from the land disturbance caused by mining (the reason why the spire had been removed years earlier).

Despite losing their church building, the congregation remained resilient. During the next 3 years they met in the Livingstone Memorial Church each Sunday afternoon.

From “Blantyre Explained” by Paul Veverka (c)

Featuring Blantyre Project Social Media with permission. Strictly not for use by others on or offline, our visitors said,

Andy Lynch A very sad picture. It reminds me how you take things for granted. I used to stand often at this bus stop waiting for the 230 to take me home from my grannies. Probably never glancing at the church and then remember being devastated when they knocked it down. And then shortly afterwards they did likewise to most of the main street (Glasgow Road)

Betty McLean Inside this lovely church I remember sitting in the balcony for the Christmas Eve service.

Catherine Newell I got married here in 1970