Foreword to the Second Edition of the Graveyard Records
To The Reader
By 2011 it had become very apparent that the 1995 edition of the graveyard
listing was becoming out of date. There was a variety of reasons for this - The
City of Edinburgh Council carried out a survey of the graveyard and laid down
all stones which had become unsafe or unstable – ‘vandal damage’ – additional
inscriptions to the existing headstones – additional weather erosion and damage
etc. There was even a new headstone(s) which had not been recorded as yet.
Additionally the current record of the graveyard (The Little Red Book)
appeared to be the only copy available to Corstorphine Old Parish Church and
as such it was felt to be vulnerable to loss or damage. Currently this book has
been copied to a computer hard drive to ensure that the content of the Little Red
Book will not be lost.
In due course all the headstones will be checked for correct details of the
inscriptions and the text content. All changes and corrections found will be
updated, and as this update proceeds the records will be reprinted, regularly, to
keep it accurate and up to date.
We wish to continue the interest in the Corstorphine Old Parish Church
Graveyard and bring up to date the locally held records, and eventually make
them searchable online.
K.D. Aitchison, D.R. Baird, G. Donaldson, 2012
Kevin Aitchison - Corstorphine Old Parish Church Member/ Corstorphine Trust Vice Chairman
Donald Baird - Corstorphine Old Parish Church Member/ Corstorphine Trust Exec Committee Member
Grant Donaldson - Corstorphine Trust Exec Committee Member
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Foreword to the First Edition of the Graveyard Records
To the Reader
Recording the memorials in the old parish kirkyard in the summer of 1994 was
a small way in which we felt we could preserve part of Corstorphine Past for
Corstorphine Future.
It was interesting and thought provoking work, here we met descendants, from
home and abroad, looking for those who had gone before. Here we met a happy
little boy, who pointing to the church, said ‘That’s where Mr Brady works’.
That comment spoke words for the minister: it also spoke words for the home
which the boy was growing up.
Here through the memorials to death we were facing the mysteries of life. Here
in the last decade of the 20th century, torn apart by nationalistic wars and man’s
inhumanity, Francis Glog, farmer at Claycott and kirk elder in the opening years
of the 18th century, spoke from his tombstone with it’s simple message of faith
amidst tribulation as experienced by Job: ‘I know that my redeemer liveth’.
To those who come after us we pass on our interest in and our affection for
Corstorphine and its history.
A.S. Cowper, M.S. Moncur
1995
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The Parish Churchyard
The Reformed Church in Scotland was concerned to wipe out anything
considered Popish. The 17th century Directory of Public Worship stated that a
corpse was to be ‘interred without any ceremony’ and that a minister need not
take part in the proceedings.
The parish church was responsible for maintaining kirkyard dykes, stiles and
entrances under an Act of 1597. This was aimed at keeping wandering animals,
especially pigs, from disturbing the graves. Corstorphine Lairds in the 18 th
Century allowed the Kirk Session to repair the kirkyard dykes with stones from
the unoccupied castle.
Kirkyards were used for secular purposes – markets, fairs, business transactions
– and also as the village public toilet. More respect for the dead came from the
Victorians and the creation of burial grounds managed by cemetery companies.
To-day Corstorphine kirkyard is a common thoroughfare with scant respect
shown by some cyclists for the living pedestrians on the pathways.
The Burial Grounds (Scotland) Act of 1855 freed Kirk Sessions from
responsibility to graveyard maintenance. Presently Corstorphine graveyard is in
the care of Edinburgh District Council. The Council Officials and Staff are
diligent in keeping the grounds tidy and attending to the preservation of the
monuments. At the office at Mortonhall are a plan of the lairs and a register of
burials since 1899.
Kirk Sessions used fees from funerals to fund assistance to the parish poor.
Before the Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages (Scotland) Act of 1855
people generally ignored the instruction to record the death in the parish register
because a fee was charged. This explains the paucity of death records in most
parishes. Registering baptisms and marriages were given more attention for on
these records depended salvation and social respectability. There are still extant
in the archives at New Register House, Edinburgh, many old parochial registers
giving information on births and marriages.
Two bells were used at funerals. The little hand or mort bell was rung by the
beadle to notify a death in the parish and sometimes to lead the cortege. Better
off people had the Great or Kirk bell tolled. Costs for bell ringing depended on
which bell was used.
Sometimes because of poverty or epidemics the body was taken to the
graveyard simply wrapped in a cover or placed in a coffin with hinged sides or a
hinged bottom so that it could be re-used after the corpse was dropped into the
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grave. Coffins were either carried shoulder high or borne on ‘spokes’ which
meant a frame made of two poles with cross bars on which to rest the coffin.
The mortcloth was a social necessity by the start of the 18 th century. It was a
pall originally used to cover a corpse when a coffin could not be afforded. Later
it was the essential covering for the coffin. Hiring fees for use of the black
mortcloth depended on its size, the quality of the material (usually velvet) and
the lining and whether it was fringed or not. The Session kept it in a specially
made bag called a ‘pock’ or a chest. When needed for a death at a house out
with the village it was delivered by the beadle. When James Watson of
Saughton died in 1716 the Corstorphine beadle, William Stevenson, set off for
Saughton House with the large new velvet cloth but when he arrived the worse
of drink he had no mortcloth having left it somewhere on his journey.
Consequently the Colinton mortcloth had to be got hastily. When church
registers include a list of payments for hire of mortcloths that list provides to a
limited extent a deaths register.
Burials within churches were forbidden by the First Book of Discipline of 1572.
Since most churches had earthen floors this prohibition was beneficial for
sanitary reasons as many graves were shallow excavations. This was possibly
the situation in 1609 when Harry Aitkin of Broomhouse broke into
Corstorphine Church through the roof and buried his wife Margaret with the
help of friends using a spade and picks.
The elaborate heraldic effigied tombs of the medieval Foresters within the
church remain to remind posterity of past glory and devotion top religion.
Somewhere beneath the great east window lies unmarked James 1679, the last
Forrester to live in the village.
The Watson Lairds of Saughton were buried from the 17 th century to the 19th
century in a vault beneath the church floor near the south aisle. A finely
sculptured flat grave slab still carrying its metal lifting rings and
commemorating James Watson 1620 was set in 1905 into the south aisle wall.
Many lie in the kirkyard without a memorial. Permission to erect a stone was
given by Session and a fee was payable. This in addition to the cost of the stone
and the charges the mason may account for the few surviving 18th century
carved stones at Corstorphine. Some memorials have disappeared, possibly the
result of two major building operations at the church in 1828 and 1905. Then
there was the overzealous clearing action of the gravedigger in 1820 ‘to secure
new graves’.
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In 1881 there still survived a memorial to ‘Francis Joseph Trelss, native of
Hungary, and late tenant of Saughton Hall 1796’. Trelss, a noted agriculturalist
at Saughton Hall, was also the miller at Dalzeil’s Mill near Ford’s Road. Now
this stone has vanished.
Fortunately there remains the memorial to Francis Glog 1736, farmer, kirk elder
and kirk treasurer. His stone represents a sower, a reaper. Father time and the
Green Man head a symbolic of fertility and the cycle of life. A much eroded
stone shows the shears and the goose (iron) representing the tailors craft.
Broken lettering suggests it may be the 1677 memorial set by James Allan a
village tailor to the memory of his father. The carpenters have stones with the
square and compass. The Angel of Resurrection with trumpet boldly proclaims
the Soul on its way to Eternity. Some stones carry the emblems of mortality –
the skull, the crossbones, the hour glass, the scythe – and the Latin exhortation
to remember that Death is always present – Memento Mori.
Kirkyards are the history in stone and grass of Scotland’s people, deserving care
and respect from generation to generation.
Headstone Entry Explanation
Dave SMITH, fa Alex, mo Isa BROWN, w Margt MACK, d 7.6.1870, s Chas
(w Eliz REID, da Mary)
Means the David Smith’s parents were Alexander Smith and Isabella Brown,
his wife was Margaret Mack who died on the 7th of June 1870 and his son was
Charles. Charles Smith married Elizabeth Reid and their daughter was Mary.
Relationship is to the first person named. Relationship within the brackets is to
the name immediately before the brackets so Charles was married to Elizabeth
Reid and they had a daughter Mary
Uncertain readings have question mark
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