Using archives in archaeological research

Morag Cross

(First published in Dunaskin News, May 2003)

Archaeologists and buildings historians often use specialist information sources such as the National Monuments Record of Scotland, an index to archaeological information held by The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS).  However, there are other lesser-known archives that can also act as a corollary to excavations and historic fabric.

Glasgow University Archive Services holds several collections of interest, each catalogued in more detail than some other sources, which makes them user friendly and easier to search.  There are 150 years of Glasgow Archaeological Society (GUAS Ref: DC 66), revealing decades of campaigning to preserve monuments and ensure sympathetic architectural designs.

The respected architect, John Honeyman, designer of the Ca’ d’Oro building and Lansdowne Church on Great Western Road, as well as Rennie Mackintosh’s senior partner, lectured on the Govan Stones in 1899.  He was soon followed by J Romilly Allen and (fellow architect) P MacGregor Chalmers, reflecting an upsurge in appreciation for Glasgow’s native history, as well as the nascent conservation movement.  In 1893, Honeyman had designed a shelter for the stones, for which the parochial heritors raised funds, and Sir John Stirling Maxwell later had casts made and photographed.

From 1899, the Society’s Council lobbied the architect of the intended renovations of Glasgow Royal Infirmary, to incorporate the Robert Adam facade into the rebuilding (eventually completed in 1914), but despite his assurances, this was not carried out.  There were also many successes, such as the consolidation of Lochranza Castle, which had partially collapsed into the Clyde until the owners were pressured, or shamed, into remedial repairs to this ‘valuable specimen of Scots castellated architecture’.

In Ayrshire, Beith Townscape Heritage Initiative aimed at regenerating part of the market town’s historic cross area.  Five buildings, due to be renovated for social housing, were first recorded and excavated by Addyman Associates.  Local historians recounted that Reverend John Witherspoon, parish minister from 1745-57, lived in one of the houses (opinions differed as to which).  As a signatory of the American Declaration of Independence and President of Princeton University, he provided a colourful link with a wider cultural perspective.  

The Turnpike Trustees’ records and petitions provided information on the movement of street lines and cottage demolitions at the Cross in the 1830s.  Parochial church heritors’ records, from the late 17th century onwards, contain valuable details of the statutory upkeep of the physical fabric of the church, graveyard and school.  For Beith, this gave details of wall repairs from the 1680s, and the re-locating of the church curtilage in the 1830s.  This truncated some lairs, forcing exhumations and the relocation of remains.

Sasines and title deeds revealed the workings of the commercial and domestic economy of the area, supported by the discovery of oven and hearth remains.  One writ from 1770 listed the history of the ownership of a “litel house” or merchant booth, 16 feet long and 14 feet wide, beside the church, from 1675.  Others detailed the ancillary structures of cellar, back house, two stables, oven, yard and furnace that accompanied such a booth, or shop.
 
Witherspoon remained elusive - until a collection of deeds showed that he had owned two properties (hence uncertainty over the address), albeit only for a few months before he was called to a more prestigious post in Paisley.  They seemed to have been purchased as a “buy-to-let” investment with a sitting tenant, “John Gordon, fidler.”  The deeds also showed that new chimneys and windows had been added to one house when it was split in two, in the mid-18th century.  Window tax records finally showed that the house Witherspoon personally occupied, in common with neighbouring clergy, was the spacious manse, and not 32, The Cross.  Although he did not live there, local memories of the Witherspoon ownership proved correct.

Archival information shed light on burials in Kilbarchan, where the Old (West) Parish Church graveyard wall collapsed due to subsidence.  The new gravedigger complained in 1892 that his apparently senile predecessor had randomly opened graves all over the churchyard, ignoring customary lairs.  In one case, the funeral party had to return to Paisley, as the correct grave was not prepared.  This is just one such example of neatly labelled graveyard plans and headstones possibly proving unreliable, giving rise to interesting questions about the use of DNA evidence from some such seemingly well-documented contexts.