Words by William B. Black
Map of Maryhill estates divided by the River Kelvin
Prior to the Reformation the area known today as Maryhill was the property of the Diocese of Glasgow, which stretched over a considerable part of south west Scotland at one point. In 1175, William the Lion declared that Glasgow was to be a Burgh of Barony, under the continued control of the Archbishop, Jocelyn.
This covered not only the town but an area roughly from the banks of the Kelvin in the west to Shettleston in the East and included Govan on the south bank of the Clyde. Following the flight of Archbishop James Beaton in 1560, the area came under the control of the Protestant church and, in 1611, the town of Glasgow was promoted to the status of a Royal Burgh by James VI, but the area around it continued as a barony.
Even before the Reformation, the area had been divided up into estates and farms, whose occupants feud the land from the Church. When this control loosened in the late 16th century, others moved in to take over control, including Walter Stewart, Commendator of Blantyre. A commendator is defined as someone having a temporary holding of an ecclesiastical benefice but Walter’s holding proved permanent. In 1587 James VI transferred the Barony charter to him and on the list of estates contained within are Garroch, Gairbraid and Rouchhill, one of the earliest references to areas that remain part of Maryhill today.
At the time that the early village developed, the core of the district was considered to be Gairbraid and we know that it existed as early as November 1515, when Alan Duncan feued part of it. More significantly in 1536 John Hutcheson inherited another part following the death of his father. Gradually over the next decades the family obtained larger parts of the estate and in August 1600 it passed to George, who was a great-great nephew of John. George’s father, Thomas had inherited the adjacent estate of Lambhill, which had passed to his other son, also Thomas. Today George & Thomas Hutcheson are remembered through Hutchesons’ Grammar School, and the building known as Hutchesons’ Hospital in Ingram St.
Gairbraid House by David Small (Glasgow Life)
The Hutcheson brothers were solicitors in Glasgow and appear to have been very adroit at adding to their property portfolio in the early years of the 17th century, often from deceased clients. George died in 1639 and Thomas three years later, both without any children and their estates passed to their three sisters. One of them had married Ninian Hill in 1609, who died around 1621 but he brought with him the small estate of Garroch, now referred to as Garrioch. Helen had a son also called Ninian and she passed on the inheritance of both Gairbraid and Garrioch to him soon after the Hutcheson brothers died. Her sisters did likewise and Ninian gained Lambhill, giving him an estate stretching from the banks of the Kelvin to Balgrayhill in Springburn.
Gairbraid and Garrioch were passed down through successive male generations of Hill, until 1738 when it was inherited by eight year old Mary, who lived in Greenock. Around 1761, Mary married Robert Graham, a former merchant navy captain, whose father had purchased Lambhill in 1700. By this time the Glasgow area was beginning to develop commercially, but Gairbraid was encumbered by debt and unable to provide much capital.
To ease the burden, the Grahams sold land on which he had attempted to mine coal without much success to Sir Ilay Campbell, owner of Garscube estate, in return for an annuity. Then, in 1785, it was announced that the Forth & Clyde Canal was to be extended westwards from its terminus at Stockingfield on the adjacent Ruchill estate.
To do so, land was purchased from the Grahams and, with their finances more secure, they decided that they must have a more fashionable house in which to live. The original Gairbraid House had been built in 1688, but in 1789 they had a new Georgian mansion constructed overlooking the Kelvin, with a tree lined drive from the Drymen Toll Road, this surviving today as Gairbraid Avenue.
The toll road, known as Garscube Toll, had been constructed in 1753, another windfall for Gairbraid Estate, although it divided their land rather awkwardly. Then, when the canal was being built, it was realised that the road would require to be moved to enable an aqueduct to be built across it. At this time it ran behind the site occupied today by the library and a 90o turn was built just below the line of the canal taking it down to the modern Maryhill Road. Beyond this, a new length of road was built running to the top of the hill, rejoining the original where it turns at Kelvin Dock. This left a cul de sac, running from the north bank of the canal to the toll road, known today as Aray St., with a narrow strip of land between the two. This would prove unsuitable for agriculture but the canal brought the potential of further industrial development. Therefore in 1787, the Grahams advertised it as a series of building plots and Robert saw an opportunity to enshrine his wife’s name in the area for future generations. At this time, it was fashionable for new areas being feued off to be named either with the family name of the seller or, possibly romantically with that of the lady of the family. It was the initial feus of these properties that contained the term ‘in the village known as Maryhill’ but, it took several decades for the name to become established.
By 1809, both Robert and Mary were dead, leaving two daughters, Lilias, who never married and remained in residence at Gairbraid until her death and Janet, who married Alexander Dunlop of Greenock. The estate passed to their son John but after Lilias’ death occupancy passed to a series of tenants. By 1923, it had been divided into flats and it was demolished a few years later.
Garrioch House
Closely connected to Gairbraid is the estate of Garrioch, which appears for the first time in 1512 and passed through several hands before coming into that of Marion Wilson, who married James Hill of Ibrox in 1582.
As seen above, their son Ninian married Helen Hutcheson in 1609. At this time it appears that Hill did not inherit the whole estate as, in 1597 half of it had been feued by Blantyre to John Wylie, Clerk to the King’s Chancel.
When their son Ninian inherited it appears to have been quite extensive, a 1680 description suggesting it ran from the modern Queen Margaret Bridge along the Kelvin to Kelvindale Rd, then followed this along a line that eventually met the Western Necropolis, then ran diagonally across St Kentigern’s Cemetery to its SW corner. From there, the boundary ran back to the point where the railway line crosses the canal, then goes back down it to Stockingfield. It then runs along the Glasgow Branch to Bilsland Dr, before heading back down to its starting point at Queen Margaret Bridge.
By the time Glasgow merchant William James Davidson bought it in 1827, it had shrunk and, when the War Office were looking for a site for new barracks in 1872, the bulk of the estate was sold off for this purpose. Of course, once the barracks closed in 1958 the logical move would have been to bring back the original name for the new housing estate but, instead, it was given that of Wyndford, originally a small area adjacent to the canal at Lochburn Rd.
Ruchill House by David Small (Glasgow Life)
The estate that appears to have gained most from the breaking up of Garrioch was Ruchill, once the largest within the Maryhill area. Like the others, it appears initially in the surviving records at the beginning of the 16th century, when it was owned by Edward Marshall. It followed the usual pattern of being inherited by several generations, at least two through the female line, but by 1658 it was in the hands of a Glasgow merchant, Thomas Peadie. He was one of the proprietors of the Eastern Sugar House in Glasgow and at one point was provost of Glasgow, the first Maryhill resident to do so. He appears to have been a ruthless individual, who died in 1717, passing the estate to his son James, the second person from Maryhill to become provost of Glasgow.
Peadie died in 1728 but his son John was the last male heir, his two sons both dying before their father. This resulted in the estate being divided between his five aunts. At this time, it stretched from just east of the former Ruchill Hospital all the way down to Great Western Rd, including Kirklee and a large portion of Kelvinside. Given their pedigree, it should not be unexpected that they could not agree on the division of the estate, including their home, Ruchill House. It had been built around 1700 and was a simple house, located approximately at the north end of the modern Whitworth Gardens. Like Gairbraid, access was along a drive from the parish road, which ran close to the Kelvin, this surviving today in the form of Shakespeare St and Ruchill St.
Robert Dreghorn
During the dispute, a surveyor had been brought in to value the estate and, once the matter was settled, he made an offer to purchase it. All but one sister, Grizell, agreed and the bulk of it passed to Alan Dreghorn. He was part of the Glasgow elite but is remembered today for his design of the magnificent St Andrew’s Church south of Glasgow Cross. He died childless in 1764 and the estate passed to his nephew Robert, better known to his contemporaries as ’Bob Dragon.’ As a child, he had suffered from smallpox, which left him with a badly disfigured face, although to compensate he became one of the best dressed men in Glasgow. While considered eccentric, he was a man who was well aware of the value of his property and also ensured that he was never undersold. This tendency contributed to delays in completion of the Forth & Clyde Canal to Stockingfield, as it went through his estate and Dreghorn held out for the best price available.
Dreghorn committed suicide in 1804, the estate passing to his sister Elizabeth, who also died childless in 1821. This resulted in the estate being inherited by her niece, Isabella Dennistoun, who placed it up for sale in 1826. The buyer was William James Davidson, another Glasgow merchant, but by 1860 Ruchill House was being advertised for a furnished let. In 1875, it became the club house of the Glasgow North Western Golf Club, who laid out their course to the north and west, part of it surviving today close to the canal. At the beginning of the 20th century, much of the estate came under the ownership of Glasgow Corporation, with Ruchill Hospital and Park being built on the southern half. The house was demolished in 1927 and much of the area built over for council housing.
Kelvinside House by David Small. This view drawn from the north west includes in the foreground the land occupied formerly By North Kelvinside School playing fields and Kelbourne School (Glasgow Life)
The portion of Ruchill that had been retained by Grizell Peadie lay to the south east and straddled the Kelvin. It became known as Bankhead until she sold it to Thomas Dunmore, a Glasgow merchant in 1749. Immediatel,y he renamed it Kelvinside and, in the following year, he had a magnificent mansion built, its position being approximately at the top of the hill in Clouston Street, on its north side. The western half of the latter formed the main drive, which ran down to the parish road along the Kelvin.
Dunmore’s son was one of those who suffered financially during the American Revolution and, in 1785, it was sold to Dr Thomas Lithian of the East India Company. After Lithian died, his wife Elizabeth remarried, her second husband being Archibald Cuthill, a Glasgow solicitor. It was during their ownership that Kelvinside House saw the birth of Henry Campbell-Bannerman in 1836, the only person born in Maryhill to become UK prime minister, at least to date.
Matthew Montgomerie and John Park Fleming purchased the estate from Cuthill’s widow in 1836 and they began to consider plans to develop housing upon it. The formation of the Burgh of Maryhill in 1856 effectively split the estate in two, with the Kelvin marking the internal boundary. In 1869, 93.4 acres of the Maryhill part were sold to John E Walker, who set about developing much of the area we know today as North Kelvin. Simultaneously Fleming’s descendants became responsible for developing the housing that was to form Kirklee and Kelvinside.
The remaining estates had small portions that were included within Maryhill, that immediately bordering Kelvinside being North Woodside, which had passed from the Church to Adam Colquhoun , Rector of Stobo. From there it went to his daughter, Elizabeth, who had married Sir George Elphinstone, provost of Glasgow.
Stevenson Memorial Church by Tom Maxwell
However, by the early 17th century it had passed into the hands of Colin Campbell and it remained with that family until 1694. Then it passed to Archibald Stirling of Kier and this heralded a period when it changed hands at regular intervals. By 1804, it was owned by Colin Gillespie, a Glasgow calico printer but, by 1822 he had gone out of business and the estate passed temporarily into the hands of the bank. They sold it on to an accountant John Paul, who retained ownership until 1845. After a short period under the control of John Bain, it became the property of the ill-fated City of Glasgow Bank. They began to develop the area for feuing and, to improve access to the city, built the handsome Belmont St Bridge.
To the north of the burgh two estates infringed, the larger being Garscube, which remains largely intact today. Originally owned by the Lennox family, in 1250 it had passed to the Colquhouns, who retained it until 1681 when it was purchased by John Campbell of Succoth. This family was to retain ownership until 1947 when it passed to the University of Glasgow. During the period of the burgh the Campbells of Succoth were seen as the local lairds, having Garscube as their principal residence.
Sir Ilay Campbell of Succoth (1734 - 1823) by David Martin
Probably the best known of the Campbells of Succoth was Sir Ilay, who rose to become Lord Advocate in 1790 and was one of the most influential men in Scotland at this time. During their occupancy, they provided support for several Maryhill institutions. Lady Elizabeth, wife of Ilay’s grandson Sir Archibald, provided small pensions for several impecunious local residents. The following Lady Campbell, wife of Sir George, went further by financing the building of a cottage hospital, a building that survives today at 2024 Maryhill Road.
Inevitably there came a point where the Campbells were no longer able to maintain their position at Garscube and, in 1947, it was sold off to the University of Glasgow, the Maryhill section today being occupied by the Science Park, where space satellites are designed for international customers.
The final estate is Killermont, the bulk of which forms the golf course, with its magnificent Georgian clubhouse. In the early 16th century it had belonged to Sir John Cunningham but, after several other owners, in 1747 it passed into the hands of Lawrence Colquhoun. This family remained in charge throughout the 19th and early 20th century, having changed their name to Campbell-Colquhoun when the estate descended through the female line. Although their contribution to Maryhill was less, they did finance the building of the second Parish School and a later extension, this being on the site of the present Maryhill Parish Church. Originally, all of the estate had been on the western side of the Kelvin but at one point the area known as Sandyflats on the Maryhill side was purchased from the Grahams of Gairbraid. Today a large part of this area is occupied by the Riding for the Disabled Equestrian Centre.
The author of this essay is a retired training manager who carries out research into less well known areas of local history in Glasgow and the West of Scotland. As a Maryhill native he has a particular interest in the history of the area and, especially, that of the old police burgh up until 1891. These essays are taken from the research notes that have been drawn up over a period of years and are intended as an introduction which can be used by those seeking more information.
Maryhill Burgh Halls Trust want to thank William Black for his incredible support throughout the years, having shared all his in-depth research and snippets since the start of the Trust’s journey into the history of the Burgh. We are also very grateful for allowing us to post his wonderful essays to our blog. This is the second one of the series, you can read the first one on shipbuilding by clicking here.