Formerly part of the Wester Craigs Estate, the Grey Rock was bought by the Merchants’ House in 1650 from Stewart of Mynto for £1,291 and lots of land were feued out at £70.6s.8d a year to quarry stone and rock. The promontory and western approaches to the estate were considered too rocky to use profitably, so it was laid out as a plantation.
The Western side of the park, with its stunning views of the cathedral was planted out with fir trees and quickly became known as the Fir Park. By 1804 due to industrial pollution in Glasgow the Scots Firs started to die off, and over the next fifty years were replaced with elm and willow. A surrounding wall was built, a keeper appointed, and an arboretum and garden constructed. 1824 saw the House buying out its feuars and three further properties near to the Ladywell. This was quickly followed by the acquisition of the lands of Limmerfield (now Wishart Street) to form ‘an unrivalled esplanade’ in front of the Cathedral. In 1825, with much pomp and ceremony, the foundation stone of the John Knox Monument was laid.
Fir Park 1831
Why the Necropolis was built
The early 1800’s saw Glasgow grow as a major industrialised city, with it came a new class of merchants and entrepreneurs who had made vast fortunes in tobacco, spices, coffee and cotton. By 1831 Glasgow’s population had trebled from 70,000 to more than 200,000. The city was flooded by immigrants, most notably Irish and Highlanders, many of whom arrived with little or nothing. The existing urban structure was inadequate and could not cope with such an influx. The working classes suffered considerable conditions of deprivation, exacerbated by inadequate housing, dire poverty, poor sanitation and contaminated water supplies.
This sudden dramatic increase in Glasgow’s population directly affected cemeteries since the aforementioned poverty and squalor resulted in fierce epidemics of cholera and typhus. In the 1830’s over 5,000 people were dying per year and were being buried in unhygienic urban churchyards. Previously burials in the 1800’s outside of a churchyard had been reserved for the unbaptised and lunatics. Buchan, in his guide to the Cathedral and Necropolis in 1843, puts this change of heart rather more forcefully, "A practice (burial within a churchyard) more revolting to human nature and more destructive to the health of the living could not possibly exist." Growing concerns with hygiene and sanitation led to the opinion that this policy of burial in urban churchyards was now to be avoided.
The Merchants House
In 1605 the Merchants House Guildry was formed with a recorded constitution. In 1675 an act of parliament gave considerable powers to the House which heralded an era of great civic pride in the City. In simplistic terms the Merchants House carried out a role comparable to that which the City Council does today. A committee headed by a Dean of Guild would oversee such matters as preventing monopolies, improving customs and excise, settling disputes between traders and providing charitable social security for members and their families. The Merchants House also had jurisdiction over the police force, roads and street lighting etc. Its members also controlled most of the city’s finances. To become a member one had to be a trader of ‘fair character and circumstances’, trade in Glasgow, and pay a membership fee. The Dean of Guild court was abolished in 1975 and all financial interests handed over to the Chamber of Commerce. The Merchants House still exists today, but is now a charitable organisation with some responsibility for the upkeep of those tombs within the Necropolis whose owners paid in perpetuity.
The Necropolis Design
The role of John Strang, Chamberlain in the Merchants House, in the design and creation of both the Necropolis Cemetery and the Bridge of Sighs cannot be understated. In 1831 Strang wrote ‘Necropolis Glasguensis’ as a historical account of burial rites world wide. He noted that “the Fir Park appears admirably adapted for a Pere La Chaise which would harmonise beautifully with the adjacent scenery, and constitute a solemn and appropriate appendage to the venerable structure (The Cathedral) in front of which, while it will afford a much wanted accommodation to the higher classes, would at the same time convert an unproductive property into a general and lucrative source of profit, to a charitable institution”. Belied by its border Firpark Street, this new Necropolis would be “respectful to the dead, safe and sanitary to the living, dedicated to the genius of memory and to extend religious and moral feeling”.
Strang also advocated a bridge over the Molindinar, at the foot of Kirk Lane as an approach to the cemetery. It was intended that the Molindinar be considered as the river Styx which everyone must cross – the separation between time and eternity. When built this Bridge quickly, and not inappropriately, became known by Glaswegians as the ‘Bridge of Sighs’.
| On 18th July 1828 a meeting was held in the Queen Street house of the Dean of Guild, James Ewing. A proposal was agreed to form a Necropolis, formed of 1,800 parterres at a price of £25.00 each. In 1831 advertisements were placed in newspapers for plans, sections and estimates for the conversion from the Fir Park to an ornamental cemetery which would embrace ‘economy, security and a picturesque effect’. Five prizes from £10 - £50 were offered, sixteen plans received which were exhibited at the Dilettanti Society’s Exhibition rooms in the Argyle Arcade. Two hundred people paid one shilling admission to see them. John Smith, Thomas Hopkirk, John Baird, David Hamilton and Stuart Murray formed a jury to judge the entries. David Bryce of Edinburgh won first prize, followed in second place by John Bryce of Glasgow. All five winning proposals were given to Baird, Hamilton and Murray to improve the design; they declined and stated a landscape gardener should be enlisted to undertake work of this nature. George Mylne was subsequently appointed as Superintendent and head gardener and the transformation of the park into a landscaped cemetery begun. The cemetery was laid out on the model of Mount Louis, Pere-Lachaise in Paris. |
Jewish Enclosure 1836
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The first interment was that of the Jewish jeweller Joseph Levi, who died of dysentery in September 1832. On 12th March 1833 authority was given by the Merchant House to dispose of burial places in the Necropolis and the cemetery was formally opened as a burial ground from April of that year.
The genius of the prolific Glasgow architects David Hamilton (1768-1843) and his son James Hamilton (1818-1861) is evident in the stunning approaches to the Necropolis. The Hamiltons were responsible for the Entrance Gates, the Cemetery Lodge, the Superintendent’s House, the Egyptian Vaults, and most notably the Bridge of Sighs. Their other commissions throughout Scotland are too numerous to list here, but include the Nelson Monument, Camphill House, Castle Toward, Hamilton Palace, Lennox Castle, Dunlop House, the Royal Exchange (GOMA) and Mosesfield House in Springburn Park.
First page from the Necropolis Daily Internment Book
Glasgow Necropolis Heritage Trail main page