Tulliallan | |
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Building in fields in Devilla Forest. Most of the land here is wooded, and has been for many years. The forest was shown as Tulliallan Forest on older maps | |
Lieutenancy area | |
Country | Scotland |
Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
Post town | Kincardine |
Police | Scotland |
Fire | Scottish |
Ambulance | Scottish |
UK Parliament | |
Scottish Parliament | |
Tulliallan (Gaelic tulach-aluinn, 'Beautiful knoll') was an estate in Perthshire, Scotland, near to Kincardine, and a parish. The Blackadder lairds of Tulliallan, a branch of the Blackadder border clan, wielded considerable power in the 15th and 16th centuries. The modern Tulliallan Castle is relatively recent, built in 1812-1820 and now the home of the Scottish Police College
The original parish of Tulliallan covered only the barony of Tulliallan. In 1673 it was extended to include the barony of Kincardine and the lands of Lurg, Sands and Kellywood, formerly included in the neighbouring Culross parish. For many years the parishes of Culross and Tulliallan formed an exclave some miles away from the rest of Perthshire, on the boundaries of Clackmannanshire and Fife. [1] [2] Culross and Tulliallan were transferred to Fife based on the recommendations of the boundary commission appointed under the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1889.
The parish is bounded on the west and north by Clackmannan, on the east by Culross and on the south by the River Forth. It is 3.75 miles (6.04 km) from north to south and 3 miles (4.8 km) from east to west, and contains 4,176 acres (1,690 ha). In 1885, 484 acres (196 ha) were foreshore and 106 acres (43 ha) water. The parish slopes gently southward to the Forth from a height of 324 feet (99 m) Between 1823 and 1839 a large area of land was recovered from the tidal waters of the Forth by two large embankments. The 1885 description said about 500 acres (200 ha) was wooded and almost all the rest cultivated. High-quality sandstone had been quarried near Longannet for many years. The land was also rich in coal and ironstone. [1]
At the last census (2011), the population of the civil parish was 3,001. [3] The area of the parish is 3,685 acres. [4] Tulliallan parish is also a Community Council area under the name Kincardine, with some variations in the boundary with Culross, its neighbouring civil parish and community council to the east. [5]
The first fortification at Tulliallan was built some time before 1304, when it was ordered to be strengthened by Edward I of England. The position was strategic, near the main ferry over the Forth, and in 1304 Edward I gave orders for the walls of "Tolyalwyn" to be strengthened. Presumably this would have included strengthening the D-shaped moat and the outer rampart, making the position strong against attack across the marshy land, which would not be drained until the 18th century. There would have been buildings within the enclosure, but the old castle was probably built later, by the Douglasses. [6]
The Douglas castle was initially an L-shaped two-storey building of ashlar masonry, with a tower at the southwest corner holding the main entrance, which was reached by a drawbridge. Most of the ground floor had small, square windows, while there were large slits above. The interior was unusual in that there were important rooms on the ground floor. The ceilings of these rooms included ribbed vaults springing from octagonal piers. The house was extended in the fifteenth century, and a major reconstruction seems to have been undertaken in the late sixteenth century. [7]
The castle was surrounded by a moat, which would have been filled by water from the Firth of Forth, which in the old days extended further inland. An 1853 account of the then-ruined building said "two narrow posterns open from each end of the southern front, of which that on the east opens into an apartment which has been termed the great hall, where three compartments are curiously formed by elegant groined arches, which rest upon a central octagonal column, the whole being in a state of remarkable preservation. [8] In 1885 the old castle, although ruined, was still described as an imposing-looking edifice. [9]
The castle passed into the ownership of William Douglas, 1st Earl of Douglas (c. 1327–1384). Archibald Douglas, 4th Earl of Douglas gifted the Tulliallan estate to the Edmiston family in 1402. In 1456 the gift was confirmed to Sir James Edmiston, great-grandson of King Robert II of Scotland, by royal charter. Patrick Blackader, grandson of Cuthbert Blackader of Blackader Castle in Berwickshire, married Elizabeth Edmiston, daughter of Sir James. She brought the Tulliallan estate as her dowry. [10]
A noted member of the Blackadder family of Tulliallan was Robert Blackadder, brother of Patrick Blackadder, Laird of Tulliallan. [11] Robert Blackadder was Bishop of Aberdeen, Bishop of Glasgow from 1484 and then in 1492 the first Archbishop of Glasgow, who added the eponymous crypt and aisle in Glasgow Cathedral. The bishop sided with rebel nobles who defeated and killed King James III of Scotland in 1488 at the Battle of Sauchieburn. The archbishop died while on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1508. [12]
One of the Lairds of Tulliallan, Sir John Blackadder, was beheaded in March 1531 for the murder of James Inglis, Abbot of Culross, in a dispute over land. [13] He was succeeded at Tulliallan by his brother Patrick, who renewed a dispute against the Homes for the Blackadder family lands around Allanton in Berwickshire. Patrick was murdered in an ambush near Edinburgh, where he was to meet the Homes to try to resolve their differences. Following this the Blackadders made no further attempts to recover their ancestral estates. [14] William Blackadder was among the supporters of Mary, Queen of Scots at the Battle of Carberry Hill (15 June 1567). He was arrested soon after and hanged in June, and his brother was hanged in September. [15]
The last Blackadder to own Tulliallan was Sir John, born in 1596 and on 18 July 1626 created a knight baronet of Nova Scotia by King Charles I of England. His estate, with lime works, salt pans and other enterprises, yielded an income of 36,000 merks annually, but this was not enough to satisfy Sir John's expensive habits and he ran up debts far beyond his ability to pay. When his effects were seized he fled to the continent, and in 1642 seems to have been in the French service. He died in America in 1651. Sir John's wife, Elizabeth Graham, was the daughter of the Earl of Menteith. She had an annuity of 360 merks, and lived at Tulliallan until 1662. His son, Alexander, could not free the estate from the burden of debts that his father had contracted. The Court of Session ordered a judicial sale. In 1700 the estate was purchased by Colonel John Erskine, son of David Erskine, 4th Lord Cardross. [10]
The celebrated covenanting preacher John Blackadder (1622-1685) was legally the heir to the Blackadder baronetcy, but did not claim the title. [16]
The last occupant of the old castle was Colonel Erskine, known locally as the "Black Colonel", who died in the 1790s. George Elphinstone, 1st Viscount Keith bought the estate in 1799, and built today's castle as his family residence. [17] The roof of the old castle was removed and it was allowed to crumble into ruins. [10] An ancient bronze kettle was dug out of these ruins, about 8.5 inches (22 cm) in diameter and 5 inches (13 cm) high. Legend says that it formerly hung from one of the bosses of the castle roof, filled with gold. As long as it hung there, the castle would stand and the Blackadders of Tulliallan would prosper. [8]
The modern-day Tulliallan Castle is about a half mile to the southeast of the old castle, built in 1818-1820 for Lord Viscount Keith. The building was acquired by the Mitchell family in 1924. During the World War II it was the headquarters of the Polish Armed Forces in the West. It has been the home of the Scottish Police College since 1954 and was the temporary headquarters of Police Scotland upon its creation in 2013. [18]
Perthshire, officially the County of Perth, is a historic county and registration county in central Scotland. Geographically it extends from Strathmore in the east, to the Pass of Drumochter in the north, Rannoch Moor and Ben Lui in the west, and Aberfoyle in the south; it borders the counties of Inverness-shire and Aberdeenshire to the north, Angus to the east, Fife, Kinross-shire, Clackmannanshire, Stirlingshire and Dunbartonshire to the south and Argyllshire to the west. It was a local government county from 1890 to 1930.
Fife is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire. By custom it is widely held to have been one of the major Pictish kingdoms, known as Fib, and is still commonly known as the Kingdom of Fife within Scotland. A person from Fife is known as a Fifer. In older documents the county was very occasionally known by the anglicisation Fifeshire.
The Firth of Forth is the estuary, or firth, of several Scottish rivers including the River Forth. It meets the North Sea with Fife on the north coast and Lothian on the south.
Alloa is a town in Clackmannanshire in the Central Lowlands of Scotland. It is on the north bank of the Forth at the spot where some say it ceases to be the River Forth and becomes the Firth of Forth. Alloa is south of the Ochil Hills, 5.5 miles (8.9 km) east of Stirling and 7.9 miles (12.7 km) north of Falkirk; by water Alloa is 25 miles (40 km) from Granton.
North Berwick is a seaside town and former royal burgh in East Lothian, Scotland. It is situated on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, approximately 20 miles (32 km) east-northeast of Edinburgh. North Berwick became a fashionable holiday resort in the nineteenth century because of its two sandy bays, the East Bay and the West Bay, and continues to attract holidaymakers. Golf courses at the ends of each bay are open to visitors.
Culross (/ˈkurəs/) is a village and former royal burgh, and parish, in Fife, Scotland.
Tulliallan Castle is a large house in Kincardine, Fife, Scotland. It is the second structure to have the name, and is a mixture of Gothic and Italian style architecture set amid some 90 acres of parkland just north of where the Kincardine Bridge spans the Firth of Forth. It has been the home of the Scottish Police College since 1954. On 1 April 2013, Tulliallan Castle became the headquarters of Police Scotland, but in 2014 the service's headquarters temporarily relocated to nearby Stirling in the former Central Scotland Police HQ.
Tullibody, is a town set in the Central Lowlands of Scotland. It lies north of the River Forth near to the foot of the Ochil Hills within the Forth Valley. The town is 1.8 miles (2.9 km) south-west of Alva, 1.8 miles (2.9 km) north-west of Alloa and 4.0 miles (6.4 km) east-northeast of Stirling. The town is part of the Clackmannanshire council area.
Kincardine or Kincardine-on-Forth is a small town on the north shore of the Firth of Forth, in Fife, Scotland. The town was given the status of a burgh of barony in 1663. It was at one time a reasonably prosperous minor port. The townscape retains many good examples of Scottish vernacular buildings from the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries, although it was greatly altered during the construction of Kincardine Bridge in 1932–1936. It is in the civil parish of Tulliallan.
Clan Primrose is a Lowland Scottish clan.
Laird of Burnbrae was a hereditary title in Scotland that was held by several generations in the Primrose family. The Lands of Burnbrae was situated near Kincardine, and has since been joined with Kincardine.
Robert Lauder of The Bass was an important noble in Haddingtonshire, the Merse, and Fife. Stodart remarks that "to 1600 the barons of the Bass sat in almost every parliament". He was a firm supporter of Mary, Queen of Scots whom he accompanied to Carberry Hill on 14 June 1567, and fought for at the battle of Langside.
The Battle of Carberry Hill took place on 15 June 1567, near Musselburgh, East Lothian, a few miles east of Edinburgh, Scotland. A number of Scottish lords objected to the rule of Mary, Queen of Scots, after she had married the Earl of Bothwell, who was widely believed to have murdered her previous husband Lord Darnley. The Lords were intent to avenge Darnley's death. However, Bothwell escaped from the stand-off at Carberry while Queen Mary surrendered. Mary abdicated, escaped from prison, and was defeated at the battle of Langside. She went to exile in England while her supporters continued a civil war in Scotland.
Clan Blackadder is a Scottish clan. The clan historically held lands near the Anglo-Scottish border.
John Blackadder was an eminent Presbyterian Covenanter preacher in Scotland during the period of the Commonwealth of England (1649–1660). Of the times MacPherson said that "after the first rejoicings of the Restoration were over, the Covenanters — Resolutioners as well as Protesters — were speedily disillusioned, and it became evident that the aim of Charles II and the junta of self-seeking noblemen who were in control of the affairs of Scotland was to establish in Scotland something approximating to an oriental despotism. The Presbyterian system, in which an Assembly of ministers and elders controlled the affairs of the Kirk, had to be supplanted by an Episcopal, with a hierarchy controlled by the Crown and easily manipulated in the interests of tyrannical rule." Despite a government ban he continued to preach in the fields. He was arrested and imprisoned in 1681 and died in jail on the Bass Rock.
Blackadder House was an estate and stately house near the village of Allanton, in Berwickshire, Scotland. It was built on the site of the earlier Blackadder Castle. The house was vandalised by troops in World War I. Since there was no money to repair it, the house was demolished around 1925.
Culross in Perthshire was a royal burgh that returned one commissioner to the Parliament of Scotland and to the Convention of Estates.
Charles George Hood Kinnear FRIBA ARSA FRSE was one half of Peddie & Kinnear, one of Scotland’s most renowned and prodigious architectural firms, famed for their development of the Scots Baronial style, typified by Cockburn Street in Edinburgh which evokes a highly medieval atmosphere. Kinnear was also a pioneer photographer credited with inventing the bellows attachment on early cameras.
Culross Town House, also known as Culross Tolbooth, is a municipal structure in the Sandhaven area of Culross, Fife, Scotland. The building, which now serves as a visitor centre, is Category A listed.
The parish of Culross, along with its neighbouring parish of Tulliallan, also Dunblane Diocese, formed a detached part of the earldom, later the stewartry, of Strathearn, which explains why both were in a detached part of Perthshire until 1891, when they became part of Fife.