1700's

History > Centuries

Pollokshaws in the 1700's

A potted history of what went on in Pollokshaws

SUMMARY

At the end of the 17th century Pollokshaws began to change it's character from a rural village into a centre of industry. In 1695 a roll of the inhabitants and their occupations included cottar (crofter), cooper (barrel maker), cordiner (cord and rope maker), clothier, blacksmith, maltman (ale maker), glover, skinner (curing the skin of cattle and sheep), mason, and wright (carpenter). Also listed are eight handloom weavers working at home. These were the first of a great number of weavers who dominated the area in time to come. Their numbers steadily increased until in 1782 there were 311 home weavers working in the village. Then in 1801 a factory with 200 power looms began operating, and thereafter the number of home weavers steadily declined until by 1850 they had almost disappeared.

In 1742 the first bleachfield and printworks in the West of Scotland were established in what a writer described as 'the green haughs by the clear waters of the River Cart and the Auldhouse Burn'. It was here the art of textile printing was advanced from wooden blocks to engraved copper cylinders, and within a comparatively short time the premises expanded to cover thirty acres. By 1793 the works employed 226 men and boys and 174 women. Bleachfields were areas where the finished cloth was spread out on grass to whiten in the sun, and printing meant the printing of patterns and designs on the cloth. A tannery, established in the town in 1782 for the treatment of chamois leather, was the first of its kind in Scotland . Next, two cotton mills that together employed about 600 were established. These industries were followed by a great variety of businesses including the manufacture of linen, thread, brewing, dyeing, engineering, paper, laundering and pottery. In 1807 one of the cotton mills was lit by gas produced within the mill, a first in Scotland for industrial premises.

The Road of Change
TOLLS

Tolls were introduced in 1750 to assist with the upkeep of roads, and were paid at Toll Bars to a keeper who lived in a nearby house. There were six toll bars in and around Pollokshaws, and a minister of Eastwood Church wrote that local travellers considered them to be excessive in number, making even short journeys quite expensive. In Pollokshaws there was the Round Toll which controlled the crossing of he roads between Glasgow and Darnley, and Cathcart and Hurlet. The toll keepers distinctive roundhouse here, which is of an indeterminate date between the late 1750's and 1800, has survived, later for business use, and then, until 1963 as a dwelling and it can still be seen, but because of its present situation in a busy roundabout it can’t be accessed easily. Auldhouse Toll was on Nether Auldhouse Road on the way to Cathcart village, while Harriet Street Toll was on the road to Stewarton via Patterton. Harriet Street was the first stretch of the present Thornliebank Road, from the Round Toll to the Auldhouse Burn bridge. The road to Govan was covered by the Haggs Road Toll at (Shaw) Moss Road, and the road to Glasgow by the Shawlands Toll situated at 'High Shawlands', at the junction of Pollokshaws Road and Shawhill Road . Dovehill Toll controlled the crossing of two roads, to Eastwood Toll and to Cathcart. After tolls were abolished in 1883 the name Mains of Newlands Farm was changed to Dovehill Farm. Its buildings remained well preserved (until the site was cleared for a housing development in 2005) set back on the south side of Riverford Road near Kilmarnock Road.

Time to Teach

After the reformation in 1560, the leaders of the Reformed Church placed responsibility on the Kirk Sessions to provide free education for the children in their parishes. While this was idealistic, it was far from being realistic as education requires money to build schools and train teachers, and finance at that time was exceedingly scarce. In fact two hundred years were to pass before the ideal was attained, and not by the Kirk Sessions but by the local government authority. But Pollokshaws made more progress towards these goals than most other communities for three reasons; the diligence of Eastwood Kirk Session, the increasing prosperity of the town, and the ongoing benefices of the Maxwells of Pollok. The first reference to there being a school in the parish is contained in the minutes of Eastwood Kirk Session for 1689, where the Session Clerk is described as also being the Schoolmaster. In these early days it was common for a layman of the Church to conduct the newly formed, part time and very elementary school, imparting knowledge as best he could from his own probably limited education. It is apparent that by 1749 a proper Parish School had already been established, because in that year the minutes record the appointment of an experienced schoolmaster. In 1751 a private school was opened in Pollokshaws, but it was soon closed by pressure from the Kirk Session which regarded this new school as encroaching on its prerogative.

The Parish School was situated beside the Church half a mile from the town. But in 1756 it was moved to Pollokshaws to give it a more central position, Then in 1790 it was again moved to a new building where, in one large classroom, pupils of various ages and studying different subjects were taught by the only teacher. He received an annual salary of eight pounds six shillings & sixpence (£8.33p) and a free house, and also emoluments from being Clerk to the Kirk Session of Eastwood. The school charged fees and in 1796 had 105 pupils, each studying one subject as follows: 36 reading, 23 writing, 22 Latin, 18 arithmetic, 4 book-keeping and 2 mathematics. The fees per term (in decimal coinage) ranged from 10p for reading to 25p for mathematics, while for book-keeping it was £1.05p for the complete course. Pupils studied only one subject at a time, starting with reading then going on to writing and so on, the amount of knowledge they absorbed depending mainly on their own ability and the number of terms their parents could afford. Among the pupils were seventeen boys who boarded in the school at an inclusive charge of £20 per term.

The Way They Lived

The “Queer Folk” of “The Shaws”

How the expression came about is not known for certain, but a possibility is that the description was first applied to a group of French speaking weavers of the Protestant faith, probably Flemmings from catholic Flanders, who settled in Pollokshaws during the 18th century seeking work and freedom of worship. Because of their foreign tongue no doubt these people would appear odd, not only to the parochially minded inhabitants of the village, but also to others in neighbouring towns and villages who in the course of time came to apply the description to all the people of the Shaws. A Barrhead man used the phrase as the refrain for a song, which became very popular as a music hall ditty, in which a Glasgow lad describes his adventures on a visit to the races in Pollokshaws in 1839 or 1840. All the verses end with the same words. One runs thus:

Ma mither tel't me tae beware

An' mind what I was aboot

For 'mind' says she 'there's queer folk there

An' that you'll soon fin' oot.

They'll pick the siller oot yer pooch

An' tear yir Sunday braws

I've kent them dae the like afore

The queer folk o' the Shaws'.