Remembering those who fought in the Great War.

Kilmacolm

 

 

 

 

Via Wikipedia

The arrival of the railway in Kilmacolm in 1869 marked a significant turning point in the village's history and lead to Victorian era expansion on a grand scale. Prior to this development, the village had changed little in the preceding centuries, falling behind the development of other parts of the county. Kilmacolm's rail connection came about as a result of railway companies entering into the shipping trade and the perceived need to link Glasgow directly to Greenock's waterfront. Links to the wider world, and particularly Glasgow, made the village an attractivedormitory settlement.

Kilmacolm expanded at an unprecedented speed and many of the large Victorian and Edwardian villas which characterise the village today were constructed, as well as such attractions as the Hydropathic Hotel and facilities such as banks and plumbed water. Combined with the dramatic expansion of the village and gentrification of the area, the traditional importance of agriculture to the parish economy declined significantly. Slightly further east on the railway line, William Quarrier's Orphans' Homes were opened in the 1870s and remained as a residential children's community until the late 1970s. Since then, what has become known as Quarrier's Village has become largely residential.

Kilmacolm gradually became a place with numerous amenities, with the construction of the Victorian schoolhouses of the village, the opening of a Royal Bank of Scotland branch in 1872 and piped clean water in 1878. Indicative of the changes which the gentrification of the village brought, in the 1920s a local referendum was held in the village under the Temperance (Scotland) Act 1913, resulting in it becoming a dry parish where the sale of alcohol was illegal. The numerous public houses which had existed in the Kilmacolm declined and it was to have no such establishment from this time until the 1990s. In 1921, the parish council purchased the former Buchanan Arms building at the cross, turning it into a Village Institute or community centre, which it has continued to be until the renovation of the Cargill Centre in 2009-10. In the religious sphere, the establishment of many of Kilmacolm's churches can be credited to religious disagreements, particularly the practice of patronage within the Church of Scotland - which allowed local landowners to choose a parish minister. This practice ended in 1874.

World War I paused local development somewhat, and 300 men (66 of whom were officers) in the parish initially enlisted in the British Armed Forces. The village came to accommodate a number of Belgian refugees. 

Service men and women born in Kilmacolm