Religion
Imagine a Sunday in 1865. It is sometime after ten in the morning and Albany Street is virtually silent. Little traffic moves on the Sabbath, and the servants are forbidden from most activity that might disturb the tranquillity. Then doors begin to open, and from out of almost every house come the residents and their servants: all dressed in their Sunday best. Reluctant children, momentarily cowed by warnings to be on their best behaviour, unusually emerge silently. Hats are tipped and heads dipped in discreet acknowledgement of neighbours as the sedate bustle fills the street. Some head east and others west, for although almost everyone is Presbyterian, the recurring splits in the church has created a remarkable diversity of religious observance, and so people are headed for miscellaneous places of worship. Thus on that Sunday morning in 1865, the Albany Street residents would have been able to choose from: Church of Scotland (27 churches), The Free Church (36), The United Presbyterians (19), The Episcopal Church (10), The Baptists (6), The Evangelical Union (3), The Congregationalists (4); the United Methodist Frees (1), The Primitive Methodists (1), The Synod of the United Original Seconders (1), The Original Seconders (1), The Reformed Presbyterians (1), The Quakers (1), The Glassites (1) and the Scandinavian Lutherans (1). The small number of Roman Catholics only had three places of worship in the city, while for Jews there was just the one synagogue. (Reverend Dr James Peddie - father of James Peddie Number 14 - by John Kay)For a long time there had been a difference of opinion within the Church of Scotland over whether the church should be under the control of the state. For those who opposed the state influence on the church, a particular aggravation was the right of a landowner to appoint the parish minister. In 1837, the landowner in Strathbogie selected a preacher who, having been the assistant of the previous minister, was so well known to the parish that only the innkeeper supported him, while the rest of the congregation actively opposed his appointment. With the courts upholding the landowners’ right to decide, seven other Strathbogie ministers and 2,000 members of their congregations gathered in thick snow to protest. Having delivered their written protest the parishioners then went to their various churches and: ‘gathering up the Bibles which some of them had been wont to leave, for long years from Sabbath to Sabbath in the pews, they silently retired. The deep emotion that prevailed among them was visible in the tears which might be seen trickling down many an old man's cheek, and in the flush, more of sorrow than of anger, that reddened many a younger man's brow. Even the callous-hearted people that sat in the only pew representing forced settlements were moved - they were awed; and the hearts of some of them appeared to give way. "Will they all leave?" we heard some of them whispering. Yes; they all left, never to return until the temple is purified again, and the buyers and sellers - the traffickers in religion - are driven from the house of God. They all left!’
The Strathbogie ministers were suspended by the Church authorities and many people signed a petition in their support, including many Albany Street residents. The issue dragged on until things finally came to a head on the 18 May 1843, the first day of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. After opening prayers, the retiring Moderator, the Reverend Dr Welsh, read out a lengthy protest charging the British state with encroaching on the spiritual independence of the Church of Scotland. He then walked out of the assembly, to be followed by all the Evangelical ministers and elders, around half of those present, including the Reverend William Cunningham (Number 16). They processed ‘through an unbroken mass of cheering people and beneath innumerable handkerchiefs waving from the windows.’ Hundreds of other Ministers joined the split, which constituted itself as the Free Protesting Church of Scotland. The Disruption, as it became called, was on a remarkable scale. Around 40% of the ministry and a third of congregations left the Established Church.
The ‘Disruption’ (The Disruption Assembly by David Octavius Hill) led to a flurry of new church building in the next twenty years, including St Mary’s Free Church, built at the North West end of Albany Street.
J. Hay Thorburn (Number 38), a grain merchant, acted as the General Secretary of The Free Church in the 1890s. He was a vociferous advocate of The Laymen’s League which promoted the reunion of the parts of the church that had split. In letter to The Scotsman he wrote: ‘The great advantage of the League is that through its branches the three Presbyterian Churches have now opened up to them a medium of conference where differences may be discussed, mutual concession arrived at, and the foundation for the reunion of our common Presbyterianism.’ Eventually in 1920, several of the branches of the Presbyterian churches did reunite, although a number of smaller ones remained separate.
Over the century many of the street's residents were ministers, including Charles Terrot (Number 39), John Brown (Number 53), Thomas Murray, (Number 3) and William Cunningham (Number 16) . Up until the split in the Church of Scotland, students for the ministry studied in the Divinity Faculty of the University of Edinburgh. Following the split, students for the ministry in the United Free Church studied at New College. At New College, in the 1850s, it was a four-year course and the subjects studied included divinity, theology, church history, Hebrew and Oriental Languages, Moral Philosophy, Logic and Metaphysics.In 1895, Number 53 was purchased by St George’s Episcopal Chapel in York Place to serve as as its manse, and through to at least the 1950s, a series of the Chapel’s minister lived here. . The church was the first Episcopal church in the city, and Sir Walter Scott worshipped there from 1801 to 1825. The church was referred to as ‘the soldier’s church’ as, in 1837, a link had been established between the church and Edinburgh Castle. Thus, it was appropriate that in 1897, the Reverend Ernest Molesworth became minister at St George’s and moved into the house as, previously, he had served with the Royal Army Medical Corps at No.13 Brigade Field Hospital in the first Boer War of 1880-81.
In the 16th century, the Scottish Reformation resulted in Scotland's conversion to Presbyterianism through the Church of Scotland. The revolution resulted in a powerful hatred of the Roman Church, and thus membership of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland remained low into the 19th century. To help revive the Catholic Church, in 1834 Bishop James Gillis commissioned James Gillespie Graham (Number 34 - see Architects) to design the first post-Reformation convent in Scotland, St Margaret’s Convent (engraving). Around this time, Eleanora Johnstone (Number 24) and her daughter, Alicia converted to Roman Catholicism: ‘The conversion of these ladies took place at a period when no little excitement was caused in Edinburgh by a large number of eminent persons becoming Catholics.’
In 1877, Number 37 was bought by St Mary’s Cathedral and converted into the Catholic Girls’ School. In 1892, the school purchased Number 39 next door, to create the Catholic Girls and Boys School.