For a number of centuries Highlanders came south to Crieff to sell their black cattle, whose meat and hides were avidly sought by the growing urban populations in Lowland Scotland and the north of England. The town acted as a gathering point for the Michaelmas cattle sale held during the "October Tryst" each year, when the surrounding fields and hillsides would be black with some 30,000 cattle, some from as far away as Caithness and the Outer Hebrides.[3]
Rob Roy MacGregor and his followers visited Crieff in October 1714: they gathered in Crieff for the October Tryst. They marched to Crieff Town Square and, in front of the gathering crowd, they sang Jacobite songs and drank a good many loyal toasts to their uncrowned King James VIII.[4]
In 1716, 350 Highlanders returning from the Battle of Sheriffmuir burned most of Crieff to the ground. In 1731, James Drummond, 3rd Duke of Perth, laid out the town's central James Square and established a textile industry with a flax factory. In the 1745 rising the Highlanders were itching to fire the town again and were reported as saying "she shoud be a braw toun gin she haed anither sing". But it was saved by the Duke of Perth – a friend and supporter of Prince Charles. In February 1746 the Jacobite army was quartered in and around the town with Prince Charles Edward Stuart holding his final war council in the old Drummond Arms Inn in James Square – located behind the present abandoned hotel building in Hill Street.[5]
By the late 18th century the original hanging tree used by the Earls of Strathearn to discipline people had been replaced by a formal wooden structure in an area called Gallowhaugh – now Gallowhill, at the bottom of Burrell Street. What is now Ford Road was Gallowford Road which led down past the gallows to the crossing point over the River Earn. Sir Walter Scott, visiting Crieff in 1796, saw the gallows as "Gallowsford".[6]
Crieff Town Hall was completed in 1850.[7] In the 19th century, Crieff became a fashionable destination for tourists visiting the Highlands and a country retreat for wealthy businessmen from Edinburgh, Glasgow and beyond. Many such visitors attended the Crieff hydropathic establishment, now the Crieff Hydro, which opened in 1868.[8]
"A yacht on his window sill, according to some
Alludes to a tragedy which rendered him numb
To cope with the grief and the hurt and the loss
He exited Crieff, Perth and Kinross"[11]
Events
Every year the town hosts the Crieff Highland Games, which include music and dancing competitions and feats of strength.[12]
Crieff Primary School – A historic picture of Crieff Primary School, see The Schoolmaster,[13] (1953) black and white, 19 minutes. The schoolmaster is played by Walter Carr and the film is narrated by Gordon Jackson.
Crieff Parish Church (Church of Scotland) in Strathearn Terrace, also known as the East Church, is on the site of a medieval building that was demolished and rebuilt in 1786, when a hoard of gold coins from the reign of Robert the Bruce was found within its walls. The church was again rebuilt in 1827.[14][15]
Crieff West Church (Church of Scotland) was built 1837–1838 on Comrie Road as a chapel of ease to the main parish church.[16][17] It was converted into the St Ninian's Centre in 1958 and used for over 50 years as a lay training and conference venue until its closure in 2001. The building is now occupied by private flats.[18][19]
^Kaufman, M. H. (February 2008). "Daniel John Cunningham (1850–1909): anatomist and textbook author, whose sons achieved distinction in the Army, Navy and Indian Medical Service". Journal of Medical Biography. 16 (1): 30–5. doi:10.1258/jmb.2006.006058. PMID18463062. S2CID7428475.
^MP for Edinburgh East constituency, first elected in 1970, then re-elected in February 1974, October 1974, 1979, 1983, 1987, 1992, 1997, 2001 and 2005. He held several ministerial posts during his political career.
