Falkirk Erskine Church

1739	Falkirk Associate Congregation	1820
	First Secession Church of Falkirk
1747	Falkirk Burgher Church	1820
1820	First Utd Falkirk Associate Congregation	1847
1847	East United Presbyterian Church	1866
1866	Erskine United Presbyterian Church	1900
1900	Erskine United Free Church	1929
1929	Erskine Church of Scotland

TIMELINE

1737: Erskine movement started in Scotland

1738: Falkirk congregation formed.

1739: The first meeting of elders was held at Lochgreen, then at Woodend, Easter Seamores, Randiford and Falkirk.

1742:  Land acquired from Alexander Johnston in Horsemarket Lane and a meeting house built with 950 seats.   The building was plain and unplastered with an earthen floor.  A loft or gallery was reached by internal stairs.

1786: The roof and side walls were described as ruinous.

1798:  A wooden floor was inserted and an outside covered wooden stairs built to replace the internal ones.

1817: Meeting house remodelled.   It was widened by 12ft, the walls and gables built of a sufficient height to admit a plastered ceiling, and new enlarged galleries.   The ground floor was also raised.  During renovation work meetings were held in the adjoining churchyard with the sacrament being dispensed in the West Church.  Cost c£1,000 and seated 1258.

1820:  Re-united with the anti-burghers as the United Associate Synod of the Secession Church.

1840:  Gas lighting installed, composed of eleven lustres of three branches each.  Roof repaired.

1843: Congregation split to form the Evangelical Union Church.

1845: Heating stove installed.

1847: Union with the Relief church to form the United Presbyterian Church.

1868:  Outside stairs removed and new ones constructed inside.   Seating rearranged.

1878: William Black advised the demolition of the old manse.  This was done and he designed a church hall with vestry, two waiting rooms and an entrance hall.  The iron gate for this was donated by Baillie Mitchell of Grahamston Iron Works.

1900: Union of the United Presbyterian Church and the Free Church of Scotland.

1903:  New site acquired for a church at the junction of Cockburn Street and Hodge Street.

The original plan had been to build in white stone, but this would have been too expensive and so a creamy sandstone from Eastfield Quarry was used (as it was at the Dobbie Hall, Larbert).   Internally the bases of the pillars are of freestone but the walls and ceiling have been finished with lathe and plaster.  Behind  the  church  and  communicating with it is a hall  to  accommodate  200 people,  a  smaller hall,  vestry,  session room,  ladies room,  waiting  room, kitchen and offices.  Messrs Ramsay Bros carried out the mason work.  The total cost of the building was put at £9248.

1910: The old church was sold for £770 and converted to the Electric Theatre and then to the Roxy.  It was finally demolished in 1960 and the site then contained the Callendar Riggs Shopping Centre.  A stone marked “Erskine Church” is inserted in the wall around the demolished Methodist church in James Street.  A mission continued in the hall adjoining the old church until 1910.

1929: Church of Scotland and United Free Church united.

2012:  Church sold to become the Erskine Community Halls.

2016: The church building rented by the Falkirk Vineyard Church under pastor Andrew McNiach.

MANSE

1760-2: First manse erected at the south end of the church.   It was a plain building, later roughcast, consisting of a ground floor with parlour, kitchen and two bedrooms; a first floor with dining room and two bedrooms and four garrets.

1794: Manse heightened and the roof replaced.

1837: New minister resigned the “power of the manse” due to its condition, and rented Gowan Cottage.  The old manse was then let at just over £8 per half year.

1840: Roof repaired.

1850s-1863: Manse in Hope Street (now the offices of Gair and Gibson).

1863:  New manse finished on 1.5 acres of land feued at Kilns.   Alexander Law donated and installed a set of marble jambs provided that the congregation did likewise.  The manse was built by his son James Law.

1880: Well ran dry so a connection was made to the mains supply.

1896: Manse enlarged.

1928: The original gas lighting replaced by electric.

FITTINGS

1743: four pewter communion cups acquired.

1861: six silver cups and four silver salvers.  Baptismal font.

1876: Communion cards substituted for the tokens.

1879:  Two silver communion salvers presented by William Donaldson.   Shortly after two more cups were donated by John Baird.

1906: Individual glasses introduced for communion.

In 1861 a silver baptismal font was gifted by Janet Belfrage.  A new pulpit was purchased for £65 and the gilded eagle used on it from the old church.  At the same time a communion table was presented by Mrs Donaldson.

ORGAN

1889:  Organ built by Messrs Harrison and Harrison, Durham.   Mr Black, architect, designed a case for it and donated gas brackets.   When the old church closed the organ was bought by the Church of St. Francis Xavier.

1905: Organ erected by Messrs Norman and Beard Ltd, Glasgow.

1930s: Lord Aitchison donated an organ case.

BELL

1905: Bell made by John C. Wilson and Co Ltd.  It is 36ins in diameter, weighs 8.5cwts and cost £83.  It bears the inscription: THE ERSKINE CHURCH,/ FALKIRK, 1905./ JAMES AITCHISON, MINISTER./ A. AND W. BLACK, ARCHITECTS.

WINDOW

See separate entry for stained glass.

WAR MEMORIALS

See separate entries for WW1 Roll of Honour and WW1 War Memorial

CHURCHYARD

See separate entry for the Erskine Churchyard.

SUNDIALS

See separate entry for sundials.

SEATING

1742: 950 seats including the loft.

1798: internal stairs removed to increase seating capacity.

1817: Remodelled church sat 1261 in a wider area.

1905: New church designed to sit 392 in the nave and transepts, and a further 353 in the galleries.

CHURCHYARD

Enclosed churchyard acquired with the site of the first church.   This was closed in 1870.  In 1960 the burials were re-interred in the Camelon Cemetery.

MINISTERS OF FALKIRK ERSKINE CHURCH

1739	Erskine, Ebenezer (officiated)	1742
Mar 1744	Erskine, Henry	Jul 1754
Sep 1758	Belfrage, John	Apr 1798
Jun 1794	Belfrage, Henry	Jun 1835
Feb 1837	Rutherford, Alexander Cumming	1842
Mar 1844	MacFarlane, Andrew	Mar 1859
Nov 1860	Miller, William	Apr 1874
Jan 1875	Aitchison, James	Nov 1920
Nov 1920	Dean, John Andrew Fowler	Oct 1944
Aug 1945	Hay, William Cruickshank	Dec 1962
Oct 1963	Reid, David Tindal	Apr 1969
Aug 1969	Bruce, Graeme MacLean	Sep 1972
Apr 1973	Chaplin, David	Oct 1982
1983	Muckart, Graeme W M	1998
1999	Macaulay, G D

Falkirk Erskine Church	SMR 1677	NS 8897 7993
	SMR 1457	NS 8850 7977

G.B. Bailey (2019)