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Johnstone. A town, quoad sacra parish,
and registration district in the extreme W of the Abbey parish of
Paisley, and near the centre of the county of Renfrew. The parish was
not erected till 1834, when there was a population of over 5000; but as
early as 1792 a church had been built, and in 1794 (when the population
was only about 1500) the building was ready for use, and bounds were
perambulated and assigned, within which the minister of the Johnstone
church had ecclesiastical charge. The town, which has now outgrown the
limits of the original parish, stands on the E bank of the Black
Cart, and a short distance W of the road from Glasgow to Ayr by
Paisley. It is by rail 3 1/2 miles W by S of Paisley, 10 1/4 W by S of
Glasgow, 14 SE by E of Greenock, and 25 1/2 N by E of Ayr. It has a station on the Glasgow and Ayr
section of the Glasgow and South-Western railway system, close to the
point where the branch turns off north-westward to Greenock, and here
was also formerly the western terminus of the Glasgow,
Paisley, and Johnstone Canal, an undertaking at first intended to be
continued to Ardrossan. The canal subsequently coming into possession
of the Glasgow and South-Western
Railway Company, it was used for goods traffic only, and has now been
converted into a railway. The town was founded in 1781, the site, at
the E end of a bridge over the Cart
known as `the Brig o' Johnstone,' having been previously occupied by a
small hamlet of only ten houses. The first houses afforded
accommodation to the hands employed at a large cotton
mill erected close by, and since then the place has, in virtue of its
position in the middle of a large mining district, become a
considerable industrial centre. The mill was built, and the plan of the
town laid out, by the proprietor of the estate of Johnstone, who was
also superior of the ground on which it stands, and it is to his
influence that the place owes its first start in prosperity and its
rapid rise, for in the first ten years of its existence the population
increased from about 50 to about 1500. The plan was a regular one, the
main street (High Street) running almost E and W, and being crossed at
right angles by numerous minor streets, while there are two spacious
squares--one of which forms a market-place. The houses are substantial
stone buildings, and the place has a remarkably airy appearance, due in
part to the spaciousness of the streets, and in part to the number of
pieces of open garden-ground attached to the houses. The Burgh
buildings, in Collier Street, were erected in 1888 at a cost of £2000,
and contain a full length portrait of the late Sir Wm. M. Napier, Bart., the spacious court-room being ornamented with the burgh coat of arms. A Cottage Hospital, with accommodation for 16 beds, was in 1893 presented to the town and neighbourhood by Mr. Charles Bine Renshaw,
M.P., the cost of which, including a gift endowment fund of £3000, was
about £10,000--the donor besides giving £100 annually for five years.
Captain Speirs of Elderslie gave the
site free, and the same year presented to the town a large field in the
vicinity to be used for recreation purposes. In that year also a new
Drill Hall was erected at an estimated cost of £1200, and a Good
Templars' Hall built at a cost of about £1000. Hand-loom weaving, at one time extensively carried on, is now extinct. The principal industries in the burgh are extensive foundries and machine works, a boiler work, a paper mill, linen thread works, and cotton mills. The old premises of the Clippens
Oil Co. (about 50 acres) were leased in 1894 by the Sun Foundry of
Glasgow. Under the Burgh Police Act of 1892, it is governed by a
provost, 2 bailies, and 6 commissioners. The police force consists of 9
men, and a police court is held on the first Monday of every month. The
town is well supplied with water, and in 1881 the property and plant of
the Gas Company were acquired by the town at a cost of £22,000. The
works are at the N side of the burgh. The parish church, at the S end
of Church Street, was built, as already noticed, between 1792 and 1794
as a chapel of ease at a cost of about £1400. The spire was added in
1823, and extensive repairs were made in 1877. Laigh Cartside chapel of
ease was opened in 1885. The Free church in William Street was built
soon after the Disruption. There are two United Presbyterian churches,
the one built in 1791 at a cost of about £900, and the other in 1829 at
a cost of about £1500. The Episcopal church, dedicated to St. John the
Evangelist, is a cruciform building with transepts and chancel. It was
erected in 1874 and enlarged in 1878, and contains 400 sittings. The
Roman Catholic church, dedicated to St. Margaret, was originally
erected in 1852, but in 1882 underwent great alteration and
reconstruction after designs by Messrs. Pugin & Pugin. Educational
affairs are managed by a committee of the Abbey Parish School Board,
and the schools are Johnstone, Nethercraigs, M`Dowall Street, Inkerman,
and Cardonald public schools, with accommodation respectively for 850,
142, 181, 280, and 144 scholars, an average attendance of about 890,
110, 80, 145, and 100, and grants of nearly £920, £115, £80, £135, and
£100. A school is also carried on in connection with St. Margaret's
Roman Catholic church, which, with accommodation for 489 children, has
an average attendance of about 390, and a grant of nearly £390.
Johnstone has a post office, with money order, savings bank, insurance,
and telegraph departments, branches of the National, Royal, and Union
Banks, a branch of the National Security Savings Bank, and several
inns. The newspapers are the Johnstone Advertiser and the Observer,
both published on Saturday. There is a Public Hall and Working Men's
Institute, with a news-room and a hall with accommodation for 1000, and
containing a fine organ presented by Mr. Bousfield. There are also Assembly Rooms, a temperance hall, a Mechanics'
Institute, a friendly society, a branch of the Bible society, a
missionary society, a Young Men's Christian Association, a
bowling-green, a fire brigade, a volunteer corps, and an Agricultural
Society which holds a cattle show annually on the Friday of Glasgow
Fair week. A horse fair is held on the first Friday of January, and a
general fair on the Thursday after the second Monday of July. Johnstone
Castle, an elegant modern mansion, stands within a large well-wooded
park, 1 mile S by E of the town. Its owner is George Ludovic Houstoun,
Esq. (b. 1846; sue. 1862). MILLIKEN House, a building in the Grecian
style, is 1 1/4 mile to the W. The parish is in the presbytery of
Paisley and the synod of Glasgow and Ayr; its minister's stipend is
£382. Pop. of town (1811) 3647, (1831) 5617, (1861) 6404, (1871) 7538,
(1881) 9267, (1891) 9668, of whom 4524 were males, and 5144 were
females; of parish (1871) 8588, (1881) 9201, (1891) 9695. Houses in
town (1891) inhabited 1980, vacant 150, building 9.--Ord. Sur., sh. 30,
1866. See Matthew Gemmill's Ecclesiastical Sketch of Johnstone.
Jordanhill. A village near the NE border
of Renfrew parish, within 9 furlongs of the N bank of the Clyde, and
2 1/2 miles WSW of Maryhill. It has a post office and a station on the
Glasgow, Yoker, and Clydebank section of the North British railway. The
Jordanhill estate, extending into the Lanarkshire section of Govan
parish, comprises only 293 acres, but has a value of over £4000.--Ord.
Sur., sh. 30, 1866. |