During the five or six years following his entry into the Society of Mechanics and
his becoming a Burgess, Bowie appears frequently throughout the Burgh
accounts. The sums are small and suggest that he was mainly engaged on
jobbing contracts or repairs, renovation and alterations to existing properties.
His major, and most notable, building work began after 1810, when the feuing
plan of Allan Park was undertaken by William Drummond, land surveyor and
nurseryman, whose immediate descendants were responsible for a wide range of
activities both locally and nationally. These included the establishment of an
agricultural museum in the 1830's, an extensive seed and nursery business,
exploration in Africa and the Drummond Tract Enterprise, the foremost 19th
century publisher of religious pamphlets.
In 1814 Bowie drew up plans for a mealmarket to be built. These were never used and
Allan Johnston's Athenaeum was built instead at the top of King Street.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ALLAN PARK
A major public works contract was undertaken by Bowie in 1816 when the Town
Council decided in March of that year to culvert the Town Burn where it flowed
through the Allan Park on its was from the King's Park to the River Forth. The
burn followed the South side of Dumbarton Road to near the Old Burgh Gate
and then under the line of the Town Wall. ( See Allan Park Map ) The Council
contract states that three openings be left for cleaning the burn and that a
'Watering Place' be left for the residents of Allan Park. This was to ensure that
they would have access to 'water both for their families as well as for watering
their cows'.
By 1815 only two houses had been built on the Allan Park feus and in 1816
Alexander Bowie acquired lot 13 on the east corner of Allan Park and
Dumbarton Road. On this piece of ground he built Nos. 1-9 Allan Park and Nos.
35 and 37 Dumbarton Road, the present opticians house and shop. In a fit of
national fervour Bowie seems to have named the new block of houses, Wellington
Place, Allan Park.
The feu superior of the Allan Park land, was Allan's Mortification Trust, set up
in 1724 by John Allan, for the education of poor boys who were sons of members
of the Seven Incorporated Trades.
NB Add a bit more about Georgian style of Architecture in general
and Edinburgh New Town's possible influence on Bowie.
The building instructions laid down by them were quite specific requiring Bowie
to build houses 20 feet in height, to have two floors, regular hewn doors and
windows and to be finished with slate roofs. It is open to conjecture how he
managed to interpret these instructions to enable him to build 5 houses linked by
a common facade and design displaying more than a passing degree of similarity
to the houses in Edinburgh's New Town. Here we see classical terraces featuring
pillars, pediments, rusticated stonework, railings and distinctive fanlights. All
the hallmark of the Georgian town house and all to be found in Bowie's
buildings. Indeed these five houses and the balanced block containing Nos. 2, 4
and 6, built about 1826 are the only examples of such Georgian terraced housing
in Stirling.
Historic Scotland has a statutory duty to list all buildings of architectural
importance and they duly listed Nos. 1---9 and Nos. 2---6 Allan park on the 4th
November 1965. Their description of Nos. 1---9 is as follows:--
"Early 19th century. 2 storey and basement ashlar classic, with segmental arched
features, 4-windowed pedimented semi detached unit + 2-windowed single house +
4 windowed pedimented semi-detached unit ground floor part rusticated, 2 fanlight
doorpieces at No 1 & 3, railed steps. Slated roof. Tunnel linking front to rear
garden adjoins gable of No 9". Nos. 2---6 are described as " Early 19th century. 2
storey and basement, ashlar classic (corresponding to Nos. 1 - 9) 3 bay pedimented
+ 3 bay + 3 bay pedimented; units, 9 window front ground floor part rusticated,
railed steps. Slated roof.
Over the years to 1829 Bowie built fourteen of the twenty-two houses in Allan
Park. Houses which are distinctive because of the use of ashlar sandstone rather
than the local brown whinstone taken from the many small quarries on the
Castle Rock. The extensive use of sandstone lends itself to fine detailed carving.
CRAIGS HOUSE
In Bowie's case this feature of finely carved sandstone is best developed in the graceful and ornate
Georgian style house known as Craigs House. Built by Alexander Bowie about
1817 for his wife's uncle, Robert Gillies, who owned the tannery opposite. For
many years it was a Masonic Hall and in the seventies it opened as the night club
'Le Clique' later becoming the fast food restaurant Fat Sams. It has now been
carefully ans tastefully restored and developed by the Bank of Scotland as their
Stirling branch. ( See photograph)
Historic Scotland listed Craigs House on the 4th november 1965 and described it
as being ;
"Early 19th century. 2 storey 3 window classic villa of elaborate character, ashlar
fronted, top balustrade, slightly advanced centre bay, Roman doric porch with
curved ends,fanlight with segmental shell heads and elaborate herring-bone fluted
panels. Main cornice, hipped, slated roof. "
THE COMMERCIAL BANK, BUILT BY BOWIE IN 1827
The identification of the building that was built in 1827 for the Commercial
Bank located at 39 Spittal Street, Stirling as being the most prestigious public
building built by Alexander Bowie came about by a throwaway comment that
Bowie wrote in a letter to his son William in September 1827. ( to be discussed in
detail in Chapter 2) In this letter Bowie says 'nothing new ---only we are getting
on with the Bank'. The fact that Bank was written with a capital letter suggested
that it referred to a Banking establishment rather than to, say, a river bank and
the only Bank built around that time, in Stirling, I knew to be the Commercial
Bank in Spittal Street. A striking building along classical lines that, when the
Bank was finished with it, became the first Royal Infirmary of Stirling (1874), in
the 20th century it was the Education Department Offices and now is the
Headquarters of the Forth Valley Health Board. Until reading that phrase in
william's letter no thought had ever been given to the possibility that Alexander
Bowie may have built it.
The search for information to test out this hypothesis involved George Dixon the
Stirling Archivist, Bob McCutcheon, Antiquarian Bookseller, Andrew Mclean,
Archivist of the Royal Bank of Scotland an establishment that bought over the
Commercial Bank. The outcome of the search was to confirm that the building
was indeed built by Alexander Bowie to a design of William Stirling of Dunblane.
The evidence
In the Stirling Journal for 16th February, 1866 in a general discussion about the
history of the commercial bank in Stirling and the influence of James morrison
and his son James M. Morrison the agents, we read " Purchasing old property at
the head of Bank Street they erected a handsome edifice of fine polished
ashlar-work, adorned with a Grecian portico supported by fluted columns and
having a chaste proportionate pediment. The Architect was the late Mr Stirling
of Dunblane and the builder Mr Bowie of Stirling." More accurate proof is to be
found in the minutes for a Board of Directors meeting of the Commercial Bank
for 21st June 1827 when it was agreed "to accept the offer my Messrs. Thomas
Traquair and Alexander Bowie for building the Bank's House at Stirling at the
price of £1960 and direct the work to be proceeded with without delay"(CS/13/2,
p529). The work involved included building an attached dwelling house for the
use of the branch agent and appears to have been completed by 1828 (CS/249/2).
The building was listed in ----by Historic Scotland and they detail it in their
listing as being " Neo-classical, 2 storey and attic. original bank building 5 bay
frontage giant antra order and tetrastyle fluted Greek Doric portico with
pediment approached by steps contained within massive podia, architraves and
cornices at ground floor windows, heavy entablature and blocking course slated
roof."
During the excavation of the foundations for the Commercial Bank Bowie's workmen
uncovered some Roman remains.
Many other distinctive sandstone Georgian houses that reflect Bowie's 'Allan
Park style' are to be found in Melville Terrace and Upper Bridge Street.
Whether they too were built by Bowie must, at present, remain in the realms of
conjecture.
BOWIE'S STONEYARD IN STIRLING
To the rear of Nos. 1-9, Allan Park, on part of his original Lot 13, Bowie
established his stoneyard. (See Allan Park map ) This site was convenient to the
town's whinstone quarries but a considerable journey from his own sandstone
quarry at Thorndyke or his flagstone quarry at Drumhead, both of which are
situated near Denny some 7 miles distant. Presumable he carried the rough
hewn stone by cart to his stoneyard at Allan Park where his masons would dress
it according to their needs.
The yard itself was situated in the backlands between Port Street, Allan Park
and Dumbarton Road with access from the latter. As late as 1858, the 25 inch
Ordnance Survey Plan shows a yard on that location, although by then used for
timber rather than stone.
aWe can deduce some more information about the yard becausefter Bowie's death
in 1829 the stoneyard and business were advertised for sale as a going concern. An
advertisement in the Stirling Journal & Advertiser for 21st January 1830,
however, indicates that the stoneyard was available to let for a period to be
agreed and that the equipment consisted of a stable, a barn and granary with a
pump and well plus other accommodation. In addition there was a quantity of
both dressed and undressed stone available.
The notice also indicated that Bowie had "enjoyed a considerable share of the
business" suggests that some others were also involved. ADD THOMAS
TRAQUAIR HERE Any potential leasee was also offered the reputation and
goodwill.
The unsold builder's yard presumably remained let providing some income to
the Bowie estate. Indeed it remained in Trustees hands until well into the 1870s.
