The Historic West End: A historical report on Paisley's West End from earliest times to the 21st Century.

By Paul Wandrum

The Historic West End: A historical report on Paisley's West End from earliest times to the 21st Century

• Language: English
• Publisher: Paul Wandrum
• Release date: Apr 27, 2019
• ISBN: 9781789269895

Book preview

THE WEST END OF PAISLEY

Introduction and areas of interest

The historic Burgh of Paisley is home to some great medieval structures such as Paisley Abbey and great landmarks like the Trinity Church steeple at Oakshaw, which is known for the heart handkerchief and spectacles story. Other architectural gems such as the Paisley Abbey drain discovery in 1990 make the town of Paisley a very fascinating place for tourists and historians alike. This historical report however will be focused on a different part of the town and it is known as the West End of Paisley.

Although the West End of our town these days doesn’t exactly share much of the same popularity as the other key landmarks along the high street, such as Paisley Museum and library or the sma shott weavers’ cottages at shuttle street, Paisleys West End is still of great importance historically. During the two years I spent studying Paisleys local history and heritage at the former University of Paisley I learned that there are certain areas of archaeological interest that I feel have been overlooked over the years. To present a brief example of this I will firstly mention the area of Woodside in the West End, which dates as far back as the Iron age.The lands which are now the modern day Ferguslie Park housing scheme date as far back as the 12th century and this was because of the arrival of a man known as Walter Fitz Alan whom came to Scotland in the year 1163. Fitz Alan was also the man that brought monks from the cluinic order in Shropshire.

These monks then went on to build a small priory at Paisley and the location of that early medieval priory today is now the site of Paisley Abbey. Six years before the construction of the early priory foundation and the site of Paisley Abbey, Walter Fitz Alan had lands granted to him by Malcolm IV.

Malcolm IV also confirmed and further extended the lands granted to Walter in Renfrewshire and Ayrshire which were to include the lands around Renfrew, Passeleth (Paisley)

These lands granted to Walter Fitz Alan within Renfrewshire and around Paisley would have indeed included Ferguslie. What I also wanted to showcase throughout this short history book on the West End is how vast the lands of Ferguslie were even before the earliest construction of the housing scheme known today as Ferguslie Park. This housing estate first began as a series of housing projects between the years 1926 and 1966 but what is most interesting is that way long before the days of the housing scheme, Ferguslie also would have been the location of an old castle, which are also known as tower houses.

THE PURPOSE OF CASTLES AND TOWER HOUSES

An old castle once stood in an area which nowadays forms part of the modern Ferguslie Park housing scheme. I have also written a chapter on this bygone castle in this report for locals that did not know that the lands of Ferguslie once had a castle long ago. Firstly, however I feel that it’s worth noting that these types of castles would not have been built on grand scales like the castles we can visit today at Edinburgh or Stirling, but they were indeed built for defensive purposes. 

THE IMPORTANCE OF PRESERVING OUR HISTORY & HERITAGE

Throughout some of the following chapters in this short history booklet on Paisley’s West End, readers will perhaps notice that the West End of Paisley was once home to some of the most astonishing architecture of the 19th century. Readers of any local history book on Paisley may also know that several of these mansion houses and historic School buildings are no longer here today due to mindless vandalism and arson over the years. This is indeed the only downside of trying to write about and showcase the history and heritage of a very old and interesting district in Paisley. The image below is an example of how we really need to start looking after our listed buildings

The West End also flourished throughout the late 19th century’s boom period of the thread industry. J&P Coats thread mills at Ferguslie had employed many workers which meant the thread industry here in Paisley was really thriving by the 20th century. Over ten thousand people would have been employed by both the J&P Coats Mill complex and the Clarkes mills at Seedhill. Many Paisley locals today would perhaps agree that the closure of the Ferguslie Mills in 1992 and the closure of the Chrysler factory in Linwood some years before in 1981 led to much higher unemployment rates and social problems within hosing schemes like Ferguslie