Remember to bring a pen or pencil as the
container is a micro.
When replacing the container please keep it to
the right of the hiding place so It doesn't get lost
Just off the B7066 Kirk O'Shotts sits above the M8 Motorway
outside Salsburgh and is, due to it's exposed position on the
hillside, battered by the weather but during the last year or two
it has been watched by passers-by while it's roof was given a
£500,000 re-furbishment, paid for by the adverts hung from the
scaffolding surrounding the building (the brainchild of Rev. Sheila
Spence).
The graveyard of the church was one of the areas reputedly
frequented by the body snatchers Burke and Hare (and others) during
the early 1800's, the duo, who worked on the Union Canal, supplied
bodies to a Doctor Knox for use in anatomy lessons, eventually
turned murderers to save them the effort of digging up the
bodies.
To prevent this unholy trade in the dead the graveyard had a watch
- house where men would remain vigilant to ward of the
"Resurrectioners.”
Close by lies Hartwoodhill Hospital, Lord Deas (1804-87) was
owner of what is now called Hartwoodhill Estate (a convalescent
home for wounded soldiers in the 1914-18 war), but which is still
better known to old Shottsonians as Lord Deas’s Estate.
He was known as the Hanging Judge, so often did he deal out the
death sentence to sheep-stealers.
This story, vouched for by more than one person, is told of him.
One summer night he was driving in his coach through Allanton
Woods, when his coachman halted at the old water trough to let the
horse drink. Suddenly a shot rang out from across the road. The
bullet just missed the judge and lodged in a tree beside the
trough.