The History of Tulliallan Castle

Nothing regal or imposing marks the old castle at Tulliallan today, but it stands on a shelf of rock, hidden by a thick wood of tall trees, and protected by moats that are now engulfed in tall bracken and willowherb five feet high. The ivy on the walls gives a quaint, old-world touch to the ruins, and, although only a couple of stone’s-throw from the approach road to the busy Kincardine Bridge, peace and quietness reign supreme.

Take away the trees, shrubs and weeds, and you see the castle standing on a shelf of rock, with, as of yore, the waters of the Forth lapping the eminence on which it stands. Take your stand at an upper window and you can capture a panoramic view of the whole estuary, with Clackmannan Tower on the western horizon, the Ochils as a glorious northern boundary, and to the east the sweeping lines of the coast of Fife. A choice site for a family seat! This and nothing more the Castle of Tulliallan has ever been. It can vie in history with Alloa Tower, where Mary Queen of Scots danced and James VI cried in his cradle, or Clackmannan Tower, where William the Lyon called his first Parliament ever and King Robert the Bruce hunted the wild boar. Indeed, history is for the most part silent about it. Yet, the structure, like almost medieval buildings, belongs to various periods. No one knows when the basic edifice was started, but, while some of the features of the lowest part might be fourteenth century, the main characteristics of the structure are clearly fifteenth century.

At one end it is three-storied and at the other four-storied, while two wings have been added. Actually, there have been three entrances, across moats and drawbridges, and at the principal entrance can still be seen the aperture for the chain which lifted and lowered the drawbridge. The ashlar masonry shows a developed skill in building, the courses are about eleven inches in depth, and the walls are six feet thick. There is a turnpike stair, leading up to a caphouse, which provided access to the higher parapet walk.

One curious feature is that in the attic the windows are actually on the floor level. Other unique features within the castle are that the hall is on the ground floor and that in one of the principal chambers there is a well with built sides. Transverse walls have been built across the large chambers, probably to secure comfort and warmth, and in the north-west corner of the hall is a fire-place with lamp-brackets on each side. Two windows have window seats of stone, providing excellent views of the countryside. The original hall has a fine pillar, which supports still a groined ceiling. The usual sanitary arrangements of garderobe and shoots are present.

Wallace had, indeed, trounced the English forces at Airth tower shortly before this. Edward feared he might capture Tulliallan and he planned to catch him as he crossed the Forth. Edward failed in this, but he achieved his end later through the treachery of Menteith at Robroyston. The next date of note is 1410, when the Earl of Douglas granted to Sir John Edmonstone the lands of the Castle of Tulliallan, in which family it remained for seventy years, but in 1480 Elizabeth Edmonstone married Patrick Blackadder from the Borders. This breed of Blackadders were the dreaded foes of the English and of them it was stated that “the black-band of the Blackadders drove back the English invader.” Typically, their crest was “a right hand holding aloft a broad-sword,” and their motto was “Courage helps fortune.” Within five years Elizabeth had exchanged certain lands she possessed in Banff in order to acquire the castle. It was the younger not the elder son of this marriage who figured in Scottish history. Robert, like many another younger son of the gentry, went into the Church, where he carved out for himself a notable career.

In 1483, while still Bishop of Aberdeen, Robert was the centre of a quarrel between the Pope and Parliament as to who should be the next Bishop of Glasgow. Feeling ran high and it was only under the threat of Papal excommunication that Blackadder was pushed on to that episcopal throne. Soon feuds arose with Schevez, the Archbishop of St Andrews, and they both set out for Rome to get the Pope to decide between them. Among other things, the Pope agreed to make no clerical appointments till eight months after a vacancy. In 1487 the See of St Andrews was raised to be equal to that of Canterbury, but this roused the ire of Blackadder, so much so indeed, that the Pope himself had to write severely: “On their very journey home, those illustrious orators and venerable brothers, Robert of Glasgow and William of St Andrews, fell into various contentions and disputes.” Pope Innocent placated the Glasgow Bishop by exempting him and his diocese from the jurisdiction of St Andrews, but Robert claimed that from St Mungo’s Day his church had been the “special daughter” of Rome, disowning all masters save His Holiness himself. Was not James IV himself a canon of Glasgow Cathedral.

Just as worthy was Blackadder’s project to build, found and endow a chapel to St. Mungo at Culross, on the traditional site where St Thenew disembarked with her new-born child St Mungo. This was secured by charter from James IV on 27th May 1503, and the income came from the lands of Craigrossy in Strathearn. It was obviously a congenial achievement not only for the Archbishop of Glasgow but for the laird of Tulliallan Castle. Although the days of the crusades were long passed Blackadder cherished the longing to visit the Holy Sepulchre and in 1508 set off for the Holy Land, stopping on his way at Venice, where he was graciously received by the Doge and his ministers, whom he accompanied in the Bucentaur for the annual ceremony of wedding Venice to the Adriatic. It was on a ship of the Venetian Republic that he continued his journey to Jaffa. It was, however, an ill-fated ship. Filled with pilgrims for the Holy Places, the terrible medieval plague broke out among them and the “great Scotch archbishop” was one of its tragic victims. The waters of the Levant and not the beautiful crypt of his beloved cathedral became his tomb. Two additional points might be noted about Robert Blackadder. He was held in high regard by James IV and was used by him to prosecute several delicate diplomatic missions. He gained also a considerable reputation as an unsparing foe of the Lollards, who were raising their heads and voices against the excesses of the clergy. He summoned thirty of them from Ayrshire to appear before the King to defend themselves. Adam Reid of Barskimming gave an excellent account of himself, so excellent, indeed, that the King in great good humour dismissed the charges with a kindly warning against heresy.

Tulliallan had in 1530 a laird of a less politic kind than Robert. This was Sir John Blackadder, who vowed vengeance on Sir James Inglis, the Abbot of Culross Abbey, for double-crossing him in leasing the lands of Balgownie behind his back. Laird and Abbot, each with a troop of sixteen horsemen, met in the lane leading down to Rosyth Castle and Blackadder at once attacked and slew the Abbot. This supposedly took place on 1st March and one account states that on 27th August, before the King and Queen and a concourse of the public in Edinburgh, Sir John went to the scaffold with his accomplice, William Lothian, a priest of Culross. Besides having been chaplain to the Prince Royal and secretary to Queen Margaret, Sir James was chancellor of the royal Chapel of Stirling. Inglis had had a varied career, having been a poet at court, a declaimer of ballads and a producer of plays, until appointed abbot. Sir David Lindsay in one of his prologues asks:

Who can say more than Sir James Inglis says

In ballads, farces and in pleasant plays?

But Culross hath his pen made impotent.

Erskine of Cardross-in-Menteith was glad to dispose of the house and estate to George Keith-Elphinstone, the doyen of British admirals, who now sought a landed property where he could in a happy retirement end his brilliant naval career. Had he not reaped all the laurels of a maritime life? He had fought with Nelson at Trafalgar and with Sir Ralph Abercromby on the beaches at Aboukir. He had captured the person of Napoleon after Waterloo. His daughter had in fact married the aide-de-camp of the French Emperor. His behaviour was always “noble, delicate and humane.” In 1820 he built a new Tulliallan Castle, to the north of the old one and he spared no money in erecting an impressive structure in the Italian style, for his first wife had been very wealthy and he himself had been richly rewarded by his country. Although 75 years of age, he spent 8000 pounds erecting a sea-wall to restrict the flooding's of the Forth at Kincardine and he sought the improvement of the community in every possible way. It is of interest to note that he reclaimed 200 acres from the sea and that the laborers on the work received the incredibly small wage of ten-pence a day, while skilled masons received one shilling per day. The castle then passed in 1823 to his eldest daughter, known as Baroness Keith, who would visit the local school three or four times a year in her pony-cart and the pupils would stand respectfully on her entrance. After all, she paid 70 pounds a year towards the teachers salary! The Keiths, whose motto was “They say: What say? Let them say,” built the new parish church and used the old church as a family burying-ground. In 1888 the property passed to Lady W. G. Osborne Elphinstone, who married Lord William Godsolphin Osborne, the uncle of the Duke of Leeds.

Meanwhile the Mitchells of Alloa, father and son, were developing the mineral resources of the district. The father acquired Luscar estate in 1890 and the son, Colonel Alexander Mitchell, procured Tulliallan Castle in 1924. It had been in the meantime the property of Sir James Sievewright, the South African magnate, whose plush heyday is vividly described by James Bark in “The Green Hills Far Away.” Having commanded the Fife and Forfar Yeomanry in the First World War, Colonel Mitchell returned to take an active part in the affairs of the Alloa Coal Company and he died at Tulliallan Castle on 4 December, 1934, and was buried with the honours of Master of the Foxhunt in the old church there. His son, Sir Harold, continued occupancy until the Second War period, when he gave it to be a headquarters for Polish troops, who were visited by the President of Poland himself. After the war, the building and estate was finally disposed of to the Home Office and now is in use as a Police Training College. Modern additions have been made to the original structure to provide extra residential accommodation and other amenities, with unavoidable alternations in the architectural features of the castle. This, however, is but another proof that changing structures and the past, no matter how romantic, cannot enthrall the present.