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[Condensed from Samuel Lewis's A Topographical Dictionary of Scotland (1851) - transcription copyright Mel Lockie 2016] (available on GENUKI) Foveran is a parish, in the county of Aberdeenshire, 12 miles (north by west) from Aberdeen; containing, with the village of Newburgh and the barony of Knockhall, 1620 inhabitants. This place was formerly remarkable for its castle, called Foveran, ... but every vestige of the fortress is gone. The parish is situated in that part of the county called Formartine. It stretches along the coast of the German Ocean [North Sea], and is separated from the parish of Logie-Buchan on the north by the burn of Tarty, and from the sands of Forvie (in the parish of Slains) on the east by the River Ythan. It is about seven miles in length from east to west, and three in breadth from north to south, and is watered by the beautiful burn of Foveran, which... falls into the Ythan at Newburgh. Agriculture is steadily pursued, and considerable traffic is carried on at the fishing-village and maritime port of Newburgh. The land is generally fertile, and distributed into many good farms, producing fine crops; the farm-houses are mostly built of stone and lime, and are commodious and well finished. Within the last twenty or thirty years large tracts of barren soil have been improved, and drains and fences constructed on an extensive scale. The mail-road from Aberdeen to Peterhead intersects the parish (now mostly the A90), and has several branches, one of which, called the Fiddes road (B999), joins the Udny turnpike-road, opening up important facilities of intercourse with that part of the county: there is also a turnpike-road from Aberdeen to Methlick (now the A947), which passes at the western extremity of the parish; and another has been recently completed, which is found highly beneficial, from Old Meldrum to the village of Newburgh (now the A920 and the B9000). About twenty head of fat-cattle are shipped every week at the port, for the London market; and lime, coal, timber, bones, &c., are imported. The annual value of real property in the parish is £5713. The church is a plain substantial edifice, built in 1794, and accommodating 700 persons; it contains two handsome marble monuments to the family of Robertson of Foveran, and another, of very superior character, designed by Bacon, to the Udny family. The parochial school affords instruction in the usual branches; the master has a salary of £28, with about £31 fees. There is also a school at Cultercullen, in the western quarter, with an endowment of £8 per annum, and a free house, an piece of land. About half a mile north of Newburgh are the ruins of the castle of Knockhall, built in the year 1565, and accidentally burnt in 1734: it was the seat of the family of Udny, whose ancient burial-ground, also in the neighbourhood of the village, contains the remains of an old chapel generally called Rood Church. [From A New History of Aberdeenshire, Alexander Smith (Ed), 1875] (also found in full in GENUKI) Of Foveran Castle, near Foveran House, not a vestige remains. The oldest part bore the name of Turing's Tower, after its first possessors, from whom it passed, about the middle of the 17th century, to a branch of the Forbeses of Tolquhoun. The tower did fall not long before 1720. [Wikipedia notes that the hereditary baronetcy of Foveran is held by the Turing family (see Turing Baronets). The cryptographer and computing pioneer Alan Turing (1912–1954) was uncle to the present Baronet.] An ancient burying-ground near the village retains a fragment of the 'Red Chapel of Buchan,' or Chapel of the Holy Rood. Foveran House, 1 mile south-southwest of Newburgh, is an old mansion; whilst Tillery, in the west of the parish, 1½ mile south-southeast of Udny station, is a more recent Grecian edifice. Five proprietors hold each an annual value of £500 and upwards, and 6 of between £100 and £500. The parish church, on the right bank of Foveran Burn, 1½ mile southwest of Newburgh, is a plain edifice of 1794, containing 700 sittings, and a marble monument with two fine busts of Col. John Augustus and Col. Robert Fullerton Udny, of Udny and Dudwick [Ellon parish], who died in 1859 and 1861. There is also a Free church 1-3/8 mile further south-southwest; and three public schools: Cultercullen, Foveran, and Newburgh Mathers. [edit] Population Growth
Populations 1801-1951 from A Vision of Britain through Time (http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk).
[edit] Research TipsThere was formerly a note on this page that the parish was linked to the Presbytery of Ellon, Synod of Aberdeen, Scotland. It would appear that since 1975 the organization of the presbyteries and synods has been revised. Readers are reminded that the Church of Scotland is Presbyterian in nature while in England the Church of England is Episcopalian. (See Wikipedia. )
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