Langholm’s first ‘Parish Kirk’ was built in the centre of the Old Town in 1703 and was reconstructed twice, in 1747 and 1779. The third building could seat 800 people but was damp, cold, had an earth floor and was difficult to access for some, being up a steep incline. A new neo-Gothic building was constructed in 1846 across the river, next to the New Town.
Much of the former church’s stonework was used for other buildings, until little more than the belfry and a gable were left. The bell served the purpose of providing an alarm when there was a fire in town.
The Parish Church also had a separate facility, the Mission Hall, on the Old Town side of the river, built in 1885. It was used as Red Cross Hospital during the Great War, opened in October 1914 and run by Lady Ewart.
The minister in 1915 was Rev James Buchanan, born in Airdrie, Lanarkshire to a coal pithead labourer. He was appointed in 1879 at age 35 and was originally an apprentice law clerk.
The church was installed with a Willis pipe organ in 1893 and had a paid organist and choirmaster, Charles Metcalfe. Born in Carlisle, he was a professor of music in London before moving to Langholm in the same year as the installation of the organ. His father William was an organist for Trinity Church, Carlisle, and had musical associations with Langholm.
In the photo below, Rev James Buchanan is at the centre. On the right is Charles Metcalfe and on the left is Alexander Milligan, Sunday School superintendent and a mill worker.
A church memorial lists 58 names of those in the congregation who lost their lives in the Great War.
The church ministers were:
- William Berry Shaw, minister 1812-1856. Friend of Disruption leader Thomas Chalmers, after whom Langholm’s Chalmers United Free Church was named.
- James Macturk, minister 1856-1878.
- James Buchanan, minister 1879-1921.
- William Lindsay, minister 1922-1942.
- James Cottar, minister 1943-[…]. former Scotland rugby international.
- Tom Calvert, minister […-…].
A hundredth anniversary booklet published in 1946 can be found here.