Harrower Family Tree » William Stevenson (± 1780-± 1803)

Personal data William Stevenson 

• He was born about 1780 in Ayrshire, Scotland.Source 2

  Note
  BIRTH-BAPTISM: Kilmarnock [597], Ayr, Scotland, Parish Registers, 1693-1820; FHL film #0102864. John was the 3rd child and first son of John Stevenson. BIRTH: Letter of David Murdoch's in possession of Hugh Robertson, Kelso, Roxburgh, Scotland. The author viewed this letter in March 1982.

• (Individual fact) on October 18, 1801: Uunfortunate event, Low or Laigh Church of Kilmarnock.Source 1
• He died about 1803.Source 1

  Was buried in the West-Church, Edinburgh, having been assistant to the Rev. Dr. Black there.

• A child of William Stevenson

Household of William Stevenson

Notes about William Stevenson

On Sabbath, October 18th, 1801, William Stevenson, my father's eldest brother, preached in the Low or Laigh Church of Kilmarnock. It was on that day that the great catastrophe took place, when 29 or 30 persons were killed, owing to a false alarm having been raised that the church was going to fall. He had preached in the forenoon, and it was when the congregation had met for the afternoon sermon that the unfortunate event happened. The church had to be taken down and built anew before another preacher stood in the pulpit or hearers sat in the pews. The sermon my uncle preached that day, was (along with some other writings of his) afterwards taken by his youngest brother to Ireland. In 1857 they were brought back to Scotland by two of his daughters. I have seen a book written by my uncle William, telling of his experiences in his early years, which they also brought over with them. From papers that I have seen at Wood, I believe he died in 1803, or not long after, and was buried in the West-Church, Edinburgh, having been assistant to the Rev. Dr. Black there.
When a little girl I saw at the Wood a printed leaf or two, which appeared to have been part of a book or pamphlet, giving an account of the calamitous event which took place in the Low Church in Kilmarnock - 29 persons it said were killed. From a memoir of Dr McKinlay, by his son, and from an old newspaper which I have seen since I came to Kilmarnock, it is said to have taken place on Sabbath, the 18th of October, 1801. Last summer, whilst staying in 18 Wellington Street, Kilmarnock, an old woman who was living in the house, whose name was Mrs Tannahill, told me that her father-in-law had been killed at the Laigh Church in Kilmarnock, when the great disaster happened in it. She said she was six or seven years of age at that time. She told me that a pamphlet had been published about that time with the names of those who were killed; also, another woman, and a cousin of my mother's, told me that they had seen the pamphlet.
In the beginning of this year (1868), one Sabbath day, whilst in the Stevenson Academy Church, Kilmarnock at the interval, an old man, who lives in Kilmarnock, called Thorburn, came forward and spoke to me. He said he was above ninety years of age; and that he came to Kilmarnock just about one month before the catastrophe took place in the Low Church. He said they were at their dinner when they heard the alarm about the church. They ran to the churchyard, and it was an awful sight. He told me he knew my father and the rest of the family when they were living near Kilmarnock. He said he reaped corn the first harvest after he came to Kilmarnock, on the farm of Boreland, near Crawfurdland; the farmer's name was Muir and his wife's name was Margaret Stevenson, a relation of my father's. He also told me that there was a relation of my fathers in Kilmarnock then, called Thomas Stevenson, who was a schoolmaster. I have heard my mother and aunt speak of a cousin of my father's, called Robert Stevenson, who went to the Indies, and his mother, who was a widow, lived in Kilmarnock.
I have heard my aunt speak of a woman, called Elizabeth Smith, living in Kilmarnock, who came sometimes to Knockinlaw when my father was living there. She used to tell her about what happened at the Low Church in Kilmarnock, in 1801. She said that three young women, dressed in white, had come into her mother's house on the Sabbath morning (to wash their feet, I think,) before going to the church to hear my uncle preach that day, but none of them returned alive - they were all killed. One of them was a cousin of my father's; a daughter of John Stevenson of Hallbarns, who appears to be buried in Kilmaurs churchyard from the inscription on a head- stone there, saying that she died at the melancholy event that happened in the Low Church in Kilmarnock.

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