The view of Leven Links, looking towards Largo Law, probably dates to circa 1900.  It shows just how unrefined golf was back then.  The player about to drive has no fairway in front of them, just sand dunes and rough grass! I wonder how today's players would fair on this terrain.  Although, when you consider that golf has been played here since 1820, perhaps this is relatively sophisticated? Only a few clubs were used - probably all locally made (perhaps by the Patrick family). Note also the barefooted boys and the normal clothes and shoes worn by players.

The local golf courses would undergo significant transformation in the next decade. The Leven and Lundin Golf Clubs ceased to share one course in 1909, with the Lundin end being redesigned by James Braid.  

The detail below shows the salmon nets out in the bay (the parallel stakes in the water). The east end of Lundin Links is visible in the distance to the left of the wooden sign behind the crowd, while the pale-coloured rectangular Crusoe Hotel can be seen to the right.  At the very foot of the post is an image, seen in an earlier post, of the Lundin end of the Links around the same time.

The previous post looked at former forester on the Lundin Estate - Neil Shaw.  His family were the original occupants of Lundin Lodge (pictured above), the old lodge house for the long-demolished mansion Lundin House.  Shaw was a native of the island of Islay, who found his way to Lundin Estate because of a man named George Todd Chiene.  Chiene was born at Crail on 21 August 1809, son of Captain John Chiene of the Royal Navy.  Educated at Edinburgh High School he became the factor for Mr Campbell of Islay.  As Islay's factor, Chiene had a key role in the running of the estate - perhaps overseeing the maintenance of the land and buildings, collecting rent, dealing with tenants, arranging insurance, undertaking inspections,etc. Chiene carried out this role for at least a decade - approximately between 1837 and 1847.  It would have been during this spell that he became acquainted with Neil Shaw.

​Chiene was noted as an "intelligent, indefatigable and hospitable factor" to Mr Campbell and was also referred to as 'Chamberlain of Islay' (ie in charge of managing the household of the island's foremost figure). But, as mentioned in the previous post, times became hard on Islay as a consequence of the potato famine and Campbell (a relation of Daniel Campbell of Shawfield) ended up bankrupt. George Todd Chiene would soon be on the move and he would be taking Neil Shaw with him.  Chiene became factor on the Lundin Estate around the time that it was purchased by the Standard Life Assurance Company.  In 1852, the company purchased the estate as an investment and development opportunity.  The railway was soon to reach Lundin Links and Largo and would trigger the initial attempts to expand Lundin Links into a planned village of upmarket villas.  We can assume that Chiene had a facilitating role to play in this venture.  

The building of the extension railway line from Leven along through Lundin Links and Largo to Kilconquhar in the mid-1850s could well have been something that Shaw and Chiene contributed to.  The advert below shows an example of another forester nearby at the time advertising wood for railway sleepers - could Shaw have done this at Lundin Links?

Chiene continued to be responsible for Lundin Estate for many years.  While the main home base for him, his wife and children was in Northumberland Street in Edinburgh, he would have spent a significant amount of time at Lundin House. The 1855 valuation roll lists Chiene as the tenant occupier of 'Mansion House of Lundin'.  After the railway reached Lundin Links in 1857, Standard Life drew up feuing plans for the village and began to build on some of the feus to attract potential buyers. Among the buildings erected at that time was the original station building at Lundin Links, Homelands, a few villas on Crescent Road and Lundin Lodge.

​George Todd Chiene was elected Captain of Lundin Golf Club (at the age of 60) in 1869, the year after the Club was first founded. His election came after the autumn meeting where the 'Standard' medal was played for and won by his son, George Todd Chiene, Jr (then aged 25). This was reported in the Edinburgh Evening Courant on 11 October 1869. There is no record of Neil Shaw playing golf but I imagine he must have played on the course with George Chiene.  The pair were undoubtedly close as the Shaws named one of their children after one of Chiene's. 'Dorothea Chiene Shaw' was born in 1871, twenty one years after Dorothea Chiene, George's eldest daughter was born.

​On 17 June 1882 George Todd Chiene died at Burntisland aged 72.  Neil Shaw died in 1892 in Edinburgh. I wonder what he would make of the fact that a hole at the Lundin Golf Club is still named after him and what he would think of the busy farm shop and cafe that has sprung up next to his former home (see image at foot of post). 

Finally, it's worth noting that two of Chiene's sons had interesting life stories.  Eldest son John became Professor of Surgery at Edinburgh University and worked with Sir John Goodsir (a theme worth returning to in the future).  Second son George followed in his father's footsteps as a Chartered Accountant, an auditor for Standard Life, a factor for several Fife Estates and Captain of Innerleven Golf Club.  In fact, the Chiene company of Chartered Accountants continues on to this day in Edinburgh and you can read about the firm's history here.

Does the name Neil Shaw mean anything to you?  Perhaps it does if you play golf?  There is a hole on the Lundin Golf Club course named 'Neil Shaw' - a name that stands out among the names of the other holes on the course.  Most holes have unsurprising names, referring to physical features (eg 'Bents', 'Burn' and 'High') or neighbouring properties (eg 'Aithernie', 'Sunnybraes' and 'Silverburn').  So who was Neil Shaw and why name a golf hole after him?

The Neil Shaw in question was born in November 1821 on the island of Islay, in the Parish of Bowmore/Kilarrow.  To give some background, Islay had been bought in 1726 by Daniel Campbell of Shawfield.  Campbell has been mentioned in this blog before. It was he who commissioned one of Scotland's first Palladian buildings, Shawfield Mansion, considered to be the likely template for Largo House.  His legacy of agricultural improvements and the introduction of flax cultivation and mills would change the island of Islay forever.  Campbell's grandson initiated the construction of Bowmore village in 1770, including the parish church where Neil Shaw would be both baptised and married.

Neil Shaw married Euphemia Logan in 1852 and the first of their (at least eleven) children was born on Islay.  However, these were hard times on the island, with the hardship of the potato famine had begun to hit some years earlier. The Campbell owners went bankrupt and administrators carried out some land clearances. In 1853 the estates of Islay were split up and sold off. By 1855 Neil Shaw and his family were in Largo Parish.  The record of the birth of their third child James places the family at 'Lundie Muirton' and records Neil's occupation as a forester.  Muirton can be seen on the 1854 map below, to the south east of Blacketyside.  The 1861 census places the Shaw family (now with five children) at one of the houses on Blacketyside Farm (noting that the house has 8 rooms with one or more windows).

By the 1871 census the growing Shaw family have moved into the newly built 'Lundie Lodge'.  This house was built on the site of a ruin, marked on the above 1854 map as 'Wright's Castle'. According to 'Scotland's Places', this old property was a dwelling house two stories high with a garden and three acres of land attached, occupied latterly by Miss Dick, which was given the name "Wrights Castle" many years previously by an eccentric occupier. The later map from 1890 below, shows the new lodge house sitting on the main road opposite the entrance to Silverburn and with a track running from it up towards Lundin House. At the 1881 census, Neil is recorded as 'Wood Forester', living at the same house, although it was at that time referred to as 'Lundie Cottage'.  Two of his sons at the same address are also noted as foresters. 

A decade later, in 1891, the Shaws have left the area and James Bruce was now in the position of forester living at Lundin Lodge.  Still in 1901, James Bruce (now age 70) was living in the house and carrying out the role of forester.  Neil Shaw and his family moved to Leith and it is there that Neil died in 1892 aged 70. Anyway, the name of Neil Shaw, who had acted as forester on Lundin Estate for three decades, lives on both in the name of the 13th hole on the golf course and in the local name for the wooded area alongside this part of the course.  For many decades after the Shaws left, the woods between Silverburn and Sunnybraes were referred to as 'Neil Shaw's Woods'.  If you know anything more of Neil Shaw - please comment.

The above engraving illustrates Largo Kirk around 1840.  Note that most roofs are thatched and roads are unsurfaced. Perhaps the variety of animals shown is for artistic effect but nevertheless the presence of livestock out in the open was probably common.  It's safe to assume that such features would be found all around the villages of Upper Largo, Lower Largo and Lundin Links.  The area around the old mill and the weavers' cottages at Lundin Mill would surely have been just as atmospheric.  And still around 1870 there were thatched roofs present - for example at Drummochy.  

Engraving involves cutting grooves into a hard surface and can be used for printing images on paper.  This highly skilled technique was largely overtaken by the advent of photography but it provides a wonderful glimpse into the pre-photography era.  Today, the Kirk and the area surrounding it retains much of its old world charm even without the thatched roofs and wandering animals.  However, I'm sure that the streets are not exactly conducive to re-cycling lorries and such aspects of modern life.

The previous post looked at the remarkable life of Henry Petheram (1809-1886), who worked as a road surveyor in Fife for half a century and resided at three notable houses in Largo Parish - Drummochy House, Earnest Cottage and Haworth.  When he died at the age of 77, a vacancy arose for the position of road surveyor for the St Andrews district. The position would be filled by one of his many children - his son and namesake Henry Petheram (1844-1895). 

Henry Jnr had been born on 23 May 1844 and by the age of 16 was a Banker's Apprentice, living with his family in Lundin Mill.  However, his banking career was short-lived, as he soon followed in his father's footsteps.  By the age of 26, the time of the 1871 census, Henry was lodging in Dunbar, where he was a road surveyor.  While based in Haddingtonshire (now East Lothian) he met Anne MacLeod and married her in 1874 in Belhaven.

By 1875, Henry and Anne had moved to St Andrews and had their first child.  Henry was now working in St Andrews District, as an assistant to his highly-experienced father.  When Henry Snr died in 1886, Henry Jnr was unanimously appointed to succeed his father.  However, some debate ensued around the salary that Henry Jnr was to be paid.  His father had been paid £300 but the District Committee had looked to pay the less experienced son a lower amount. Discussion around the appropriate amount had taken place, including whether this would include an element to cover the cost of keeping a horse (thought to be no less than £50 per annum).  Ultimately, a salary of £250 was agreed (Fife Herald, 22 Sep 1886).

Sadly, Henry Jnr would not have the longevity of his father and died at the age of 51 on 2 October 1895.  The St Andrews Citizen at the time commented upon his death, as follows...

"Deceased was of a retiring disposition; but was an enthusiastic curler, and always took an active part in promoting the interests of the game.  Mr Petheram has been taken away in the prime of his life.  He had suffered for months from a painful complaint for which he had been unsuccessfully treated in Edinburgh Infirmary.  He leaves a widow and family, for whom in their bereavement much sympathy is expressed."

The register of death shows that Henry Petheram suffered from diabetes, for which at that time there was no effective treatment - the discovery of insulin came many years after Petheram's death. As yet, I have not found photographs of either of the Henry Petherams, however, to give a feel for the work of a surveyor in days gone by, below are some surveyors with their equipment.