Shotts area Fortissat

[nvb272]

Hi

I'm doing some research and found some one who was born 1873 it says parish of Shotts actual birth place-  Fortissat, Hillhead.

I can find Fortissat but not Hillhead so assume it was maybe a house and not an actual village, Just trying to clarify what Hillhead is/was.

[Forfarian]

Have a look at
https://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=17&lat=55.83476&lon=-3.82994&layers=6&b=1

[nvb272]

ok, and clearly one was not looking too well!

[Skoosh]

The old house of Fortissat still exists but the lairds thereof decamped to Hamilton having won a watch & exploited the minerals on the estate. They held onto Fortissat possibly used as a shooting-box? Maybe miners cottages.

Skoosh.

[Forfarian]

In 1865 John Meek was the proprietor of Fortissat. The tenant of Mains of Fortissat was Robert Hamilton, and the tenant of Easter Fortissat was one of my Storrys, James Storry (1829-1883). The 1865 valuation roll also lists cothouses at Hillhead, Springbank and Fortesiet (sic) Colliery owned by James Meek, but does not name the tenants or occupiers. Nor does the 1875 VR.

William Waddell (1765-1843) and Agnes Thomson had at least two sons born at Mains of Fortissat, in 1792 and 1800. Their son John later farmed at East Redmire and then at Blackhall. John's grandson James Wilkie Weddell was a prominent architect. William was a son of James Waddell and Christian Bryce in Easter Baton, but I have not been able to work back any further than this James.

[Skoosh]

   These Meek's had Fortissat since the mid 1600's. They moved to Cadzow Bank, Hamilton where John Meek of Fortissat was the provost, dying there 1893, age 77. The family were Covenanters & the Shotts Parish flag, carried at Bothwell Brig, was found hidden in the loft of Fortissat in 1897, now in the Hamilton Museum. The ninth laird of Fortissat was John Croill Meek b.1872, who moved to Walkerburn, Peebles. One of that family, James Meek, was a Moderator of the Church of Scotland & George Meek of Campfield, surgeon, founded the Falkirk Bank.
 James Meek the novelist from Dundee is off the Fortissat Meek's.

Skoosh.

[Skoosh]

@nvb272, just heard from a buddy anent Scobbies who ran 3 pits on Fortissat estate, one living at Hillhead in the 1841 census, Wm Scobbie 70, a weaver, Marion Scobbie 75 & John Cooper 12. The census has Fortissat Mains, Fortissat, Hillhead & Fortissat House.
 Hillhead was a row of four dwellings & was aptly renamed Shuttlehill sometime between 1841 & the 1890's. They were gone by the time of the Great War.

Skoosh.

[Skoosh]

Apparently these four hand-loom weavers cottages were formerly thatched! 

Skoosh.

[mosstrooper]

No body mentioned how the place got its name, or the Fortissat Stane, where 40 sat. still there today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5RDWhuj1B0

From the signing of the National Covenant in 1638 to the Revolution in 1688, the struggle between Presbyterianism and the Episcopacy went on until it reached its height in the killing times - 1684-1685. Shotts and the adjoining parishes of Monkland and Cambusnethan were strong supporters of the Covenant, and many conventicles were held within their bounds. The principal place for field preachings in the parish of Shotts was on a large moss between Benhar and Starryshaw. It was here at a place once known as the "Deer Slunk" that Donald Cargill preached on the Sunday after Richard Cameron's death, 26 July 1681. John Kidd also preached here to a large, armed conventicle. Nearby is the large whinstone boulder which has been known since the time of the martyred Alexander Peden as ‘Peden’s Stane’.

There is a Covenanter's stone in the kirk yard to a certain William Smith, who fought at Rullion Green in the Pentlands in 1666. In 1678, the Duke of Monmouth, with an army of 10,000 men, camped for ten days at Muirhead, about three miles east of Kirk o’Shotts. They were on their way by the old bridle road, to Bothwell Bridge where they defeated the Covenanters. It is reckoned that 160 Shotts men took part in the battle; 13 were killed and 33 taken prisoner.

James.