Stories behind silent stones
The rocky ruins of West Hartfield Farm stud upland meadows beside a country road near the former Peesweep Sanatorium on Paisley’s Gleniffer Braes.
Only stony foundations remain, along with lichen-laced door lintel, window sill and gableend fragments.
Cattle and sheep graze among mossy masonry. Small grey and white birds, called wheatears, perch there and black-feathered ravens croak ominously from a windswept tree which graces the kailyard.
The dilapidated domain lurks 700 feet above sea level in a remote realm. It’s surrounded by desolate marshes and moors, mantled with firwoods and fern-festooned valleys echoing to mournful calls of curlews, peewits and buzzards.
It’s hard to believe that, within living memory, farming families occupied West Hartfield. They tended livestock, grew crops, churned cheese and butter and sold eggs.
There were ready markets in rapidly-expanding towns, such as Paisley and Johnstone.
Just over 100 years ago, the farm was inhabited by the Craigs. This family was related to Robin and Cathy Craig, who live in Elderslie today and are Paisley Abbey’s magazine editors.
Peter Craig and his wife Annie were married at West Hartfield on August 11, 1891, by the Reverend David Stewart, of Caldwell Church, in nearby Uplawmoor.
Life was harsh on the Braes, with no National Health Service, nor state childcare.
Peter and Annie’s first little girl, whose name is unrecorded, died in infancy.
Further anguish followed when Jane Margaret, born in 1893, passed away before her second birthday.
Mine of information
Derek Parker knew many of Paisley’s secrets – the grimy and the good.
He wandered every corner in search of the clues that would unlock Renfrewshire’s rich history.
These tales were shared with readers in his hugely popular Parker’s Way column.
We’ve opened our vault to handpick our favourites for you.
Altogether, just three of seven of the couple’s children survived, including Peter, who became Robin’s uncle.
The tragic tots were buried in unmarked graves at Woodside Cemetery, Paisley.
Tombstones were costly and money was better spent on the living than the dead. Young Peter attended Nethercraigs School at the foot of the Braes.
Eventually, the family moved to Great Hamilton Street, in Paisley, where a relative owned a cow-feeder’s business.
The Craigs became prosperous wine and spirit merchants, with premises in Causeyside Street and Ferguslie.
West Hartfield accommodated farming families, like the Reids and Jones, until the mid20th century, when it became unprofitable and was abandoned.
Today, its rocky remains are mouldering memorials to men, women and children of rural Renfrewshire who lived, worked and shared life’s joys and sorrows there.
Their spirits still speak among the silent stones.