Mystery of death in Las Vegas
Last week I and some keen volunteers did some clearing at St Ninians old… you know the one that the Jacobites blew up in 1746?
C’mon the one with the isolated clock tower?
The cemetery is locked as there are wobbly stones and every now and again I help organise some volunteers to clear the trees and ivy that threaten the stones.
The place is just lovely andone of the oldest places in Stirling.
Its first recorded in the early 12th century and probably goes back to the 5 th century.
It is also probably somewhere where the real St Ninian actually visited.
Anyway I’m sure I’ve told you that before, but what I know I’ve never written about is the grave that’s pictured.
This concerns the Morris family. One died in New Zealand and another, James, in Lasvegas.
Now I always talk about this stone as it shows just how far people emigrated from 19th century Stirling.
That’s always interesting bu ti f you’re paying attention you’ll see that Lasvegas is described as being in Mexico. This was justa typo. It should be New Mexico.
However, Lasvegas in the 1880s was notorious for its gun fighters and out laws like Billy the Kid, Doc Holliday and Jesse James, who all walked its streets.
It’s been described by historians of the wild west as‘ without exception there was no town which harboured a more disreputable gang of desperadoes and out laws than Lasvegas.
So what exactly was James doing there and how did he die?
Now while it would be great to imagine he was a Stirling gunslinger shooting out with a bank robber we really don’t know andof course most people weren’t criminals and just wentto find work.
But he may have seen or met these famous outlaws!