Ancient Times and the Celtic Church
The roots of the Church in Oban reach far back to long ago when Christianity arrived. People have lived in this part of Scotland for a very long time, at least 7,000-9,000 years, thousands of years before the Romans invaded Britain, a time that is often called the Stone Age, simply because people made things out of stone because metals, like iron and bronze, were yet to be invented. You might wonder why this is of importance to Christianity, but it is and we can look to the village of Kilmore to find out.
There is a wealth of archaeological evidence, meaning archaeologists have found things like tools, or the foundations of buildings, in Kilmore. This “evidence” tells us information about the people that lived here. Imagine what Kilmore might have been like thousands of years ago! The evidence suggests it was an important area and cairns have been found. Cairns are ancient burial chambers, where the people would bury their dead. It is a sign that the ancient people living here were part of an advanced civilization. The people who lived there at this time (about 3,500 years ago) would have likely been farmers and we know they had boats and were able to construct cairns and standing stones. Because Kilmore was already a very old settlement in 500AD (1500 years ago) the missionary St Bean, who came from Ireland to spread Christianity, decided it would be a good place for him to found a church. He would not want to have his church in a place with no people, or a place that was unimportant. He would have wished to reach many people and so older villages would have seemed like a suitable location. We don’t know very much about St Bean except that the old church in Kilmore, now a ruin, was dedicated to him.
Medieval Times
The ruin of Kilmore church is over six hundred years old and so from a period we call medieval, although it is thought to be built upon the foundations of another church which is much, much older, perhaps even from around the time of St Bean himself, although nobody can be sure of this.
The graveyard at Kilmore Church is very interesting. It has many medieval graves with interesting carvings. It is not possible to read them as erosion from the wind and rain has made the letters too faint. The oldest gravestone possible to read is of a minister of Kilmore called James Campbell who was forty-seven years old when he died in 1756. You might assume the old church at Kilmore is a ruin because it is so old, but this is not the case, apparently in the 19th Century Victorian times the church was purposefully ruined to make it look romantic. Romantic ruins were very fashionable at the time!
Kilbride church (near Lerags) is also very old and was founded by another missionary, St Bride, in 525 AD. There was no church in Oban because up until around 200 years ago it was a very small village with a small population of fisherman. The people who lived there had to walk to Kilmore or Kilbride churches, a distance of around 4 miles and back again every Sunday. The graveyard at Kilbride is where traditionally, the chiefs of the Clan MacDougall were buried. It is still possible to read the gravestone of John MacDougall who had his land taken from him after the Jacobite rising of 1715, like the others who supported the risings.
Interestingly, Kilbride was also where a medieval school was situated, one of only about one hundred in the whole of Scotland at the time. Since King James IV introduced a law which meant all oldest sons of Scottish gentry (meaning families of the time with titles and land) had to attend school from the age of eight or nine it is likely that the sons of important people in Argyll would have gone to school there.
Into Victorian Era
The churches of Kilmore and Kilbride united in the early 17th century as the populations of both had declined due to more job opportunities in the growing town of Oban. Services were held in Kilmore church one Sunday and then Kilbride the next. Later, as the village of Oban grew in population the churches at Kilmore and Kilbride became very crowded. It was decided that a church be built in Oban to ease the pressure on the older churches, it took a long, long time before the church was built and so services would take place outside. Eventually, in 1821 ‘The Chapel of Ease’ was built where Glencruitten church is now. The people of Oban now had their own church and would not have to walk miles or stand out in the rain!
There is an interesting story about the bell of the chapel of Ease. Apparently it was made in Glasgow in 1786 and was supposed to go to Maryland, USA but the ship carrying the bell was wrecked near Mull and the bell was brought to Oban. It had a few former homes before coming to the church, it was used in the shipyard of Mr Stevenson and then later, it became the bell at Kilbride church where it was attached to a, presumably very large, tree, and rang to welcome the people to the service on Sunday. It was moved to Oban where it remained until the Chapel of Ease was demolished for the current church. Another interesting story is that in the church yard there was also a cutting from a willow tree that was taken from Napoleon’s grave on the remote island of St Helena by an Oban sailor.
The first minister in charge of the new church was a bit unfortunate for the people of Oban. It was a man called Rev. Alexander Beith who was an intolerant and difficult man to get along with. He did not think much of the Obanites and in his diary calls them ‘wicked, unbelieving ignorant men’. He complained of many things (such as getting a horse shoed on a Sunday) and offended many people. After being in Oban for two and a half years he quit and moved to Glasgow, interestingly he only stayed there for two and a half years before moving on once again. Perhaps he also found the Glaswegians to be wicked!
In 1843 there was a huge event in the history of the church, which is called the Disruption. About a third of all ministers walked out of the general assembly of the church in protest about political interference. In Oban, one of the ministers left along with many of the congregation. They formed the Free Church of Scotland and built a new church on the hill that is still used today. Also at this time in Oban the majority of people were Gaelic speaking and so church services were in Gaelic, as they had been for hundreds of years. However, this began to change and as the village of Oban grew much larger during Victorian times and more and more people were English speaking, the English speakers wanted the services to be in English. This led to the building of another new church for the English speaking congregation in Argyll Square. When the church was built in 1888, behind the memorial stone was placed a ‘time capsule’ containing copies of the Scotsman, The Herald and the three Oban newspapers of the time including The Oban Times as well as some coins from the time. The building was sold in the 1980’s and has now been converted into the tourist information office. However, it is hoped that the time capsule is still there!
War Time
The Second World War affected life in Oban and in the Church. You have probably heard of “black outs”, meaning everything had to be blacked out to prevent buildings being targets for the German planes. Thick black curtains were used on windows to not let any light escape and street lighting was not allowed. This meant that evening services in the churches had to take place in the afternoon so they wouldn’t be using the lights and also so people could see their way home. Without street lighting, lights from houses or a torch it would have been very dark and dangerous to walk home. This meant the only light was from the moon. Interestingly, the Women’s Guild used the church vestry for their meetings (it had blackout curtains) but only on moonlit nights so the women were able to see their way home. The Church hall was also used by the Red Cross and as a billet for soldiers.
Check the rest of our website to see how our history has helped shape how we are Christians today.