BCD SPECIAL REPORT ON HISTORIC CHURCHES 31st ANNUAL EDITION 19 cement repairs to the stonework were removed and a close stone match was identified, so that the stone indented work looks original. Balustrading around the base had to be remade. Despite examining old photographs from the Washington Wilson Collection, there was no evidence of what the original gate looked like. However, FoGN’s archivist and cast-iron expert designed a new gate inspired by others in the city that were contemporary with the mausoleum. CURRENT PROJECTS Today, the charity’s focus is the conservation and restoration of the Monteath Mausoleum, one of the most iconic monuments on Glasgow’s skyline, designed by architect David Cousins in 1842. Over £83k has been raised to date through tour donations and grant applications which will cover repairs to the two sections of the roof, the installation of replacement leaded glass in the lantern, and work to restore the original door. This work will make it wind and watertight and the pigeon-infested interior has now been cleaned. Since then a survey by a structural engineer has been carried out, funded by FoGN. The survey found that ‘although the building has no major structural problems, the decay of the historic fabric is extensive and alarming.’ FoGN has applied for many grants over nearly 20 years, among the most recent during the Covid lockdown when the use of the Necropolis as an inspiring, peaceful contemplative place illustrated how much the Glasgow Necropolis means to Glaswegians. As a tribute to the NHS, it applied for grant funds to restore the three monuments to the Nurses from Glasgow Royal Infirmary which is situated across the road from the Glasgow Necropolis. The first of these memorials is from the end of the 19th century and commemorates young nurses who died from infectious diseases caught while caring for their patients. KEEPING RECORDS One of the most important aspects of FoGN’s work is to keep an accurate record of what there is and to find out, where possible, what has been lost. All aspects of the monuments are being recorded. A Photographic and Stone Condition Survey (PSCS) is two thirds complete. The burial registers are being indexed and all of the transcriptions of the currently visible inscriptions have been made. Further re-erection of stones will be commencing soon, which will reveal more inscriptions. To that end, its members have attended workshops by Glasgow School of Art Digital Studios to learn how reflectance transformation imaging can be used to read the faint inscriptions, and Historic Environment Scotland have carried out an image laser survey scan of the Monteath Mausoleum. As much film and as many photographs as possible are being collated from different collections and photographers. One member of the committee has collected information on all the missing, mainly bronze, portraits and collated all the names of the architects and stone masons involved in past work at the Glasgow Necropolis. This information is all now with our archivist and researcher. Every means possible is used to ensure that the charity has all the information it can gather. NATURE’S ROLE The built environment of the Necropolis may be of the most obvious interest to visitors. However, the landscape is also important and it has similarly suffered from decades of neglect. From the beginning, FoGN has been aware of the landscape’s greenspaces, some unused for burials and some with unmarked graves. These ‘hidden’ burials are considered to be as important as the built environment and continue to be investigated. In our first newsletter in 2006, the Friends of Glasgow Necropolis proposed wildflower meadows and borders for biodiversity on greenspace and unmarked grave areas in the Glasgow Necropolis. Compartment Tertius, which is not a burial site, was the obvious choice and ideas were based round a memorial garden. The area had been used for storing displaced monuments and stone fragments, and is now very overgrown. However, the presence of Japanese knotweed prevented this from happening until treated. FoGN therefore undertook to improve an adjacent plot, part of Compartment Secundus, again not a burial site. With assistance from GCC and along with two local schools and corporate volunteers, FoGN members turf-lifted manually and planted seed and plug plants. Further development here was a ‘Green Man’ sculpture, created by a local sculptor and GSA tutor. Plans for the development of a memorial garden in Compartment Tertius will continue once the knotweed and other invasive species have been eradicated, and once the displaced memorials have been recorded with the assistance of Glasgow University archaeology students funded by FoGN. In 2019, FoGN was successful in obtaining an HLF Grant for its First World War Project. That included research into the 160 men and one woman commemorated here and included archaeology on five areas of unmarked graves: Eta, 2 areas of Iota, Theta and the area now named Zeta. Research was done on these areas and the idea of a wildflower border as opposed to a meadow was agreed, so as not to disturb the burial sites. Eta was chosen first as the results and findings in that area seemed more specific and the likely area of the burials could be identified. In 2021/2, GCC funding enabled FoGN to begin the marking of unmarked graves in Compartment Eta and it produced a successful wildflower Romanesque-style ‘beak head’ mouldings on the Monteath Mausoleum
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