St John’s Kirk

St John’s Kirk War Memorials

Robert Lorimer carried out a restoration to transform the Kirk into the War Memorial to the dead of Perth and Perthshire following the Great War 1914 – 1918. In addition to the concept of the whole building being a War Memorial, within the church are a series of individual plaques to specific regiments and groupings. The Parachute Regiment The Burma Star Association The Royal Army Service Corps. The Black Watch in the Boer War Members of the Congregation of St. John’s A shrine to all from Perth and County who fell in the two World Wars. The Scottish Area Women’s…

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21/10/2023

War Memorials

Association of Perth Veterans War Memorial

Perth's most recent war memorial is in St John Street at the east end of St Johns Kirk. It was erected by the Association of Perth Veterans (APV) during 2020 and dedicated on June 26, 2021 after delays due to the Covid-19 pandemic. “The APV was formed in 2018 as a pressure group to ensure that those men and women who served in the forces from the Perth area, as well as those who gave their lives for our country – and the memorials erected to honour them – aren’t forgotten,” retired Colonel Bert Macrae, association secretary, explained to the…

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21/10/2023

1000-1603 AD / Religious

On the East Wall in St John Street is a plaque recording that King David granted the Church of St. John the Baptist in Perth to Dunfermline Abbey in 1126 under whose auspices Perth fell at that time. In 2020 the Association of Perth Veterans War Memorial was placed in front of this plaque. Outside the Kirk are two modern information boards. Earlier versions pictured here were initiated and funded by Perth Partnership, but these were replaced in 2021 by Panels 7 and 8 of the new Perth Medieval Trail created by Perth and Kinross Heritage Trust in conjunction with…

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16/10/2023

Religious

St Ann’s Lane and Chapel

A small green plaque at the South Street entrance to St. Anne’s Lane which runs north to St John’s Kirk tells the history of this ancient Kirk Vennel. It passed in part through the medieval graveyard next to the Chapel of St. Ann, which held a number of altars dedicated to the Mother of the Virgin. The chapel acted as a hospital for travellers and the poor. The chapel was in existence in 1514 when prayers were said every Tuesday for the soul of James IV who fell at Flodden the previous year. (Marshall T. H., The History of Perth:…

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07/10/2023

1000-1603 AD / 1603-1774 AD / Education

Former Perth Grammar School

The modern Perth Grammar School in Muirton has existed since 1971 but was not the first school to bear that name. A plaque high on the north side of South Street at its junction with Princes Street outlines a small part of the history of the original Perth Grammar School. The first recorded evidence of the school is in a charter of 1150. Robert, Bishop of St. Andrews together with a number of his successors confirm the presence of the school as part of the organisation of the church. By 1560 the Town Council, together with the reformed church had…

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07/10/2023