247 April 2015 - Gryffe Advertizer
The Advertizer - Your local community magazine to the Gryffe area.
The Advertizer - Your local community magazine to the Gryffe area.
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World Book Night comes to<br />
Bridge of Weir<br />
Everything changes when we read.<br />
Your local World Book Night event will take place at Amaretto<br />
Restaurant and Pizzeria, 60 Main Street, Bridge of Weir, PA11 3AB<br />
on Thursday 23 <strong>April</strong>, starting at 7.30pm.<br />
The guest speaker will be poet Jim Carruth, who will be reading some of his<br />
poetry.<br />
• Free book supplied by the Reading Agency from this year’s World Book<br />
Night list – 3 titles to choose from.<br />
• Book Swap – bring along an ‘old read’ to swap for a great ‘new read’ for<br />
a small donation.<br />
• Quiz – test your literary knowledge in our book quiz<br />
• Raffle – all proceeds of the raffle and swap go to outstanding local<br />
charity Quarriers<br />
If you have any spare audio books that you could donate to Quarriers’ literacy<br />
projects, please bring them along to Amaretto on World Book Night.<br />
Learn more about the Reading Agency and World Book Night at www.<br />
worldbooknight.org.<br />
St Mary’s Lecture <strong>2015</strong><br />
Tuesday 21 <strong>April</strong> at 7pm<br />
Alastair McIntosh, Honorary Senior Research Fellow in the College of Social<br />
Sciences at the University of Glasgow and a Research Fellow at the School<br />
of Divinity (New<br />
College) in the<br />
University of<br />
Edinburgh will<br />
speak on A Virginity<br />
Most Subversive for<br />
Our Times.<br />
To be followed by<br />
refreshments, and<br />
time to talk to our<br />
lecturer. If you need<br />
further information,<br />
please call Gill<br />
Reynolds on 01505<br />
842629.<br />
Photo - C Médiathèque Lafarge - Alain Le Breton<br />
Horsewood Road, Bridge of Weir<br />
by Fiona McEwan from PCPC<br />
bishopton, langbank<br />
& bridge of weir<br />
.....................................................<br />
Memorial - Bridge of Weir &<br />
the First World War<br />
100 years ago this month – <strong>April</strong> 1915<br />
Neil Watson Macdonald, 5th Canadian<br />
(Royal Highlanders)<br />
<strong>April</strong> was to see the fifth addition to Bridge of Weir’s<br />
war dead. Neil Watson Macdonald was born in<br />
1881 in Leeds, where his father John, originally<br />
from Bowmore, ran the Clarendon Hotel, and where<br />
Neil was to spend his formative years. In the early<br />
1890’s, the family returned to Scotland and John<br />
took over the “Wheat Sheaf” Inn, Burngill, Bridge<br />
of Weir. Neil was still of school age and joined the<br />
local Boys Brigade.<br />
By 1901, he was a plumber’s apprentice in lodgings<br />
in Bowmore, working the family connections. By<br />
1912 his parents had retired to Pollokshields and<br />
Neil decided to follow the exciting prospect of a new life in Canada. When<br />
Britain declared war, a call for a Canadian Expeditionary Force was impressively<br />
supported by volunteers and by early October 1914 the first contingent of<br />
33,000 Canadians, including Neil, had arrived for training in England.<br />
The 1st Canadian Division arrived in France on 16th February 1915 and was<br />
assigned to the front line. On the morning of 22nd <strong>April</strong> they relieved the French<br />
11th Division holding 4,500 yards of the Ypres Salient. That evening would mark<br />
the start of a series of German offensives which, according to the Reichsarchiv,<br />
“had their origin solely in the desire to try the new weapon, gas, thoroughly at<br />
the front.”<br />
At 5pm, the Germans released the valves on 5730 cylinders of chlorine gas<br />
which formed a green cloud moving at 5 miles an hour directly into a French<br />
Algerian detachment who were forced back in panic, requiring the Canadians<br />
to hold the breach. On the early hours of the 24th <strong>April</strong> the Canadian line was<br />
subjected to a pounding barrage of German artillery. Another gas cloud was<br />
released at 4 am. At 8.30am, in a lull in the bombardment, Neil’s battalion was<br />
ordered back to the Gravenstafel Ridge.<br />
By the end of the offensive, Ypres had been held but the Canadians had lost<br />
over 6,000 men, a third of their strength, in only 48 hours.<br />
Neil was probably a victim of that artillery bombardment on the morning of the<br />
24th <strong>April</strong>. His body was never found. He was 34.<br />
Read more about Neil’s life and untimely death at http://www.<br />
bridgeofweirmemorial.co.uk/index.html<br />
Gordon Masterton<br />
St Mary’s Church<br />
We have a regular cycle of prayer for those who live and work in Bridge of<br />
Weir. The dates of prayers for local roads are as follows: 5th <strong>April</strong>, Rosemount<br />
Lane. 12th <strong>April</strong>, Shillingworth Place. 19th <strong>April</strong>, Southbrae Avenue. 26th<br />
<strong>April</strong>, Southview Court. For further information, to ask for special prayers, or in<br />
pastoral emergency, please call the Rector on 01475 705378.<br />
St Mary’s Church, Scottish Episcopal Church. Delighting to praise God; Showing<br />
Christ’s love; Growing in faith. Services Sundays at 10am.
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