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Monument Inscription
IN MEMORY OF
THOMAS BALLANTINE
CRAIGEND,
DIED 29TH DECEMBER 1891
AGED 61 YEARS.
HIS WIFE
MARGARET CRAWFORD
DIED 3RD OCTOBER 1924
IN HER 89TH YEAR
Family History
Thomas Ballantine who is commemorated on this monument came from a farming family whose origins lay in the parish of East Kilbride. His father George was responsible for moving the family to the Mearns where he took occupancy of Holm Farm. Two of George’s sons, James and Thomas, were to follow in their father’s footsteps by becoming farmers. James elected to remain at Holm Farm where he took over its management as his parents grew older.
Thomas sought independence by moving into the nearby farm of Craigend. His sister Christina joined him there as housekeeper. With the assistance of a ploughman and a farm servant Thomas set about turning the seventy acre farm into a profitable enterprise. Succeeding in this aim he married Margaret Crawford from East Kilbride, suggesting that the family connection with that area remained strong. The couple had only one child, a daughter named Janet who was born in 1863. She married Alexander Harvie of Shieldhill Farm in 1887.
As a young girl, Janet walked twice daily the miles between the farm and the Parish School at Mearnskirk. On Sundays she walked the same route to church, but on entering the glebe she washed her feet in the burn before putting on her Sunday shoes and stockings, prior to attending the service. After the morning service she sat in the glebe and ate her bannocks and cheese, while awaiting the second service of the day.
Craigend Farm was situated at the northern extremity of Mearns Parish near to the Stewarton Road at Patterton. The land though hilly in nature was nonetheless fertile and was able to supply its owners with a reasonable living. The near proximity to the developing industrial village of Thornliebank was undoubtedly an asset to the profitability of the farm and its produce.
On Thomas’s death in 1891 the farm passed out of the hands of the family. Margaret Crawford moved to Studio Road in Giffnock. She later moved to Langbank Cottage in Newton Mearns to be near her daughter Janet who with her husband Alexander Harvie lived in nearby Shieldhill Farm.
Margaret died in Langbank Cottage in 1924, having outlived her husband Thomas by nearly thirty-three years.