Edinburgh - Dundas Street

[ainslie]

Can anyone please tell a Sassenach whether there was a kirk (Presbyterian) in Dundas Street in 1825, and if so, is it still there?.  A relative is supposed to have been married there.
A

[Little Nell]

Dundas Street runs from Great King Street to Queen Street.  There is no kirk on the street and none was marked on the 1847 map.  I certainly can't recall any building which might once have been a kirk.

The closest one I know is St Stephen's at the bottom of St Vincent Street.  There was an episcopal chapel close by.

Nell

[ainslie]

Thank you, Nell. 
The wedding in question may be one of those  celebrated twice - once in Fife at the groom's kirk - he was a minister -and again in Edinburgh.
A

[Rockford]

Hi A,

It might also be the case that the couple were married at an address in Dundas Street, rather than there being any church service.  This appears from my own family to have been very common in Scotland, where couples tended to be married at the bride's residence.

I have loads of presbyterian ancestors/relations who were married by ministers at private addresses.  Rarely, someone was married in the manse and it seems that only relatively recently that people started getting married in the church itself.

It might depend on the 'status' of the couple though - mine were all farm servants and miners!

Best wishes

Rockford

[Henry7]

As Little Nell says, Dundas Street ran north between Queen Street and Great King Street.  To its first crossing, at Heriot Row and Abercromby Place, it ran between private gardens which have never been built on. Between there and Gt King St there are two unbroken blocks of tenements on each side of Dundas St, built c1800-1820, all to the same general design and more or less unaltered today. None of these four blocks has anything that looks in any way like a church.

If you come north to explore, or look at modern street plans, you might see that Dundas Street continues north of Great King Street, and that there are possible church sites there.  Don't be misled!  This extended part of the street was called Pitt Street until around 1950. 

So you can confine your search to the part south of Gt King Street. 

Do you have the house number in Dundas St?  I could nip out and have a look; I live nearby.   

[ainslie]

Thanks to all responders.  Having invested in some of Scotland's People, it becomes more of a puzzle.  The register in Fife (where the groom was minister) records that the banns were duly published, and the couple were married in Edinburgh on 2nd February [1825].  The Edinburgh parish register entry records their marriage as having been on 23 January "3 pro, no objection".  I take this to mean 3 proclamations of banns.
The bride was shown in the Kilrenny register as residing in Edinburgh.
No number in Dundas Street is shown in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, where I first found the marriage, or in either register entry.
In the light of what you kind people have said, I conclude that the marriage was at the bride's residence, and not the kirk.
A

[Hibee]

Do you know what denomination the service was?  I have seen United Free Church weddings apparently conducted at the home of the minister.

Hibee

[ainslie]

Hibee
The groom was a minster of the Church of Scotland - Presbyterian, and his bride was a daughter of his (deceased) predecessor at Kilrenny, Fife.
A

[rossko57]

Decades later ... and no great contribution. I have a newspaper report of a marriage -

newspaper Edinburgh Evening News issue 19 Mar 1928
MARRIAGE.
FREE - DICKSON. - At the Dundas Rooms, on 17th March, by the Rev. R. W. Leekie, Davidson's Mains, VINCENT F. FREE, son of Mr and Mrs FREDERICK FREE, 19 The Village, Cramond, to ANNIE, oldest daughter of the late ROBERT DICKSON, Milwaukee, U.S.A., and Mrs Dickson, 81, Morrison Street, Edinburgh


So "Dundas Rooms" looks like a venue.  I do not think Dundas Castle would be possible (unlike nowadays), nor Dundas House (a bank at this time).  So I'm guessing an establishment (like a supper rooms) in Dundas Street, which seems to tally with earlier messages.