posted 07-05-2003 08:06 PM
Try:Relationship between village and castle (4th Duke Gordon didn't like it nearby): http://www.planlocal.com/about/fochabers.asp
http://www.fochabers-heritage.org.uk/main/Fochabers.htm
"'desirous to remove the present Town or Village of Fochabers upon account of it's inconvenient nearness to Gordon Castle', and at the beginning of 1776 he took steps to shift its inhabitants to a new site."
Commemorated by Burns: http://www.robertburns.org/encyclopedia/GordonCastle.398.shtml
"Wildly here, without control
Nature reigns and rules the whole;
In that sober pensive mood,
Dearest to the feeling soul,
She plants the forest, pours the flood,
Life's poor day I'll musing rave
And find at night a sheltering cave,
Where waters flow and wild woods wave,
By bonie Castle Gordon."
Labourer's wages: http://www.ex.ac.uk/~ajgibson/scotdata/wages/gordon
official Castle info: http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/features/featurefirst5160.html
http://www.geo.ed.ac.uk/scotgaz/features/featuredetails5160.html
About the Duke: http://www.electricscotland.com/webclans/earldoms/chapter3s17.htm
Levan