St Margaret of Scotland, Aberdeen

The Gallowgate was one of the poorer areas of Aberdeen and in the mid-19th century consisted of a large area of slums. St Margaret's was founded in 1867 as a mission church by Father John Comper, one of the first followers in Scotland of the Oxford Movement. Comper was at the time rector of St John's, Aberdeen's oldest Anglican congregation. Comper felt that the poorer areas of Aberdeen were not being reached by the Church and felt obliged to respond, firstly in 1863 by founding a convent of the Society of Saint Margaret on the Spital and then the Gallowgate church. The original church was a room rented by Comper on the Gallowgate. By 1870, a joint chapel-school had been consecrated and…