| Description | Council meeting, 30 August 1805
[Sederunt given]
The Council approved the report of the Perambulation of the Outer Marches between the County Lands and the Freedom Lands by Provost Leys; Baillies Farquharson, Galen, McCombie and Tower; Mr Hadden, Dean of Guild; Mr Thomson, Treasurer; Mr Donald, Shoremaster; Mr George Hogarth, Mr Alexander Gibbon and Deacon Hendry of the Council; the three Town Clerks; Duncan Davidson and James Hardie, advocates; Joseph Hogarth, Arthur Gibbon, James Young senior and James Young junior, John Young, William Pirie, Gilbert Shepherd and William Johnston, merchants; Alexander Gildawie, mason; Thomas Fletcher, engineer; and Robert Balmanno, auctioneer. [Report engrossed.] The report made the following remarks.
First, the Visitors recommended that Messrs George Mole & Company should open a door in the brick wall they had erected along the road from Clayhills to Ferryhill, to allow the marches to be visited.
Second, the Visitors directed Robert Whyte, one of the workmen on a new road being made through the muir above Mannofield to Countesswells, to intimate to John McDonald, contractor for the road, to secure saucer stone ten, opposite the Kirk of Banchory, which his labourers had undermined.
Third, the Visitors recommended that gaps be left in the dykes and hedges around march stone twenty-eight, situated on the north boundary of Borrowstown, near the march with Bogfairly and Easter Kinmundy, to allow the marches to be visited.
Fourth, the Visitors recommended that intimation be made to Sir William Johnston of Hillton to leave a gateway in his enclosure near the quarries, where march stone fifty-three is placed, to allow the marches to be visited.
Fifth, the Visitors directed Mr Gildawie, to re-erect march stone sixty-four, at the Bansticle Burn.
Sixth, the Visitors suggested that a plan of the Marches be executed.
(202v - 203v)
The Council agreed to the proposal by John Rae, late Tacksman of the Shore Dues and Ballast Lighters, to submit the following legal processes to arbitration: the process brought by the Shoremaster concerning the depreciation of the Ballast Lighters; and the processes brought by Messrs Harrison & Company of Sunderland and by Garden Farquharson & Company of Aberdeen, concerning the damage caused to the Henry of Sunderland by one of the Ballast Lighter's anchors. John Rae also proposed to submit claims against the Shoremaster for the cost of fitting out and employing another Ballast Lighter, and for the Shore and Harbour Dues and the Weigh House and Pack House Dues. (204r - 204v)
The Council granted the application from the Management Committee of the Aberdeenshire Canal Navigation, requesting permission to construct a waste weir at the south east corner of the canal basin at the Quay of Aberdeen, in accordance with a submitted sketch. (204v)
The Council remitted to the magistrates, or any three of them, the petition from William Brand, John Main, Andrew Baxter and William Smith, pilots in Footdee, requesting that the Council build new houses for them near to the New Pier, as their existing houses were over-rented, uninhabitable and, being in the westermost part of Footdee, were inconvenient for seeing vessels coming into the Bay. (204v - 205r)
The Council approved the report of the committee appointed to consider the application from Alexander Fraser, merchant, to align his counting house and warehouse with other houses on the Quay. The report stated no objections to the building being aligned with the houses to the east, belonging to Messrs John Coutts and Alexander Gibbon, shipmasters; the report recommended that the feu duties of the ground at the front of the warehouse, formerly let to Alexander Aberdeen, and of the ground required to extend the building, be sold to Mr Fraser for £50; and the report also recommended that the office used by the Tacksman of the Shore and Harbour Dues be demolished and re-built, at Mr Fraser's expense, at the edge of the Quay, nearly opposite the house belonging to William Knox, merchant, in order to allow Mr Fraser's house to be built in a straight line to the street. (205r - 205v)
The Council appointed John Taylor, tailor, Burgess, to the office of Principal Warden of the Churches of Aberdeen, made vacant by the death of James Black, for the usual salary, fees and emoluments. (206r)
The Council remitted to the magistrates, or any three of them, the application from Rev Dr James Shirrefs, requesting that the line of his proposed enclosure on the road to Countesswells, be inspected before the meeting of the Commutation Road Trustees on 12 September 1805. (206r)
The Provost laid before the Council a copy of the Acts and minutes of the General Convention of Royal Burghs held at Edinburgh in July 1805, which approved the tax roll, with minor alterations to the taxation of Forfar and Brechin, made at the meeting of the Annual Conventional Committee in November 1804. ( The result of the Committee meeting was reported in the Act of Council of 6 December 1804.) (206r - 206v) |