Dundurn Churchyard is located east of St Fillians, in the attractive River Earn valley, close to the foot of the Pictish Hill Fort. It contains the ruin of the 17th-century Stewart of Ardvorlich Mausoleum, a local aristocratic family whose ancestral home is nearby at the foot of Ben Vorlich. Mary Stewart’s remains are also among those resting in the churchyard.
Mary died of influenza and pneumonia on November 26th 1918, at Marshall Meadows, Berwick upon Tweed, aged twenty-one. She is commemorated on a familial headstone adorned with the family crest within the Mausoleum shell. The headstone is faded but still legible.
Mary was born on April 30th 1897 (possibly in London), the second child of Captain William Stewart 13th of Ardvorlich and Sarah Lilly Mary (nee McLaren). On July 2nd, Mary was baptised at All Souls Church Marylebone. The Stewart family resided on Harley Street at this time. By 1901, they had relocated to Dundee. When her younger sister Marjory arrived the following year, the family lived at their ancestral home at Ardvorlich. William Stewart, who served in the 10th Bengal Lancers, rose to Major.
I imagine that Mary and her family would have lived the relatively comfortable life of a (minor) aristocratic family. When the 1911 Census was taken, Mary was not living at Ardvorlich. At age fourteen, she was likely completing her education outside South Perthshire.
Class and status did not derail war-related tragedy. The Stewarts of Ardvorlich were no exception. On September 26th 1916, Mary’s elder brother William Jr fell at the infamous Battle of the Somme. The loss of their eldest son and heir apparent would have been devasting for William Sr and Sarah. The former died in Morningside, Edinburgh, on June 18th 1918, from heart disease, aged fifty-eight. After he retired from the Army, he served as the governor of the former Carlton Prison. Tragically, Sarah would suffer another loss a mere five months later with Mary’s death.
Mary’s obituary was published in the Strathearn Herald on November 30th; her passing was acknowledged as “sudden”, which was quite typical in Spanish flu-related fatalities.
Sarah survived her husband and daughter by fourteen years. She died on July 30th 1933, aged sixty-nine.
Sources: Ancestry, British Newspaper Archive, Scotland’s People
Broken Columns 