3-074-738 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Statue of James [sic] Tannahill, the poet, at Paisley, 1883. Scottish lyrical poet Robert Tannahill (1754-1810), known as the 'Weaver Poet', wrote poetry in English and lyrics in Scots in the wake of Robert Burns. He was '...a native of Paisley, and a weaver, is not forgotten in his own country...Paisley, it appears, has not yet, with all the bustling industry of that thriving seat of trade and manufactures, become insensible to the delights of Tannahill's poetry. At the centenary festival of his birth, in 1874, a series of annual concerts, for the singing of his songs, was set on foot, by which a fund of £800 was raised, and two years ago they opened a public subscription for a monument of Tannahill. A bronze statue, the work of Mr. D. W. Stevenson, sculptor, of Edinburgh, A.R.S.A., has been erected on a pedestal of red Aberdeen granite, at the border of the Abbey Churchyard, in front of the "George A. Clark Townhall." We give an Illustration of this monument, which was unveiled, on the 20th October, by Mr. W. Peattie, Chairman of the Tannahill Anniversary Committee'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.