Scone & St Martins Parish Church - Perth & Kinross, Scotland - Bell Towers on Waymarking.com

A Free Church was built on this site in the small town of Scone (pronounced scoon) a couple of miles to the north-east of the Scottish city of Perth in 1840. It was replaced by the current building in 1886-87, built in a gothic style in local sandstone to a design by Sydney Mitchell & Wilson, after being gifted by Miss M. Goodman of Balformo.

The church has undergone various changes in name since then, with many unions, including in 1900 with the United Presbyterian Church, when it became known as the Abbey United Free Church. In 1929 it merged with the Church of Scotland to become the Abbey Parish Church and then merged with the West Church in 1952. The final union came in 1980 with the church in the village of St Martins.

The church was built in rock-faced red Corsehill sandstone with a slated roof and is aligned from north-west to south-east to the west of a bend in the A94 road as it heads through the centre of town. The most prominent feature is the bell tower with its distinctive crowstepped top on the eastern side of the church nearest the road.

The four-stage tower features throughout hood moulded windows and also moulding over the large pointed-arch entrance at the towers foot. The second stage features a large window with three lancets and tracery. The third stage has three rectangular slit windows on the north and east faces. The fourth stage has a pair of louvred lancets openings and a parapet crenellated with hit or miss corbels, with water chutes on the corners. The tower is topped by a crowstepped caphouse with narrow lancets in the gables. A semi-octagonal stair tower is on the south side.

Inside are eight tubular bells ranging from 1.4m to 2.3m, which are by Messrs Harrington, Latham & Co. of Coventry, installed in 1894.