Huntingtower and Ruthvenfield

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The clock tower at Huntingtower
The clock tower at Huntingtower

Huntingtower and Ruthvenfield, a village of Perthshire, Scotland, on the Almond, 3 miles northwest of Perth, and within 1 mile of Almondbank station on the Caledonian railway. Pop. (1901) 459.

Bleaching, the chief industry, dates from 1774, when the bleaching-field was formed. By means of an old aqueduct, said to have been built by the Romans, it was provided with water from the Almond, the properties of which render it specially suited for bleaching.

Huntingtower (originally Ruthven) Castle, a once formidable structure, was the scene of the Raid of Ruthven (pron. Rivven), when the Protestant lords, headed by William, 4th Lord Ruthven and 1st earl of Gowrie (1441-1584), kidnapped the boy-king James VI, on August 22, 1582. The earl's sons were slain in the attempt (known as the Gowrie conspiracy) to capture James VI (1600), consequent on which the Scots parliament ordered the name of Ruthven to be abolished, and the barony to be known in future as Huntingtower.

This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.