More on Old Deer

Abridged from Pratt

Besides the parish church, there is an Episcopal church, erected in 1850, on ground granted by Mr Russell of Aden, who with Mrs Russell, was otherwise a large contributor to the building. It is in the early English style, beautiful in its general features, and, on the whole, correct in the details.

At less than a quarter of a mile east of the village, and on the opposite side of the stream is Aden House (Russell), [Now ruined] the ancient Alneden, from a barony of that name, an elegant and commodious mansion, built in a regular square, the centre of which is a billiard-room or library of noble dimensions and beautiful design. The west front is chaste and classical. The grounds, possessing great natural capabilities, have been improved to the uttermost . . .

Pitfour House (Admiral Ferguson) is about a mile north of the village. The house [now completely demolished] and grounds are on a large scale, the former having from time to time received considerable additions. The grounds are strikingly fine, containing a lake of forty or fifty acres in extent, shrubberies, ornamental flower gardens, carriage-drives, and winding footpaths, several jets d'eau, and a minature model of the temple of Theseus.

The remains of Aden House and its policies have been taken over by Aberdeenshire Council and have been sensitively redeveloped into a fine country park. An outstanding feature of the park is a splendid semicircular range of farm-buildings and accommodation, decorated with a fine Temple of the Winds on its central block.]

Aden and Pitfour, as they were, are depicted in a set of scans taken from old postcards which record the grandeur of country houses in Buchan in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

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